Full list: Food Sovereignty News

May 04, 2013
By Mario Moretto
Full Article

BLUE HILL, Maine — A Superior Court ruling against a Blue Hill farmer who has been selling unlabeled, unlicensed raw milk will have farmers in several Maine towns wondering about the future of local “food sovereignty” ordinances that seek to exempt them from state oversight.

Dan Brown, of Gravelwood Farm, lost a civil case on April 27, in which he was accused of violating three Maine laws: selling milk without a license, selling unpasteurized, or “raw,” milk without marking it as such and operating a food establishment without a license.

Since 2006, Brown has been selling raw milk from a farm stand located on his property. An 8- by 11-inch sign states that the milk is raw. Brown also sold his products at farmers markets after Blue Hill adopted its Local Food and Community Self Governance Ordinance in 2011.

Brown said his sales were legal under the ordinance, which exempts local food vendors from state licensure and inspection, provided they sell their products directly to consumers.

Eight other Maine towns — Appleton, Brooksville, Hope, Livermore, Penobscot, Plymouth, Sedgwick and Trenton — have also passed local food ordinances with the same or similar language.

In her order, Hancock Superior Court Justice Ann Murray ruled that Brown was not protected under the Blue Hill ordinance. It was a major boost for the argument from the Maine Department of Agriculture, who filed the lawsuit against Brown in 2011, that towns cannot simply opt out of state law.

The ruling could have an effect on the other towns with similar rules. If the state were to pursue civil action against other farmers operating without a license, their attempt to seek protection under local food rules would likely fail.

Brown sought shelter under the so-called Home Rule of the Maine Constitution, which permits a municipality to enact its own regulation when permitted to do so by the Legislature, so long as the regulation “is not denied expressly or by clear implication.”

While the Legislature has carved out an exception for small farmers who sell produce at farm stands and farmers markets, the state excluded milk products, making clear “the legislative intent that milk products be subject to stricter regulations than other products,” Murray wrote.

“It is axiomatic that a municipality may only add to the requirements of the statute, it may not take away from those requirements unless permitted to do so otherwise,” she wrote.

While the decision sets a clear precedent in Hancock County, home to five of the nine towns with local food rules, Lourie said the decision’s effect on other county courts would depend on how persuasive the presiding judge found Murray’s legal analysis.

Lourie said Murray could have ordered the town to strike the ordinance from the books, but since she didn’t, Blue Hill is under no obligation to backpedal on its assertion of a right to Home Rule. In the meantime, Brown hopes ultimately to win the case on appeal.

“Obviously this will have some effect, but to put it into perspective, this is not a final ruling,” Brown said. “Until the Superior Court makes a final ruling, I think there’s still some wiggle room.”

Jim Schatz, a selectman in Blue Hill who has supported the local food rules in town and at the State House, where several proposed laws would bolster local food sovereignty efforts, said he doesn’t anticipate conversations among selectmen about repealing the ordinance.

The ruling “shows the kind of work that needs to be done at the legislative level,” he said Friday.

Schatz stressed that selectmen are merely administrators. The ordinance was put forward by residents and approved at a Blue Hill town meeting. In towns such as Blue Hill, voters are the legislative body.

“It may be that the people interested in this ordinance come and ask for some refinement of it, but that’s not a process the selectmen would initiate,” he said. “We’re mere tools of the legislative body, which is a good place to be.”

There are bills being discussed at the committee level that would exempt local food ordinances from being pre-empted by state law, as well as a proposal to allow for direct-to-consumer sales without state oversight throughout Maine.

“We’re carefully monitoring the progress of those bills, because at this point it’s a policy question,” he said Friday.

Regardless, Lourie urged caution for farmers selling their products without licenses under the assumption their towns protect them from state law.

“The law can remain on the books, but it won’t be regarded as a defense [against civil lawsuits from the state],” he said. “Anyone who relies on it does so at their own risk. The town probably ought to repeal the ordinance because it leads people down the primrose path thinking they’re protected when they’re not.”

Brown is scheduled for a civil penalty hearing on May 16 in Hancock County Superior Court, where Murray will rule on what penalties will be levied for each of his three violations.

By Katy Savage
Standard Correspondent
4/20/13
Full Article

Randy and Lisa Robar began dairy farming two years ago with one cow. Without a barn or enough land, they kept Sophie in their garage.

