Stacy Miller, Executive Director of Farmers Market Coalition kicks off National Farmers Market week in Oregon.
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Farmers Market Coalition visits Oregon City Farmers Market to kick off FM week
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Where’s Dar now?
Off to Portland Oregon
I travel this evening to Ecotopia (read the description of the area in the book “The Nine Nations of North America”) to work with my colleagues at the Community Food Security Coalition (CFSC), and as a bonus, to meet up with the fine folks from Farmers Market Coalition (FMC) who will be also be traveling to the area.
As many probably know, I serve as a board member of CFSC. It is an amazing organization that puts on the best food conferences and its crackerjack staff has a myriad of projects going to support many different organizations, like FMC and their Learning Circle project (more on that later) that I will be able to work on as well.
Check out both of their websites:
Pictures and updates from the Renewable Region over the next few days…
Vermont Enhancing Farmers Markets with Evaluation Tools
What: Enhancing Farmers’ Markets with Evaluation Tools
When: Monday June 20. 11 am – 2 pm
Where: Vermont Agency of Agriculture Conference Room, 116 State Street, Montpelier, VT
Note: We will provide coffee, tea, and light refreshments
Led by Market Trainer/Researcher Darlene Wolnik, sponsored by NOFA-VT
what’s next?
If you came to the blog because of an email I sent out, then you probably know me as the past director of the marketshare program at marketumbrella.org, or as the market manager at Crescent City Farmers Market, or as the White Boot Brigade staff or the Festivus, The Holiday Market For The Rest Of Us manager or the Go Fish on Film “producer.” Now, you’ll know me as an independent organizer, consulting with many market organizations throughout the US.
I have worn many hats in my 9.5 years with the wonderful marketumbrella.org. I enjoyed every minute of my work there and believe our relationship is just moving to a new definition.
But why?
It has been my belief for some time that we (the market community) need to continue to be as nimble and as brave as the generation of market founders that started this movement were, back in the 1970s-1990s. They did the impossible sometimes, the slightly difficult often, and the nutty more often than they would like to admit.
But what they did do was to build a wide foundation. They allowed a lot of new ideas to come together under one tent (pardon my market analogy) and kept innovating as needed. Some of those folks are still around running markets:
Ann Yonkers and Bernie Prince in DC
Donita Anderson in Cleveland OH
Leslie Schaller in Athens OH
Richard McCarthy in New Orleans LA
Chris Curtis in Seattle LA
Pompea Smith in Los Angeles CA
Just to name a few. I am sure there are many more that I am forgetting. Or don’t even know. Folks that are still around and deserve your appreciation and if you do get a chance to sit and pick their brain, take it.
But many others have moved on to other work or initiatives, leaving their markets in good hands they hoped. So this is our question: what is the legacy for those of us in the second and third generations of market organizers and market trainers?
I hope it’s to understand how markets sit within the larger alternative food system, within the larger public space movement, how they support newer markets and other initiatives. I hope it’s to continue to be brave and add difficult ideas to our markets and to welcome new people every week. I hope it’s to change the way we ALL live but with dignity and fun. And it better be to keep on honoring the farmer, the fisher, the harvester, the forager, the entrepreneur. They are our partner in this and yet are left out of the decision-making too often.
This is one of the reasons I am now on my own. I want to build this as a movement and to do that, we need to move even faster to connect to more ideas and to share more skills and to make some decisions about what we believe in, what we stand for in the public market movement. My old employer marketumbrella.org, will be there at the forefront with me, this I know. Farmers Market Coalition will be there too. Community Food Security Coalition, Food and Water Watch, National Campaign for Sustainable Agriculture, the SAWGs, Federation of Southern Cooperatives, ALBA, Native American Farmers Associations, Food Secure Canada, Projects for Public Spaces, APA, APHA… again to name just a few of the many, will be there too.
Share your stories here, and call on me if I can help you.
Dar Wolnik
dar wolnik at gmail
My favorite place to be- among my peers. Well, if there was a market around us, that would be best...Sarah Blacklin Mkt Mgr Carrboro NC, Cliff Slade VA farmer, Bernie Prince Co-Director Fresh Farms DC, Darlene Wolnik, Mike McCreary Mkt Mgr Asheville NC, Peter Marks Director Appalachian Sustainable Agriculture Project, Erin Kauffman Mkt Mgr Durham NC, Matt Kurlanski of Wallace Center, Stacy Miller Executive Director FMC.
Food policy-stage center.
