The Ward 8 Farmers Market (1310 Southern Avenue SE) is a community and local farmer-based grassroots market formed as a response to inadequate healthy food choices in Southeast D.C. and as a self-empowerment tool. The goal of the market is to help members of the community eat fresher, more natural and nutritious foods, and adopt healthier lifestyles for their long-term benefit as well as their children, families, and society. Organizers John Gloster and Virginia Major discuss how the market got started and its community impact. Click here to view a map of the market’s location.

[Pictures courtesy of Maurice Fitzgerald.]

Ward 8 Farmers Market opened its first ever Tuesday market at United Medical Center last month.  Part of the excitement of a market is always that transformation of a little bit of city real estate into something very different.  The transition is not always simple, as we learned at about an hour before  opening when a few drivers rolled their vehicles right between the tents during setup, seeking the elusive parking space. Our first lesson was to abandon a wide-open, welcoming look and get some cones into place.

The first market of the year, especially in a new location, always has a bit of a party feeling for the market manager and vendors, including a nervous stomach flutter as you wonder if the guests are actually going to show up.

The team at the United Medical Center (UMC) Foundation did a tremendous job of generating excitement within the building.  Starting when the market opened at 3, a steady stream of staff in scrubs and suits ran out of the building to shop. In a sign of UMC’s commitment, hospital CEO Frank Delisi was on hand. Calvin Smith, head of the foundation, was a major presence all afternoon.

When the morning shift got off work at 3:30, to our delight, many in the throng stopped by to visit the tents before they headed for home.  Although many of them had seen the posters, ads, signs, and emails, there is nothing more enticing than glancing out the window and seeing that our farmers have really brought their produce, baked goods, potted plants, and even lemonade out to the heart of Southeast.

The connection between access to fresh food and access to medical services is big at this location.  It is the site of several clinics, including a WIC mobile clinic.  The National Children’s Medical Center will be establishing an outpost of their emergency department there later this summer. This location not only makes fresh food more convenient to buy, but links people who have food access issues to medical professionals who are also produce enthusiasts.

Perhaps the biggest factor in bringing fresh food to the residents of Southeast is affordability. The Ward 8 Farmers market accepts all forms of nutrition assistance that apply, including EBT, and the Farmers Market Nutrition Program (FMNP) for WIC and Commodity Supplemental Food Program for senior citizens. The very first customer I handled paid with a coupon from the Senior FMNP, in fact. By the time the market closed at 7, we had only seen a couple more of those, but we know there are several housing developments catering to seniors in that stretch of Southern Avenue.

That first day, about five percent of our sales were paid using food assistance.  As June turned into July, that percentage rose, as we got the word out in the community and became less dependent on the doctors and nurses, who tend not to be eligible—despite their student loan obligations.  Sure enough, at the July 20 market, 40 percent of our business was from customers receiving help.  As the summer goes on, we hope to see new faces turning into regulars.

Michael Segal is the market manager for the Ward 8 Farmers Market.

In the round of the zoning update on food issues, I didn’t see fit to submit comments about urban agriculture, even though I guess I should have. Evidently, it’s still gonna be close to impossible to have poultry, not to mention there is little discussion of urban orchards, urban forestry, and other issues, even though people are concerned about “food deserts” and access to fresh foods.

According to the Washington Business Journal, in Cheh introduces “grocery ambassador” bill, Councilmember Mary Cheh has introduced legislation on the topic, calling for a grocery czar amongst other steps, but I think the legislation is somewhat narrowly conceived because this issue is about more than just trying to attract some grocery stores.

The real issue is a comprehensive plan for food security and foodways in the city. Grocery stores are but one piece.

The Community Food Security Coalition is an organization broadly focused on food access. Toronto and a number of other communities across North America have created “Food Policy Councils” to focus on food access at the local level, especially in urban places, and work to make more direct links between urban and rural food policy. (The bookThe Edible City looks broadly at Toronto’s foodways, food policies, and food industries. This paper, Food Policy Councils: The experience of five cities and one county, from 1994 discusses the disconnection of cities from foodways policymaking.)

Food Trust in Philadelphia has pushed food security and initiatives to increase the availability of fresh foods and supermarkets in underserved areas in the city and state.