Kiss the Cow Farm now has 13 cows that produce raw, organic milk at a once-abandoned dairy farm in East Barnard. It’s small and not too profitable, but, for Randy, farming is a lifestyle.

“Nobody (farms) to make money because you probably aren’t going to make money,” Randy said. “All those chores aren’t chores, they’re just part of the daily life routine.”

Perhaps the hardest part in launching a dairy farm isn’t finding customers; it’s the start-up costs. Vermont law prohibits dairy farmers from selling their product in stores without a certified production facility, which can cost thousands, Randy said.

“The biggest challenge is trying to sell the food we grow,” said Randy. “There are plenty of people willing to purchase it, but I’m not legally allowed to sell it.”

But the Robars have dreams of making farming a career. They want to produce cheese.

Learning to farm
When Lisa and Randy moved to an apartment in Barnard to escape the Boston suburbs, they wanted to farm but didn’t know how. By chance, the apartment they rented was owned by longtime farmer Joe LaDouceur.

Lisa signed LaDouceur’s lease with one request: He teach Randy how to farm.

Nearly everyday for two years, Randy followed LaDouceur around Bowman Road Farm, learning about grazing, fencing, farm infrastructure and how to start an old truck that’s been sitting in the field for years.

“(Randy) had that heavy desire,” said LaDouceur. “If you don’t have that heavy desire, I don’t care if you’re a zillionaire; you aren’t going to be a farmer. You have to be willing to work and not make big income.”

LaDouceur, 75, started farming in the 1970s and uses his knowledge to mentor those who have never farmed.

“I have a mission,” said LaDouceur. “I have been doing this a long time and I’ve seen a lot of farms go out of business. I want to see new people coming back. Randy and Lisa, when they came to town, they wanted to farm. I’m pretty proud of what they’re doing. They’ve gotten right into it now.”

The number of dairy farms in Vermont has been declining since 1980, according to vermontdairy. com. There are 42 dairy farms in Windsor County currently and 995 in the entire state, a decrease of 36 percent since 2000.

Much has changed since LaDouceur began farming.
“There used to be a lot of nice little farms and we all helped each other out,” said LaDouceur. “All of those farmers helped me out a lot. But now they’re all gone. That’s why it’s nice to see (Randy and Lisa); maybe the valley will come back.”

LaDouceur said it’s not easy to make a living farming. Those who farm do it because they love it.

And, Randy, it seems, has caught the farming bug.
“(Randy) reads a lot and studies a lot,” LaDouceur said. “He doesn’t mind getting his hands dirty. That’s why I think he’ll be a good [farmer]. He’s very meticulous; really in to getting things right.”

A farming future?
The Robars don’t have to go grocery shopping often — Lisa has successfully experimented making yogurt, soft cheese, butter and sour cream with her raw milk.

She is currently a music teacher at Woodstock Union High School, but farming has “bitten (her) life completely,” she said. She wants to join Randy and farm full-time.

Within the next couple years, the Robars hope to purchase more cows and start producing cheese, and maybe someday other dairy products.

But whether he makes money or not, Randy is happy doing what he’s doing.

“At the end of the day, the work I do is visible,” he said. “It’s not like paperwork and email. I spent too many years doing that sort of work.”

By STEVE BROWN
February 06, 2013
Full Article

Capital Press

OLYMPIA — Felicia Hill has made three notable trips to the Capitol.

First, she came to urge legislators to permit home cooks to sell products made in their own kitchens.

Later she received the first state-issued cottage food permit from the Washington State Department of Agriculture Director Dan Newhouse.

Hill returned on Jan. 31 with a new request, that she and other home cooks be allowed to make a living wage. House Bill 1135, with bipartisan sponsorship, would remove the $15,000 limit on gross annual sales, which was part of the original legislation.

She told the House Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee that 33 states now have cottage food laws and three more are pending; 21 of them don’t have a limit on sales.

“The $15,000 cap doesn’t provide a livable wage,” she said. Even a minimum wage job earns more, she said.

However, she said she thought a $50,000 cap could be considered. “Beyond that, it does need to go into a commercial setting.”

Another cottage food operator, Wendy Kingsley, said she makes wedding cakes. For the average wedding of 150 people, a cake will cost $500. That means that after she has sold 30 cakes, she must stop.

Though prime sponsor Rep. Jason Overstreet, R-Lynden, said all original safety and inspection requirements would remain in place, spokesmen for state agencies voiced concern about the potential for foodborne illnesses.