As the attendance at Community Food Security Coalition’s (CFSC) conference showed, the healthy/regional food movement is gaining maturity and strength.
Over 600 attendees from every part of the U.S. and Canada came together to discuss, to see Portland’s leadership and to network. (I can personally attest to the networking ability of regional food system people.)
The Coalition always manages lively face to face opportunities and backs it up with good leadership in the sessions themselves. Planners, public health professionals, farmers, market organizers, grassroots activists, city officials were all in attendance.
They also tried to use technology to get real time voting in the Friday plenary which had some bugs (Laurel MacMillan CFSC staff, was a trouper on stage with amazing aplomb and humor to keep it going and people engaged, paired with local leader/market trainer Suzanne Briggs up there with Laurel, typing madly) but since everyone was in good humor after a pleasant breakfast, all was fine by mid-morning.
From Vancouver’s Food Charter poster to the free pear savers (those spun their own debate) to the lively networking sessions (the South/Southeast session was almost drowned out by an insurance conference play acting in the next conference space but valiantly held their space) there was plenty to learn, see and hear. As we know the 2012 Farm Bill is the focus of every food system and CFSC did an admirable job capturing the breadth of issues on the table and tactics that will be needed. The draft of priorities outlined by CFSC included:
Defend and expand Community Food Projects and Farmers Market Promotion Program
Secure support for the infrastructure needed for local and regional food systems.
Increase access to federal nutrition programs participants to food system points of entry.
Work on urban-rural linkages across existing programs.
Require USDA to streamline SNAP redemption and technology.
Promote incentives for fruit and vegetable purchases for federal nutrition program participants.
Call for a USDA report and guidance document on how local government regulations can support access to healthy foods.
Incorporate more local product into DoD Fresh and USDA Foods.
Institutionalize the tracking and evaluation of Farm to School programs.
Of course, those were presented as draft priorities so that CFSC Policy Director Kathy Mulvey and Associate Policy Director Megan Lott can continue to evolve the platform based on the membership needs of CFSC. They were very active throughout the conference as they have been in the listening sessions they have held throughout the year.
As a board member of the Coalition, I was very proud of the program staff and the work done to make the conference happen. As always, Emily Becker our conference planner (and I am sure Aleta and Erika as support) hit another home run for the movement. Doubletree Hotel was a nice location with food sourced locally.
Portland Food Policy Conference and Market visit
I’ll upload some content from the CFSC Food Policy Conference attendees later this week; it was a great conference with loads of good ideas flowing. I am sure CFSC will release some data from the sessions, especially from the voting session.
Portland hosted beautifully; the regional food community was gracious and inspiring.
– City 145.4 sq mi (376.5 km2)
– Land 134.3 sq mi (347.9 km2)
– Water 11.1 sq mi (28.6 km2)
Elevation 50 ft (15.2 m)
Population (2010)
– City 583,776
– Density 4,288.38/sq mi (1,655.31/km2)
– Metro 2,226,009
Seating at Portland Saturday Market
Portland Saturday Market display
CFSC Food Policy Conf-South/Southeast Networking Session
States in South/Southeast networking session at CFSC’s Food Policy Conf
Willamette River
Mkt Mgr tent-Portland
Display-Portland Mkt
Bamboo stand at Portland Market
Map of Portland Farmers Markets
Pink Umbrella-Portland vendor
Like many markets, Portland ensures they leave only memories for their hosts.
Food Policy Conference
Although this post is unlikely to encourage you to register and attend the Community Food Security Coalition’s Food Policy conference at this very last minute, it might. And of course, it might just get you to the CFSC’s fall conference that will be held in Oakland CA this year.
In any case, if you are in driving or biking distance of Portland, do your best to attend and or to start to connect to your peers working on policy issues. Even if you simply download the workshop list and do your best to follow or reach out to the speakers and conveners at a later date, you’ll be doing your organization a world of good.
Nashville food system work
Went to the 2011 Food Summit in Nashville this weekend, convened by Community Food Advocates. I drove there from New Orleans (just about the same amount of time to drive as to fly-about 9 hours each way) and so I was able to view some of the damage from the tornado destruction and to hear from folks along the way about the flooding of Memphis from the Mississippi and its tributaries.
The one day summit is the follow up from their 2008 Summit and shows just how much can be done in less than 3 years in one area. Over 300 people registered for this event and the breadth of the projects represented was impressive.
What is working is the deep commitment to social justice issues, such as racial equity and cultural barriers. The universities are involved, the neighborhood activists are involved and the food system fulcrums that already existed (like the Nashville Farmers Market) are there.