Finally, the Economic Research Service of the USDA has created aCommunity Food Security Assessment Toolkit which provides a more systematic method for evaluating community food security and a planning framework for improvements.

The issue is tricky.

First, there is a conceptual problem with the food desert issue, because of how new urbanists and such are defining the need for access–a grocery store within easy walking distance–and the reality of how the supermarket industry is organized and focused on providing stores of 50,000+ square feet, serving retail trade areas of 50,000+ residents in a retail trade area five miles in diameter.

The reality is that not every neighborhood is large enough to support a full line grocery store the way that the grocery industry is set up to “deliver” supermarkets. Plus, many people are cost-conscious and end up patronizing stores where prices are lower (as opposed to smaller neighborhood-based stores). And the industry has worked hard at closing smaller, neighborhood stores in favor of larger single stores serving many neighborhoods.

Second, there are many grocery stores accessible to DC residents in neighborhoods that are seemingly understored, but the stores happen to be located just outside of the city in Maryland.

Washington Post image from the 2007 article “Signs of Change Line the Shelves.”

Third, we need to look at farmers markets and public markets more systematicaly as a way to deliver fresh foods to residents, not so much in the higher-income areas of the city, but in the “food desert” areas. Although these areas are hard places to make such markets work if their prices are higher than typical supermarket prices.

Fourth, plus working with store sizes significantly smaller than 50,000 s.f. and with extant companies, from corner stores to affiliates of Murray’s stores, and companies that aren’t necessarily the region’s largest supermarket chains, and independents–finding companies that are innovative and able to understand the center city as a market that is distinct and different from the suburbs.

I don’t know why it is so hard in the U.S. to find a company like Sobey’s, one of Canada’s more innovative suprmarket companies, with a couple divisions focused on center city locations. See “How Sobey’s is taking on Loblaws” from the Toronto Globe & Mail and “Grocery chains develop a taste for urban living” from the Toronto Star.

Fifth, related to both 3 and 4 concerns how such entities are organized. A faux “public market” with 10-15 different vendors, along the lines of how Baltimore’s Belvedere Square is organized, is a way to assist the development of retail entrepreneurialism as well as extend food access by working with smaller entities to offer “departments” within a common space, where the overall effect is the creation of a complete array of food offerings, but through multiple businesses rather than only one.

Sixth, not to mention nutrition education. The issue isn’t merely access to nutritious food, but actually purchasing and eating such food. For a number of years, I have recommended that demonstration-teaching kitchens be incorporated into Eastern Market and Florida Market, as a way to teach better nutrition.

Seventh, plus urban agriculture, including community gardening, orchards, and forestry.

—–
I suppose I just put myself out of the running for the grocery ambassador position…

[Cross-posted from Beyond Bread.]

Aaaand we’re gleaning again!

On Saturday, more than a dozen Bread for the City volunteers drove down to Parker Farms in Colonial Beach, VA. Some of our volunteers were BFC donors; others found out about the project from an NPR story about it last year; and still others learned about it from the DC Food For All. All of them were ready to roll up their sleeves and come to the rescue of the farm’s surplus sweet corn.

There was more out there than we’d expected. We gleaned just one acre out of 100s that were available to us, and left at the end with more than 1,700lbs of corn in tow. Farmer Rod Parker met us in the fields, and at the end of the day he told me, “my only complaint is that you didn’t bring enough bins.”

Why is so much corn left in the farm’s field? Here are some reasons:

1) Human error: laborers inevitably miss a certain amount of corn that is market-ready and perfect. Farmers often opt not to pay for a second pass through the fields, but are happy for volunteers to come do it.

2) Undersized/under ripe: corn that is too small to sell is left behind, even if it is edible. Shoppers are so picky that almost every type of produce has size minimums and shape requirements. Under-ripe corn is also left behind. It’s not as tasty or filling, but still edible — and often ripened by the time we get to it.

3) Damaged: corn that has been eaten or broken. There wasn’t actually that much corn that was actually damaged, and we left it all behind too. There was way more of the good stuff to be had.

This successful trip marks the launch of the second year of Glean for the City, a project that already feels like a cherished tradition around here. Last year, we rescued 50,000 lbs. of fresh, surplus produce from farms and farmers markets, including apples, bell peppers, broccoli, and a plethora of other fruits and veggies — an average of 2,000 lbs. of fresh produce every week! All for free, all food that otherwise would have gone to waste, but instead went to the kitchen table of the DC residents who need it the most.

