SLV Local Food Coalition: keeping it local, fresh and healthy

SAN LUIS VALLEY — This Thanksgiving marked the 400th anniversary of the first communal dinner held in Plymouth, Massachusetts and attended by members of the indigenous Mashpee Wapanoag Tribe and the Pilgrims, who had landed on local shores and proceeded to call the land their own.

Many commonly accepted facts of the occasion are now being reassessed by historians with questions about the context of the event. But it is an established fact that the meal was, among other things, a celebration of the harvest, the first harvest managed by the immigrants whose initial chances of survival had been less than good.

Recognizing the importance of the harvest, the diverse cultural traditions and practices connected to growing and harvesting food and the universal goodness in eating food that is healthy and fresh and locally grown is at the heart of a strong and thriving organization known as the San Luis Valley Local Food Coalition. And, like many groups both now and in the past. SLV Local Food Coalition has its own interesting story of creation.

About 13 years ago, Melissa Fritschka, Alamosa Garden coordinator, traveled to Philadelphia to attend a Community Food Security Conference with the promise to return and share with others what she had learned.

Fritschka kept her word. Upon her return, a local foods potluck dinner (of course) and presentation was scheduled. It was expected that about 15 people would attend. But, in

the first of many times to come when results far exceeded expectations, a crowd of 65 people crowded into the room, anxious to hear what was learned and even more anxious to explore what was possible.   

Their concern was loud and clear. All the healthy, fresh and locally grown food in the San Luis Valley was being exported to other markets in other places, making it unavailable to those who lived in the same valley where the food was grown. People wanted access - physical, social and economic access - to fresh and nutritious food that they liked, that they trusted to be safe and that they knew would provide them with what they needed to live healthy and active lives.

“We needed to create a parallel local food system to give people in the valley that access,” says Liza Marron, founding Steward of the San Luis Valley Local Food Coalition (SLVLFC).

Out of that need, so clearly identified then and since, was born a grassroots organization with a mission that encompasses exactly what SLV Local Food Coalition continues to be all about: “To foster an equitable food system that restores the health of the people, community, economy and ecosystem.”

The Rio Grande Farm Park was one of SLV Local Food Coalition’s first projects and is, in many ways, its north star. Located on Highway 17 just north of Highway 160, the Farm Park sits on 38 acres that were once the site of an old elementary school where a vegetable garden was used to teach students about growing, tending, harvesting and selling produce. Continuing with that tradition, the Farm Park is dedicated to each of those skills.

Guided by the core principles of preservation, saving land and growing food, the Farm Park has a Family Garden program, operated under the management of Jesus Flores, a farmer with expertise in soil health, vegetable production, irrigation and caring for bees. The Family Garden provides families who want to grow their own food with the use of free land, along with access to the soil and irrigation system that is available. The only condition – what is grown is for personal use only and cannot be sold at markets.

Straight out of the chute, this program was of enormous benefit to members of the community, including the Mayan community who had recently become unemployed when the local mushroom farm temporarily closed its doors. To this day, seventeen families are growing enough food to meet the needs of 400 members of their community. [LM1]

The Farm Park also has a Farmer Incubator program where, currently, nine new and some inexperienced and mostly landless farmers learn about regenerative farming practices with support from the farm manager. Additional support is available in the form of healthy soil, sufficient water, access to markets and other components necessary for the farmers to launch their own business selling their produce to the public.

But, of all the programs born from the efforts of the Local Food Coalition, one of the most ambitious and far-reaching endeavors is the Valley Roots Food Hub where customers (both in and outside the valley) connect through an online ordering platform with the farmers growing the food.

The program operates on a weekly basis with two cycles per week. On Mondays, farmers put online what crops are ready to harvest and what products are available (beef, yak, bison, lamb, eggs, cheeses, dry beans, cornmeal, bars, drinks, other value-added products). Prior to Tuesday afternoon at 4:00 p.m. – the cut-off time for ordering – customers can go online and place their order. On Wednesday, farmers harvest or gather based on what has been ordered. On Thursday, the Local Foods Coalition dispatches drivers to the participating farms and, on Friday, food deliveries are made.

The delivery area is expansive and includes Denver, Durango, the San Luis Valley and communities in Chaffee and Gunnison Counties. Both retail and wholesale customers are welcome, and the array of food (from asparagus to zucchini) rivals whatever can found in the local franchise grocery stores.

The benefits are bountiful. The Food Hub accepts SNAP. Short of being related to or friends with a farmer, buying food through the Valley Roots Food Hub is about as close to “know your farmer, know your food” as a person can get. The carbon footprint is greatly reduced with transporting food limited to locations just a few hours away compared to typical retail outlets where produce is often shipped much longer distances.. The food could not be any fresher, short of someone walking into a field and picking it where it grows. Consumers can also vote with their food dollars for the regenerative practices these farmers use. Production practices and the Rio Grande Farm story are linked to every product on the online platform. The Local Food Coalition even has an RSL (Regenerative Soil Farmer) label farmers get based on an honor system. And, for many, there is great value in knowing where their “food dollar” is going and to whom.

There are also benefits for the 65 farmers who participate. Growers whose produce ends up in the produce aisle of large, chain grocery stores typically get 11 to 14 cents for every dollar of their produce they sell. But farmers, selling directly to Valley Roots Food Hub consumers, receive approximately 75 cents. A profit seven times greater in one market than the other says it all.

Valley Roots Food Hub, which has other programs not described here, is a success story all its own, not just in the access provided to local, fresh food but also the impact to an economy. In 2015, revenue from the program totaled $100,000. In 2021, just six years later, it has topped $1 million.

With such a broad range of relevant, community-inspired and driven programs, a mobile kitchen equipped to offer fresh, local and freshly prepared food to the public wherever the public happens to be is part of the plan.

Nicknamed “MoKi”, the 1989 superbus was originally used by Colorado State University Extension’s “Healthy Habits Project” prior to becoming what “MoKi” is today. And MoKi’s mission is collaborative and much needed. The mobile kitchen, part of the Coalition’s Local Foods, Local Places program, not only helps to accomplish the organization’s mission, it also contributes to making downtown Alamosa an even more dynamic place to be.

All this goodness - for people, for the community, for the economy and for the ecosystem - was born from the seeds planted in a small room on an evening in 2008. It gives credence to the old saying, “Bloom where you are planted.” Accordingly, as is sung in a schmaltzy, famous old folk song, may the SLV Local Food Coalition “bloom and grow” forever.

The SLV Local Food Coalition Is a non-profit and will be participating in Colorado Gives Day on Tuesday, December 7. For those so inclined, “MoKi” is in desperate need of some strong love, including body and engine work, if it is to continue on in its journey bringing good food to good people in good places. More can be learned by going to www.slvlocalfoods.org, https://www.coloradogives.org/SLVLFC emailing [email protected] or calling 719-539-5606.

  [LM1]This is how it started, however we also have a few Anglo and Mexican families mixed in too now.


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