I am looking through their handout book “From Charity to Justice” which outlines the food insecurity in the Nashville area. Seems like a textbook example of using Mark Winne and CFSC’s Food Policy training, which means they will be successful.
I think the highlight for me was the taped video message from Mark to the Nashville folks (who he clearly has worked closely with):
“For God’s sake, don’t blow it.”
Community Food Advocates
Nashville Food Summit May 7, 2011
Community Food Advocates, in partnership with the Nashville Food Policy Council, will host Food Summit 2011 at the Millennium Maxwell House Hotel on May 7th, 2011 from 8:30 am to 3:00 pm. The Summit will be a gathering of stakeholders – from farm to fork – across Nashville’s diverse food system.
“Food Summit 2011 – Growing an Agenda for Change” will celebrate and highlight food systems accomplishments in Nashville, feature “best practices” from national experts, equip participants with advocacy and change-making skills, and help set an agenda for change for the future.
Community Food Advocates is a non-profit organization in Nashville dedicated to the notion that all members of our community should have access to food grown in a way that promotes the health of people, planet and community. Community Food Advocates works with community residents, policy makers and businesses to provide education about food assistance programs, advocate for policies that ensure equitable access to healthy food, and bring healthy foods back into food desert neighborhoods.
The Nashville Food Policy Council is a program of Community Food Advocates and is funded in full by the Department of Health and Human Services, as part of the Metro Public Health Department’s Communities Putting Prevention to Work campaign. The Nashville Food Policy Council engages City/County policy makers, consumer interest groups, retail food industry, local agriculture industry, and faith- and community-based organizations to strengthen and align efforts to create food system change in our community.
For more information on Food Summit 2011, please contact Shavaun Evans at 615-385-2286 ext. 226
The event is free and open to the public.
Boulder
CFMA members write up some things that they would like to chat about over lunch
I am heading back from Boulder and Fort Collins, up there in Colorado. Was invited to present at the 2011 Colorado Farmers Market Association conference by Cindy Torres, one of my fellow Community Food Security Coalition board members.
Cindy Torres (Dir-CFMA) and Jenn Ross (Boulder Mkt Mgr, CFMA Brd member) out for some tapas with me in Colorado.
Unfortunately, no nearby markets to see this time of year, but more “winter markets” (as they call them in Colorado) are coming all of the time. The conference was held at CSU in Fort Collins, lovely place.
Market managers, extension folks, graduate students, and organizers thinking about starting a new market all attended. I did a SNAP briefing using the FMC “Real Food, Real Choices” report and some other helpful information about Colorado SNAP supplied by Stacy Miller of Farmers Market Coalition a few days before.
The SNAP briefing and discussion was 2 hours long and very lively. I think about a half dozen markets attended, along with some new market organizers.
The next day the conference started in earnest. Loads of information was presented to the 70-80 people that attended. Very in-depth, useful information from state departments and county health folks, as well Colorado Ag (Market Maker) and an update on a regional assessment report.
I also presented in the afternoon about the 4M framework and measurement; I was followed by Manage My Markets’ Kathleen O’ Malley, who sparked a lot of interest in their back office product.
The state association is doing first-rate policy work on the state level as well as in many counties. Every agency spoke personally of their connection to Cindy and their deep trust in CFMA’s work. From evolving food handling guidelines for small-scaled vendors to beginning market and farmers programs, the expansion of SNAP and WIC voucher programs and their insurance program, all were discussed.
What is clear to me is the need in Colorado for this association to continue to grow their capacity to serve their members and to be present for the many challenges that are coming. I wish them great luck.
And thanks for the first-class lunch…
At NOFA-VT conference…
Listening in on the Vermont Farmers Market Association annual meeting while at the NOFA-VT Direct Marketing Conference.
Professional, really covering a great many topics and a diversity in farm stands, markets and CSAs represented.
Saw a bit of the round table on emerging farmers market questions, and sat in on the SNAP at farmers market talk. Seems like they have 30 markets in the state doing tokens, and a mini-grant program for new markets to start EBT. Very detailed talk and an obvious, great partnership between the Department of Children and Families rep and NOFA.
Lunch is coming, local ingredients galore.
Local apples and apple ciders on the table all morning have been delightful.
South Royalton is a charming little town; the picture postcard of Vermont it seems. The conference is being held at the Vermont Law School campus.
Should I buy books? there are a lot of farmer business planning books for sale. I wonder if our farmers would use it…
Helping Farmers Markets Grow 