WSDA’s Kirk Robinson said he was concerned about the large volume of low-value products that would be allowed with no threshold. Also, he said, removing the cap would impact food processors who have made sizable investments in equipment for commercial kitchens.

Rep. Joel Kretz, R-Wauconda, wondered whether the $15,000 limit means less to spend on equipment that would actually decrease the risk of contamination.

The committee scheduled a Feb. 7 vote whether to pass the bill along.

Dan Murphy
November 21, 2012
Full article

As a professor of philosophy and environmental studies at Vermont’s Green Mountain College — and something of an authority on animal ethics — Prof. Steven Fesmire found himself at the epicenter of the recent activist-driven flap over the college’s plans to slaughter and serve the meat from two working oxen that toiled on the college’s on-site farm.

The idea was to align the school’s farming operations with a robust concept of sustainability. The result of what seemed to many as a pragmatic—if somewhat controversial—decision was an outcry ginned up by members of VINE, a local animal activist group that operates a sanctuary its members lobbied for the college to consider as an alternative destination for the pair of aging work animals.

Both Fesmire and William Throop, the college’s provost who also specializes in environmental ethics, were caught up in an aggressive campaign to demonize the college and threaten the owners of a local packing plant where school officials had planned to send the oxen. The plant owner balked after receiving numerous threats, and due to an injury, one of the oxen eventually had to be euthanized.

That was hardly the end of the controversy, however, which continues to reverberate across the rural campus, as students, activists and Green Mountain’s leadership grapple with the fallout of a highly charged, media-driven food fight.

To set the record straight about “Oxengate”, and to discuss the larger issue animal agriculture, Prof. Fesmire spoke with Contributing Editor Dan Murphy.

Q. Let’s start at the obvious place: What happened with the protests against the college’s plans to turn its oxen into meat, and what’s the situation there currently?

Fesmire: It’s become a serious dispute. What we’re dealing with here are vegan abolitionists, the folks who think that animal agriculture itself has to be abolished. The vitriol and the harassment against us on this issue is coming from these people, diehard animal rights abolitionists. From their perspective, any aspect of animal agriculture is analogous to human slavery. Thus, there’s no such thing as a “better master.” From their standpoint, even small-scale animal operations, such as we have at Green Mountain College, are no better than the concentrated feeding operations you find in the industry.

Q. You have gotten some very critical comments directed at you, as I have, despite Green Mountain’s attempts to be even-handed about this issue.

Fesmire: Yes. To these folks, any type of animal use is a violation of the fundamental rights of the animal, so it all has to go away. These folks are organized, and with social media, they have a big international network they can mobilize, so that’s where the heat’s coming from.

Q. And there’s been quite a lot of heat, as I understand.

Fesmire: Yes. It’s interesting. Most people—regardless of their diet—might agree or disagree about our decision about the oxen. But this [controversy] has almost nothing to do with Bill and Lou [the two oxen]. They’re merely props. However, the activists see them as mascots for the animal rights movement. This [dispute] isn’t about the vegetarian agenda; most vegetarians are used to living with the [meat] industry. Many of them eat dairy products. This controversy is about the vegan agenda.

Q. How is that different from being vegetarian?

Fesmire: Most people—even vegetarians—can accept that there is a plurality of different diets. For instance, a recent graduate of nearby Middlebury College, who is a vegan, emailed our president and said, “I’m so sick about what these [activists] are doing to you guys, I’m going to send you a contribution.” And he mailed a check for $250. That attitude is pretty prevalent at our college, and that’s what we’re used to.

Q. But that’s not where these protestors are coming from, eh?

Fesmire: No, not at all. The people who are protesting against our college believe there is only one right diet—a vegan diet—and it must be imperialistically forced upon everyone else. To them, that’s the only possible “ethical” diet. It’s not a matter of accepting there are lots of dietary choices out there. They believe in the PETA concept of meat is murder. They’re the ones who blocked off our slaughterhouses, they’re the ones who have threatened our local businesses, they’re the ones who are harassing us daily, and they should not be confused in any way with “typical” vegetarians or vegans.

Q. Without condemning industrial agriculture, or exclusively touting small-scale farming, how do we get to a more balanced approach to food production?

