First Local Foods Commitee Meeting

[Holly D'Angelo]

Just a quick announcement: We will be having our first local foods committee meeting on Monday May 21st from 7:00 to 8:00 pm in the basement of Irvings Bagels (downtown State College). Hope to see you all there!

[jcd]

Here are the notes I took tonight at the meeting:

Introductions:

• Holly D'Angelo
• Jeff D'Angelo
• Bill Sharp
• Barbara Fisher
• Anna Dounaevskaia
• Brian Burger - newcomer to TTSC who brought with him a wealth of knowledge about cow/bull/ox husbandry
• Jenn Landry
• Steve Fast - pet project: microdairy of 10 animals to feed 15 families

Notes:

• first product of the group: The Local Food Guide
• working the two main points: SUPPLY and DEMAND
   
  • how do we handle different levels of scale?  e.g. up from small family level
  • Steve: it may take about a year with a person working full time to go to next level, just based on number of connections you need to make
  • Kathryn's work on Spring Creek Homesteading has covered the low end (local families)
  • repeating the Lancaster co-op would be a good step here
  • but what is the next level?
       
    • need demand and supply to balance and scale together
    • need to find a good margin for suppliers, and mitigate risk
• Barb's idea to approach an institution, specifically Weis markets, and let them handle the infrastructure
   
  • which area customer would use the new Weis?  The northern valley, Howard, etc.
• Steve: cooperative models for collective ownership
   
  • get some investers to invest in some land, and have it work out well for both investers and manager of land; make work for the local demograph
  • $2k/person/year
• Brian: schools good place to expand, for the market (demand), but also educate children in the school
   
  • PASA project with kindergarden kids and tomatos; pass off to next year kindergardeners and mentor as 1st graders
  • reskill children, bring in old farmers, teach hands on engineering skills short in supply these days
  • Brian: you can do multidiscipline instruction on site
  • Steve: Penn State was founded on the old farming engineering skills (without needing to buy products offsite)
  • Intercommunity dependence as opposed to compartmentalization; or re-localizing the recently globalized interdependence
• "Happy Valley" coming from the depression when the local community here was able to trive with local interconnections despite being fiscally poor
• Bill: how to build from 19th century America a model small farm from 3.5 arces
   
  • wants to rebuild that educational system
  • concurs with Steve: old farmers are dying fast, we need to learn from them while we still can
• Steve: co-op hubs needs to not just be about State College, but about every municipality
• Bill: this can be a marketing tool, use it to build the market, the demand
   
  • this guide should help define what the market is, who the providers are what distribution channels exist, what the margins are
• Steve: we know that New Leaf has a student incubator working of living sustainable projects
   
  • college labor pool
  • connect with socialogists
  • do the research (Bill has background in this) to connect the dots on this
• Penn State is still focused on the global market
• Barb: need someone skilled in grant writing
   
  • Steve has no problem writing, but needs to know who to write to; who has the money?
• Bill: a good business plan is needed...and we should tap the "1%"
   
  • the "guy with the gold and the golden heart"
  • it may be accessible if we build the right plan
• Brian: Is there a "slow money" (investment plan B) option in State College?
• Bill: there's a huge economic disparity in State College compared to the rest of center PA
• Barb: most donors want recognition
• Holly: there's sympathetic wealth owners who can be tapped
• Brian: when you donate, you know that other groups see that and may go after you
   
  • what is the body of the 99% that do give?
• Centre County Farmland Trust & Clearwater Conservancy have similar donors
• Jenn: look at kickstarter, many good projects go there
• Bill: we are collecting good skills via our connections

At 8:05pm, Irvings staff indicate that they are closed at 8 during the summer, so we start to wrap up.

• we may need to pick a few aspects of our map on the whiteboard to focus upon
• Spring Creek Homesteading has a great information clearinghouse site, but not structured in the way we need it
• Bill has been working on the lines between the dots, connections
• Steve: there may be connections for beef, but not necessarily grass fed organic
• Bill: it takes a set of skills from each of us to get this overall project to work
   
  • the guide should be the easy first project

We then reconvene in Websters at 8:15pm, including Bill, Steve, Anna, Brian, Holly, Jeff, Jenn (others had to leave).

