Meeting Notes: 10/06/11

Following a welcome by Sallie Maron and Carolyn Goodwin, of Sound Food,   two members of the Bainbridge Island Grange, Kathleen White and Terry McKenna, spoke about the Grange.

• The Grange is working to re-establish the connection with the Island’s farming community.
• The National Grange is a powerful lobbying entity, and it offers insurance plans for farmers at group rates.
• The Bainbridge Grange is currently seeking donations to “Lift the Loo.” The downstairs bathrooms are seriously in need of refurbishing, and the BI Rotary has offered a matching grant of $7,500 in support of the project. Donations can be sent to B.I. Grange/Lift the Loo, P.O. Box 130, Rolling Bay, WA 98061

Dwight Sutton, a member of the Regional Farm Policy Council, gave the group an update on the activities of that organization:

• The Regional Farm Policy Council was formed a year ago to work toward strengthening the local food system in the Pierce, Kitsap, King and Snohomish County area.
• Their mission is to develop policies and action plans to forward to local lawmakers.
• Recommendations are designed to enhance quality of and access to food.
• Members of the Council include Educators, Chef’s Collaborative, Produce Distributors (Charlie’s), Seattle Tilth, PS Meat Co-op, Kitsap Economic Alliance, and social services groups – a total of 30 entities that meet monthly.
• Three areas of focus:
  • Access to quality food for all people in the region, regardless of income or location
  • Agriculture/ Food Production
  • Economic Development
• One of the first priorities is to get an accurate assessment of our food production capacity: how many acres are in production, what kind of land, what’s being produced, and how much?
• Until you know how much food is there, you don’t know how much processing capacity you need, how much needs to be distributed, etc.
• Meat processing is one area of need. There are 15 meat processors in the region; most are not operating to capacity. And yet there’s a real need for more capacity in many areas. Most of the processors are in Eastern Washington. The mobile unit comes once a month to Kitsap.
• Sutton asked attendees to contact him with issues and recommendations – where re the problems, what can policy makers do to make the system work better?

Senator Christine Rolfes then spoke to the group about efforts at the state level. She encouraged the group to come to her with ideas for new legislation to strengthen the regional food system and remove impediments, and mentioned that the recently passed Cottage Food Law was a good example of how a citizen idea could become legislation.

The group then moved on to discuss each of the six different elements of the food system:

•          Skilled local producers using organic and sustainable methods

•          Community Gardens: there’s a map of all of them on the Sound Food

•          Home food production on the rise

•          More information about how much food is being produced, how much we need.

•          Incubate new production operations. Training, funding, land.

•          Connect those who can share land w/ those who need it

•          Use of more urban production methods due to our limited land availability.

• Brian Stahl (Kitsap District) mentioned that he is mapping producers in the county – who is producing meat, poultry, produce, and wine to supplement the information available on Sound Food’s Local Farm Map.
• Diane from BI Farms said that if your farm is certified organic you have to report tonnage, and that those figures would be available.
• The County Assessor requires reporting of tonnage and value.
• Non-certified farmers would probably be willing to share numbers as long as the data was anonymous

City of BI’s role:

• Barry Peters said that the City is engaged in efforts to strengthen the food system – by overseeing the public farmland, and working to make city code more supportive.
• The city is currently looking at whether city farmland can be permitted for other purposes than farming, specifically for education.

• Diane from BI Farms explained that she is prohibited from selling salsa made in the commercial kitchen on their farm because her water comes from a well, even though it is tested every year. To hook up to municipal water would be prohibitively expensive.
• Brian Stahl said that he has a permit to slaughter 1000 chickens even though he too is on well water.
• It was mentioned that in Kitsap, it is legal to gather as much roof water as you can store for irrigation.

Next steps:

• It was agreed that the two priority areas for future discussions and work groups would be the BASELINE STUDY and WATER.

• Producers who make jams, syrups, vinegars and more.
• Local bakers turning local fruits and grains into bread and pastries.
• Port Madison Farm making local cheese at their Sunrise farm.
• Limited access to mobile slaughter unit
• Cottage Food Law to go into effect in early 2012.

• A licensed, commercial sized food processing kitchen for value-added processing and educational activities’
• Dry, cold and frozen storage facility for ingredients and final products
• USDA meat processing: mobile slaughterhouse / local meat shop,

Next Steps:

• It was agreed that a task force could be formed to look into creating a rentable commercial kitchen, preferably adjacent to dry and cold storage, and expanding access to meat processing.

Distribution and Access:

• Individual farms and producers deliver to retail and restaurants
• Saturday Farmers Markets in Bainbridge, Poulsbo, Suquamish
• CSA programs
• Individual farmstands, e.g. Day Road and Rolling Bay Farm.
•  Bay Hay, Pane d’Amore and T&C sell some seasonal local produce and dairy

• Food hubs: a place to aggregate and store product for distribution
• A better connection between large producers and commercial buyers.
• More retail outlets offering increased daily access to local produce, meat, dairy and value added foods

• It was noted that the Ferry Farm Stand had been missed both by farmers and consumers. It was agreed that a work group should be formed into re-starting it next year in a form that it can operate without being dependant on volunteers.

• There was a question about how to get local groceries to expand their selection of locally grown foods.

• Becky Peddy from Helpline discussed their efforts to make local foods more available to the disadvantaged on the Island. She said that 1 in 10 Islanders depends on helpline for some or all of their food needs – 2,000 people.. Purchasing CSAs for Helpline has been done by a local church, and is another way to provide access.

• Betsey Wittick asked for more information on how farmers could support Helpline – what type of produce was acceptable, how it should be packaged for delivery, etc.

• Martha Roben, BI Farmers Market Manager, said that the BI Farmers Market was working to set up the systems that would allow the use of Basic Food coupons (formerly called Food Stamps) at the Farmers Market.

• It was mentioned that MARC recently did a dinner using local food, and that several residents there have asked why they can’t eat local food more often. How can we strengthen ties between these institutional buyers and farmers?

Next steps:

• Task groups could look at restarting the Ferry Farm Stand, improving connections between producers and institutions like schools, retirement centers, Helpline, and groceries.

• Home composting
• Bainbridge Disposal now accepts food waste in garden recycle bins
• Sustainable Bainbridge’s Road Map to Zero Waste has info on how to recycle all food wastes

• More initiatives like the New worm composting business taking shape on Day Road
• Educate the community about home composting
• Gleaning program for unharvested food

• Brian Stahl asked, “When is Bainbridge going to have its own local composting facility?” He said there was enough interest and enough livestock to make this possible

• John Barutt proposed the creation of a local farming district – which doesn’t change zoning but permits farming and associated activities like composting. It doesn’t regulate, and is only involved in permitting

Next steps

• A task force could be formed to look into a local composting facility, and the idea of a farming district.