Fesmire: Well, on the issue of animal agriculture, you have to get past thinking that the only choices are business as usual or abolition [of all livestock]. If you get past that, you can have an intelligent conversation and people have some flexibility to think about alternatives. But these pompous, sanctimonious abolitionists are utterly incapable of shining a spotlight that can lead us forward. They block the road on that kind of dialogue.

Yes, the industry does need to change, but right now, there’s not a lot of room to have the dialogue that we need to discuss how we might do that.

Dear Editor:

The recent controversy over the fate of Lou and Bill, an aged team of working oxen at Poultney’s Green Mountain College, illustrates the profound and dispiriting disconnect between contemporary American society and the source of our food.

After announcing that Lou and Bill would be slaughtered for beef and served in the school’s cafeteria, Green Mountain College became the subject of rampant harassment, including a cyber-attack, on-line bullying, and threats of physical violence. After weeks of bullying, the college relented. Lou, who suffered from chronic injury, was euthanized in cloak of night and under tight security; Bill will be kept on at the college’s farm. Now the GMC students are left questioning how to attain GMC’s stated goal to become the first college or university in the United States with a major food service provider to eliminate all animal products that are not humanely raised and slaughtered, if they are not secure in making these decisions for themselves.

No matter what one thinks of the college’s choices regarding Lou and Bill, this episode is emblematic of our culture’s tragic desire to remain unaccountable to the ramifications of how we feed ourselves. Let us be clear: Truly sustainable agriculture and food production is dependent on animals, not only for the nourishment of their meat and milk, but also for the fertility of their manure, essential to the production of the fruits, vegetables, and cereal crops upon which all of us depend. Indeed, to erase animals from the cycle of agriculture is to ensure dependence on fossil fuel-based fertilizers. Sustainable? Not exactly.

We have suffered through multiple generations of agricultural and food production opacity. The time has come for full accountability and utter transparency regarding the most crucial, intimate exchange we all engage in: Food. The time has come to acknowledge that our very survival is dependent on the taking of life and to hold ourselves fully accountable to this truth, difficult as it may sometimes be. Green Mountain College set a strong example for all of us by having an open community forum for students to come to a shared decision about the fate of Bill and Lou. This shared decision-making is the essence of food sovereignty – the freedom for communities to choose how they will access their food according to their shared values and needs.

To be sure, there is no excuse for the deplorable conditions at large scale meat production facilities. In fact, there is no excuse for anything short of reverence for the animals that serve us. Lou and Bill and every other creature that provides our nourishment – either directly or indirectly – should be treated with the utmost respect. And when the time comes to end their lives, as it inevitably will, they deserve our deepest gratitude and the most humane slaughter we can provide.

Rural Vermont has long stood for a community-based food system that honors all its participants, including farmers, consumers, animals, and the environment. Rural Vermont also stands with Green Mountain College and the thousands of other Vermont farmers who acknowledge the sometimes difficult realities of creating and maintaining healthy food systems and who provide for their animals in a manner that honors their critical role in our nourishment.

Rural Vermont Board of Directors and Staff

BOARD:                                                                                                STAFF:

John Pollard – Shrewsbury                                           Andrea Stander – Montpelier

Lisa McCrory – Randolph                                               Shelby Girard – Brookfield

Ben Hewitt – Cabot                                                          Robb Kidd – Montpelier

Carl B. Russell – Randolph                                             Mollie Wills – Middlesex

Doug Flack – Enosburg Falls

Tamara Martin – South Wheelock

Randy & Lisa Robar – South Royalton

Dexter Randall – Newport Center

View the full PDF here.

Dear Colleague in Food and Agriculture,

I am writing to request both your attention to and support in an issue that impacts farms of all sizes, the ability of livestock-based businesses and educational farms to function without the threat of harassment or harm from outside special interests, and the possibility for communities to determine the future of their regional food systems.

As you may have heard or read, the Green Mountain College community followed a decade-long tradition of discussing the fate of livestock on the college’s Cerridwen Farm before deciding to send our two longstanding oxen to slaughter. Bill and Lou have been central elements of the college farm since their arrival ten years ago, but Lou injured his leg this past summer and is no longer able to work or even to walk any significant distance without experiencing obvious pain. Therefore, in an open community forum this fall, about eighty students decided to send the much admired pair to slaughter and processing, with the meat to be used in the college dining hall, as we have done with sheep, poultry, swine, and cattle in the past.

