North Coast Report
The North Coast wrapped up a busy year. We held our annual membership party where 35 people came to discuss the CAFF's strategic plan and regional goals for the upcoming years. Current and future efforts focus on establishing native plant hedgerows on farms, establishing Farm-to-School programs in Sonoma County, expanding opportunities for Latino farm workers and helping the open space district create a policy that will foster good neighbor relations.
Our November LFN workshop, Farmscaping with Native Plant Hedgerows, drew more than 50 people. Sam Earnshaw presented slides of Central Coast efforts, and led a lively discussion. Native plant hedgerows can be an excellent farm management tool to control erosion, attract beneficial insects, protect water quality, and create viable habitat. Keith Abeles, North Coast regional coordinator, followed up with several participants who intend to plant hedgerows.
CAFF actively participates with the new group, Food Matters in Sonoma County (FMSC). The FMSC mission is "To bring together community members and organizations to promote a stable food system with access to healthy, regionally produced food for all." Their first event is a Farm-to-School Forum planned for February 5 in Santa Rosa. We intend to bring farmers, educators, administrators, parents and others together to showcase Healdsburg's emerging program and build momentum for similar efforts around the county.
We will be holding three LFN meetings in Spanish this spring. The programs will assist Latino farm workers to learn new skills and create improved economic opportunities. They will focus on pragmatic, sustainable viticultural practices. We surveyed numerous workers and employers this fall to determine appropriate topics for presentation. People are most interested in learning the overall growth pattern of grapes, and how the specific activities throughout the year relate.
We also continued with our Buy Local and Food belt Campaign. We submitted additional articles to the Sierra Club's publication, Needles, about the importance of buying local, along with creating our own information sheet on why and where to buy local. This effort bridges environmental and agricultural concerns, and appears to be drawing new people to CAFF.
We are working with the Sonoma County Open Space District, California Farmlink, and Ag Innovations to attract diversified farmers onto public lands. The open space district owns lands in between cities that are ideal for direct market food producers. We are assisting with the selection of appropriate farmers and creating a good neighbor relations policy. Because the lands are close to residential areas, we aim to help the new neighbors understand and support each other. Like so many places in California, Sonoma County experiences tensions at the increasing urban/rural interface. We see this interface as an opportunity, and hope to create a policy that works for all types of residential/agricultural situations.
Last year was exciting and fruitful for our region, and we expect no less in 2002. Anyone interested in participating in CAFF's work on the North Coast should contact CAFF's North Coast regional coordinator Keith Abeles at (707) 823-6788 or e-mail kda@sonic.net.