• Steve: we could take these ideas, vote it, see what takes first and second pick (Holly writes on the board):
   
  • Local Food Guide
  • Funding models
  • Incubator farm idea? not happen within a year; may need regulations changed
  • Determine what regulations are; identify legal issues and local food/farming/funding
  • Food Bank Farm
  • Food Banks
       
    • Food Banks are often supplied by charities
    • Food Banks tend to be saturated with supply
           
      • they don't have the storage and processing
    • some regulations preclude processing
    • demand is not the problem
    • people can only come a few times a year, not weekly
  • processing plant
  • schools
  • Universities & other institutions
       
    • Prisons?
    • Hospitals
  • Weis Farm
  • Cooperative Investing schemes
       
    • Amish banking (but a lot of mortgage in mainstream banking)
  • Cooperative Food Processing
       
    • Mormon method (2 year emergency); they have food processing plants
  • Cooperative Endeavors - check business models
• Steve: we should create a community research project, to investigate these ideas and report back online:
   
  • what format will work?
  • we have the forum?  we can use google docs...
  • we need to allow people to contribute online in short bursts
• When describing our committee in context of an introduction to another group of people:
   
  • you use whatever introduction and motivation that works for the context
       
    • it doesn't have to be all about Peak Oil and Climate Change
  • e.g. usually we talk about the economy first
  • we are gaining traction; we need to keep working on bringing people in
  • the Local Food Guide is a tool to do it (keep bringing new people into the group)
• watch for myths about Amish being local, independent and organic
• Lancaster Farm Fresh; group of farmers that got together
• 10% Berlington Food local
• Intervale, on Bill's center local food google docs
• Steve: evolutionary trait for humans to form societies to survive
   
  • this is when brains grew the most rapidly
• who take legal issues; Jenn volunteered to lead
• Holly: Let's phrase the questions
   
  • community: collect answers ... (on an online site)

The scribe takes a break...

• public outreach events, how to spread awareness
• 3 municipalities in the nearby region fought to change ordinances to raise chickens
• Centre County Farm Tour
   
  • some people go for different reasons
       
    • farmers vs homesteaders vs the mildly curious
• PA Certified Organic Farm Fest at Grange Fair
• Penns Valley Community Learning Garden in Millheim is struggling for volunteers
• Do we go on a field trip to Penns Valley to inspire people?
   
  • Holly: do we have an events committee?
  • they (in Millheim) have a farmers market
  • Penns Valley Community Learning Garden's site is http://pvlg.org/
• we're still talking about specialized farming vs homesteading gardening
   
  • produce vs grass fed beef
  • vs feed 10 families (little bit of everything, or small network of different farms)
• Bill: permaculture can restore the land that was weakened by factory farming
• Brian: find a farm land in grass; which is often less modified than that used in monocrop
   
  • grass land is usually untapped because of slope, less ideal soil types and hydrology issues, which can be more challenging
  • but this tends to not be as bad as land used for monocrop
• Holly: keylime plowing, penetrates layers from monocrop and reintegrate
• Anna: bokashi (e.g. http://www.bokashicycle.com/)
   
  • you can put meat, bones, milk etc into it; cover it
  • anarobically compost
  • efficient microbes liquid, feed plants (like compost tea)
  • feed animals, chicken, cows, pigs; need far less antibiotics
  • can use for household, like septic tank toilets (kill smell), sink drains, clean house surfaces
  • treat cat/dog poo
  • you can restore soil with it, with bacteria
  • can cost $2 to $17 per bag, depending on the quality/who does it
  • it stores well, for many year
  • example of a school for deaf and blind who have restored the local grounds, got kids involved
  • there's no methane byproduct like there is from traditional compost
• Bill: most soil is missing trace minerals
• Holly: so we need to wrap up (time gets to 9:08pm, Websters closes at 9:30)
• Jenn: write the producer's story into the guide
• Bill: when Holly approached him to post an ad for Fox Hill Gardens, he asked if he should make it a plain job ad or an "opportunity to learn"
• Holly: what context should this go into?
   
  • Anna: should go onto web site?
  • Bill: printed version would be nice, too
  • Jenn: get artists involved
  • Brian: slow money group has done in Penn's Valley: Penns Valley Business Directory
       
    • PV Conservation Association donated funds
    • appreciation by early vendors; new ones help self supporting
    • on http://pennsvalley.net/
    • see http://pennsvalley.net/cms/index.php?id=85,0,0,1,0,0
• Lehigh Valley has a sustainability directory
• start with farmers markets to get people interested
• Anna: perhaps we can hire student art labor; or volunteer for resume
• Holly: local foods restaurants
• Marks in Lemar, fresh local meat
• tell the story in the guide, "what is local? sustainable? natural? free range?"

So we start to wrap up:

• Holly: we need questionnaires? (perhaps on website first)
   
  • Farming practices
  • Local?  How local?
• Jeff: we should get the people who came tonight onto the beginning of a google group mailing list for rapid attention getting communication
   
  • and then use the forum for more detailed conversations

Adjourn 9:30