However, an extremist animal rights organization, VINE (Veganism is the Next Evolution) Sanctuary, turned our community-based decision into an international advocacy and fundraising effort. VINE recently set up its new sanctuary and education/advocacy center in Springfield, Vermont in order to take on everything from backyard poultry to small-scale livestock production to the iconic Vermont dairy industry. They allow for no distinction between any form of livestock agriculture. As a case in point, one of the founders of VINE states the following:

“Another issue we face is that Vermont is a big ‘happy meat’ place. The happy meat people are convinced the animals are treated well. It is just a myth, and regardless, any farmed animal on a factory farm or a ‘happy meat’ farm, can’t get away from ending up dead.”

Another VINE blog makes the point even more explicit:

“Despite the blather about respecting the bedrock of one of Vermont’s primary industries, and   despite the inane lies pitched in almost hysterical fashion by ‘happy meat and milk’ farmers, cows are nothing more than potential money-making machines to people. That’s what they’re there for, after all.”

The Green Mountain College oxen case seemed to have been the perfect target for VINE’s efforts, quickly supported by Farm Sanctuary and PETA. Why focus on our college farm and not a “factory farm” or some other farm with questionable livestock management practices? Perhaps we find ourselves in this situation because the college has long been transparent about our community-based discussions regarding the fate of the livestock on our college farm—it is a vital part of our educational program here. It could also be that we have been targeted because we are not only teaching and advocating for sustainable livestock farming, but some of our graduates are seeding the local landscape with these kinds of farms.

Unfortunately, this issue is not just about the fate of Bill and Lou or the intense local and international pressures faced by a small but diverse college community that opted for transparency, truth, and accountability in its own food system. If the extremist elements in this activist agenda succeed in forcing our college to choose a course not of our own making in this issue, then they will have the power and the confidence to do it again—perhaps next time to a smaller and less resourceful community or farm or even to a bigger institution or initiative. Such an outcome would be inconvenient to some and perhaps tragic to others. And it flies directly in the face of Vermont’s innovative efforts to develop community-based food systems, envisioned on a grand and courageous scale through our nationally-acclaimed Farm to Plate Initiative, a strategic ten-year plan to build the vision of interlinked local and sustainable food systems that can build thriving communities even in the most rural reaches of our state. Imagine the pressures our college has faced in recent weeks and consider how other communities placed under such pressure might fare:

• Numerous petition drives, with tens of thousands of signees from all over the world—people who know nothing of Bill and Lou’s conditions, much less the accountability and transparency we have built into our college food system
• Action alerts that have generated email assaults (at least one staff person received almost 1000 emails in a single day) and switchboard and voicemail overloads of our campus phone system
• One cyber-attack generated 3.9 million emails filtered in a period of several days—all from a single domain
• Harassment and threats of physical violence to students, faculty, staff, and administrators
• Constant surveillance of our college farm by stealthy intrusions, video cameras, and Facebook reports of our daily activities
• Driving a livestock trailer to the edge of campus and barging into our administrative offices demanding that Bill and Lou be turned over
• Dishonest and highly abusive postings on the college’s social media sites, requiring around-the clock monitoring and editing
• Attempts at widespread defamation of character of faculty, staff, and administrators through letters, emails, websites, and social media channels
• Threats of continued negative publicity campaigns unless we turned Bill and Lou over to VINE Sanctuary
• Online discussion of whether to give Bill and Lou medications that would render their meat unsafe and inedible
• Slaughterhouses throughout Vermont and New York were threatened with protests, harassment, and potential violence if they agreed to work with the college, ultimately eliminating virtually all such possibilities for us, including our scheduled date at a local Animal Welfare Approved facility

Throughout it all, we have attempted to avoid a polarization among parties. After all, our student body is comprised of approximately 70% meat-eaters and 30% vegetarians and vegans. One of my colleagues in helping our students to think critically about these livestock decisions is Dr. Steven Fesmire, a philosopher and a vegetarian. For ten years, he and I have tried to model open and civil discourse about dietary choices and related animal issues through forums, joint classes, and guest lectures. We are unaccustomed to diatribe replacing dialogue, and our students tend to be open to a diversity of ideas and respectful of differences in opinion. Our community finds it odd that certain extremists have opted to try and make us out as villains when one of our stated goals is to become the first college or university in the United States with a major food service provider to eliminate all animal products that are not humanely raised and slaughtered.

Our college honors different dietary choices and encourages a diversity of philosophical perspectives related to agriculture and animal ethics. Were that not the case, we would not have a higher than average population of students who are vegetarians and vegans. We teach animal rights perspectives in our classes, as we believe that these philosophical ideas can help to illuminate the path toward more humane and sustainable livestock agriculture. The challenge we are now facing is not one of a philosophical perspective that we find inappropriate but rather of an extreme activist agenda that is divisive and destructive. The end goal is the abolition of livestock agriculture, whereas our college is invested in the transformation of livestock agriculture.

What happens next in this situation may have ramifications far beyond our campus community. If VINE, Farm Sanctuary, and PETA succeed in harassing and threatening not only us but also our regional livestock businesses to the point at which we succumb to their abolitionist desires, then they will march forward with their activist agenda and wreak havoc not only on the rebuilding of community-based food systems but also on the longstanding efforts in our region to create increasingly humane and ecologically appropriate livestock production and processing.
It is time for more organizations and individuals to come forward to denounce the intrusive and unethical bullying orchestrated by these organizations. Their tactics do not promote discourse, diversity, or democracy. Ultimately, they impede animal welfare reform by putting backyard poultry on the same level as a poorly managed “Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation” (CAFO). You may or may not agree with our community’s decisions regarding Bill and Lou. We recognize that people can come to different conclusions in what is the best alternative for each of these animals, and these discussions can be civil and frank. Regardless of your opinion in this particular matter, it is important to recognize that the extreme bullying tactics employed by these groups need to be countered with the courage, reason, and civility of people and organizations that believe in the transformation of livestock agriculture, not its abolition.

During the early morning hours of November 11th, under the cover of darkness and with complex security plans in place, we had to euthanize Lou and bury him in an undisclosed location, as outlined in a statement to our community by President Paul Fonteyn. It was a difficult and complex decision. President Fonteyn offered these words regarding Bill: “Bill will not be sent to a sanctuary but will stay on Cerridwen Farm and will be cared for in a manner that follows sustainable, humane livestock practices, as is the case with all of our animals. We take responsibility for our animals on the farm–it is an obligation we will not ask others to bear.”

Please make your voice heard on this issue, whether it be through letters to the editor, calls and emails to your elected officials, or by appropriate direct action through your organization. Green Mountain College has decided to stand up against the bullying directed at us while also standing up for farmers, businesses, educational farms, local food systems, and burgeoning farm-to-institution programs—in Vermont and elsewhere in the country. It is our ardent hope that reason and civility will prevail and perhaps save some other farm or organization from the onslaught that our college has opted to engage, oppose, and defeat.

Sincerely,

Philip Ackerman-Leist
Director of the GMC Farm & Food Project
Director of the Masters in Sustainable Food Systems (MSFS)
Associate Professor of Environmental Studies
The links below will provide you with some insight on this issue:
• http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2012/11/10/vt-colleges-oxen-slaughter-planriles-
activists/1696553/
• http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2012/11/09/vermont-college-still-under-fire-over-planslaughter-
oxen/COKrxmfAJWYEZbgHUReU8K/story.html
• http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2012/11/01/college-oxen-slaughter/1676227/
• http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2012/10/25/firemountain/
f8mIXuOFwg201TopTbeXiK/story.html
• http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/29/us/oxens-possible-slaughter-prompts-fight-invermont.
html
• http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2012/10/22/163257176/despite-protest-college-plans-toslaughter-
serve-farms-beloved-oxen
• http://chronicle.com/blogs/buildings/a-decision-to-slaughter-oxen-at-a-college-farm-angersanimal-
rights-activists/32260
• http://www.cbc.ca/asithappens/episode/2012/10/24/the-wednesday-edition-50/ (Part 1)
• http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/10/25-0

July 24, 2012
By STEVE BROWN

OLYMPIA — Felicia Hill first came to the state Capitol to urge legislators to permit home cooks to sell products made in their own kitchens.

When she came to Olympia on July 23, it was to receive the first state-issued permit.

In an ceremony at the Natural Resources Building, WSDA Director Dan Newhouse presented Permit No. 00001 to the self-described “stay-at-home mom” from Vancouver.

In the process of pursuing her dream, Hill became the leader of the cottage food movement in the state. Her Facebook page — Washington State Cottage Food — has nearly 700 followers.

In a conversation with Kirk Robinson, assistant director for WSDA’s Food Safety and Consumer Services Division, Hill said, “I told him, when I started this it was to help myself. But as I realized how many people I’m reaching, it’s quite empowering.”

Hill’s cake design business, FH Cakes, had been limited by state laws requiring that food prepared for sale must be processed in a commercial kitchen. She testified before legislative committees that small home business operators should be able to use their kitchens.

“I’m forced to put my children in daycare,” she told them. “(If SB5748 is enacted) I will be able to provide an income for my family and care for my two children.”

She has two sons, ages 4 and 6, one of whom is allergic to peanuts, which is what got her into specialty cooking to begin with.

Hill’s cake recipes, in 12 different flavors, include peanut-free, gluten-free and dairy-free options. Each separate recipe had to be approved by state inspectors.

The required home inspection “went really quick,” she said. “They used me as a guinea pig, and it gave them the opportunity to see what works and didn’t.”

The Facebook connection is just a starting place, she said. “My intent is to let this run for one full calendar year. I’ll start rallying supporters and present hard evidence to legislators” about how much the cottage cooks could have made with more food products approved and a higher limit on gross sales.

That limit is now $15,000 a year. The approved product list includes breads, cakes, cookies, granola, nuts, jams and jellies and other low-risk products.

It took almost exactly one year to put the legislation into action, WSDA public information officer Mike Louisell said. The Cottage Food Act, modeled after a Michigan law, went into effect July 22, 2011, but before the agency could implement the legislation, it had to write the rules.

Louisell said 17 have applied for permits, and “We’ve heard interest expressed by about 250.”

WSDA will inspect the kitchens annually. Operations must meet sanitary standards, and operators must have a food worker card from the local health department.

WSDA estimates the cost of meeting all requirements should range from $230 to $290 a year.

By David Gumpert
29 Jun 2012
Full Article

New England town meetings typically include dozens and dozens of proposals for citizens to vote up or down, on quickly forgotten matters like new stop lights and bridge repairs.

But this year, things have been different. The residents in eight small Maine towns have all voted to declare “food sovereignty” — and they won’t be forgetting the issue any time soon. In other words, they’ve passed ordinances that explicitly allow local farmers and ranchers to sell their food — meat, eggs, unpasteurized milk, honey, veggies — directly to consumers within town borders, without state or federal licenses, permits, or regulations.

Towns in Massachusetts, Vermont, and California have all replicated these experiments, which in Vermont have all been based on a single template. And while the mainstream media is referring to the ordinances as “symbolic,” it is yet to be seen how the courts will rule.

These votes are the result of work by activists in the food sovereignty moment, who see the ordinances as a response to an ever more intensely regulated food system. On the federal level, the recent Food Safety Modernization Act could require small food producers to complete a sophisticated hazard analysis critical control point (HACCP) plan, which would be both costly and tedious. Meanwhile there has also been an increase in local health department enforcement around the country, in places like school bake sales and kids’ lemonade stands.

Activists see food sovereignty ordinances as a compromise of sorts over the thorny issue of private food distribution. And although many food safety measures and regulations were developed alongside industrial food production — and have a place in protecting consumers — many activists now believe they’ve been used to target small businesses. Food sovereignty activists feel that people have a right to acquire food — such as raw dairy products — privately through membership-based food clubs, outside the parameters of long-standing regulations that require retail, dairy, and other permits.

In a recent AP article, Maine’s state agriculture officials said the ordinances “don’t hold legal muster.” But the state’s so-called “local rule” laws could contradict this view. Via its constitution and legislation, Maine confers significant power on municipalities to enact ordinances that are local in nature, and aren’t denied by state law, like controlling town growth or banning herbicide spraying. “Maine has long been considered a strong ‘home rule’ state,” says the Maine Municipal Association.

While everyone who voted to pass Maine’s food sovereignty ordinances knew they were risking conflict with state and federal authorities, they hadn’t imagined the objections would be as swift, or intense, as they have turned out to be.

“Farmers know whether the milk is bad”

Just months after the first six towns passed the ordinances, the state filed a lawsuit against a farmer named Dan Brown of Blue Hill, Maine, for selling unpasteurized milk without a state permit. Brown says losing the suit could put him out of business, since complying with state permit requirements would be so costly as to not justify operating his two-cow dairy. He owns the cows primarily so that he can provide milk for his family, and he sells what’s left. 

“I have never had any questions from customers saying there was any problem with my milk,” Brown told the Bangor Daily News. “This has been done this way for hundreds of years. Farmers, when they milk a cow, know whether the milk is bad or not.”

Brown says the state has devoted significant investigative resources to making the case against him, and he has led several demonstrations, including one at the capital in Augusta, demanding that the state drop the suit.

While there’s no mention of the food sovereignty ordinances in the suit, and state officials have denied a connection, Brown’s defense lawyers obtained email correspondence that suggest otherwise. For instance, a Maine Dept. of Agriculture program manager sent an email in June 2011 — two months after Blue Hill’s food sovereignty ordinance was enacted — about Brown allegedly selling food at a local farmer’s market without a license. “Sounds like we have our first test case,” he wrote.

The email was one of nearly 700 pages of emails, memos, and other documents obtained by the lawyers under Maine’s Freedom of Access Act, and they provide a window into the intensity of the food sovereignty battle. Activists also found written warnings to a second farmer, Heather Retberg of Quill’s End Farm, who has been active in organizing the residents of several towns in favor of the food sovereignty ordinances. One warning reads: “If you refuse to bring your business into compliance and continue to operate in violation of the laws of the State of Maine we will refer this matter to the Attorney General for enforcement action.”

Regulation or retaliation?

The controversy has extended to the top levels of Maine’s government, including Republican Gov. Paul LePage. Last September, after hearing feedback from constituents in support of the food sovereignty ordinances, LePage wrote a memo to the head of the Maine Dept. of Agriculture, Walt Whitcomb, that read:

I am particularly concerned about over-regulating the small farms with large capital investments and costly licensing. In recent weeks I have received letters, emails and constituent visits concerning regulations involving intrastate commerce.

Attached to LePage’s memo was a proposed bill in the Maine legislature that would have allowed the sale of raw milk without a state permit. On the proposed legislation was a note that appears to be from the governor or an aide: “This statute sounds reasonable. Please advise the problem you see with it?”

Also attached was a letter from a Maine farmer, John O’Donnell, who wanted to let the governor know what was behind the food sovereignty movement. In the letter, O’Donnell wrote:

As you may know, several Maine towns passed food sovereignty resolutions last year. This was mainly driven by small farmers experiencing unfair regulations that are barriers to entry, and restraint of trade. Many of these farmers fought for the same Maine bills I did, and saw how the Subcommittee on Agriculture was mainly under the control of the large farm and dairy interests and would never let small farm bills out of committee favorably. We also saw how the Department of Agriculture testified in these hearings that there would be repercussions from the USDA or FDA if we relaxed the standards for selling poultry, milk, and other products in our local communities and state.

Under this paragraph was a hand-written note, presumably also from the governor or an aide. It read: “Why would this concern us, if the products are sold intrastate.”

There is no direct response from the Maine Dept. of Agriculture in all the documents. But the department made its opinions known this February in a form letter from Agriculture Commissioner Whitcomb. The letter was addressed to everyone who “shared … thoughts with the administration regarding local food sovereignty ordinances.”

The cache of emails show the Dept. of Agriculture having reversed a long-standing agency policy of ignoring unlicensed sellers of raw milk who don’t advertise. It also shows the department deciding to intensively investigate any illnesses reported from people who consumed raw milk, even if the illness were known to be highly unlikely to have originated from raw milk consumption.

Depositions are now being taken and arguments made in the state’s case against Brown and the trial could begin next fall.

While food sovereignty may stem from local efforts, however, it has arisen in response to a much larger problem — one that’s far from localized.

As Bob St. Peter, farmer and food sovereignty, organizer said to WABI, a local Maine TV news channel, recently, “Seventy-six million people a year get sick from foodborne illness. These are systemic problems … When people come to my farm or they come to Dan Brown’s farm they’re looking for a way out. They’re looking for an alternative to that system.”

Vermont has 99 farmers markets and 164 CSAs, with a population of fewer than 622,000, according to the 2012 Strolling of the Heifers Locavore Index, which relies on U.S. Department of Agriculture and census figures. Iowa, Montana, Maine and Hawaii rounded out the top five.

McDermott said being a locavore has changed how she and her husband eat. They used to have steak often; now it’s only once a year. She grows garlic, onions, potatoes and carrots and freezes large amounts of tomatoes each year.

“We eat low on the hog,” she said.