The farmers love it, our volunteers love it, our clients love it, and our community was so enthusiastic about it that you all helped us win a contest on the internet, ensuring that we had enough funding to cover the cost of a full-time coordinator to manage the program. (Speaking as this year’s new coordinator, I want to say thank you!)

You’ll be really excited by what we have in store this year. First of all, we’ve extended the gleaning season by one month, and connected with new farm partners to bring in more quantity and a healthier variety. We aim to bring in 3,000 lbs per week this time. And we’re even partnering with other local food pantries to run coordinated gleanings and share the bounty!

In fact, I hope to someday honor our Food Pantry Director Ted Pringle’s goal of ultimately replacing all canned vegetables in our pantry with farm-fresh produce.

If you’re interested in volunteering, or if your community group or organization might want to partner with us, please email me. In the meantime, if you’d like to support this work, you can help us cover the cost of transportation and other things like bins, bags, gloves, and so on, by making a donation to Glean for the City today.

How much food could you buy for $16 per month?  Furthermore, what could you buy for $16 that would be nutritious and didn’t involve fast food joints?  For too many individuals in our community, the $16 thought experiment is actually a reality.  As of April 2009, the minimum SNAP (formerly food stamps) benefit is $16 per month. Sadly, this is an increase from the previous minimum of $14 per month.

So, how are SNAP recipients to cope? The good news is that with a bit of planning, $16 can go a lot further at the grocery store than you might think!  Join the Capital Area Food Bank’s Director of Nutrition Education, Jodi Balis, on July 22nd as she facilitates an interactive workshop on how individuals can stretch their food budget–and still eat nutritious meals. This workshop is aimed at service providers as they seek to communicate healthy eating on a budget to clients.

The Nutritious $16 Food Bag
11am-1pm on Thursday, July 22^nd
George Mason Regional Library
7001 Little River Turnpike
Annandale, VA 22003

Click here to register for this free workshop.

If you are interested in other free workshops offered by the Capital Area Food Bank, check out this website or send an e-mail to aaa@capitalareafoodbank.org.

Donate it to us!

At the Capital Area Food Bank we can take donations of fresh produce anytime between 8:30am-4:30pm Monday through Friday. Drive up, dash in, drop off, fill out a 2 minute donation form, and you are off!There is no schedule or advanced notice required. It’s that easy!

Looking for something more sustained? We have a partnership program called Grow A Row that pairs your beautiful garden with a neighborhood non-profit feeding program. You donate directly to them through the end of the growing season.

Visit our Grow A Row webpage or email us for more information about donating fresh produce.

Happy Growing!

Thanks to our garden manager Chris Turse (and other staff, volunteers, and our youth workers, of course), the garden looks the best that it ever has. So if you haven’t been out for a visit in a while (or ever), please do so!

This event will be the kickoff of our new Nature Explore Classroom, a project with the Arbor Day Foundation and DC Urban Forestry. We’ll also be celebrating our new honey bee hive and will have our beekeeper, Toni Burnham, here to give a show and tell. There will be food, live music, and gardening themed activities for children too.

Please see our website for more details and directions.

By: Bella Herold

At 6:30am on Tuesday June 1^st, I sat in a van with Andrea Northup, Coordinator of the D.C. Farm to School Network, and her colleague Scott Lewis, Director of Food Services for a school food service provider, mesmerized as the D.C. highway slowly transitioned into a beautiful countryside: rolling hills and lots and lots of green.  Within two hours, we saw plots of farmland, barns, cows, horses, and rows of crops fill the landscape.  We passed a horse-drawn carriage and Mennonite women in long dresses and bonnets going about their day.

By the time we arrived at the produce auction, the open-air marketplace was already filled with yards of fresh fruit and vegetables, hanging plants, carts of melons, lines of herbs and various plant varieties.  Farmers unloaded and stood by the fruits of their labor, jubilant, smiling, and eager to engage in conversation about their crops.  Our mission was to purchase about 200 heads of lettuce for the D.C. Farm to School Network’s upcoming Strawberries and Salad Greens event.  The greens would be served as part of school lunches in cafeterias across the District.

The auctioneer spoke into his microphone, quickly describing each item for sale, how many boxes of it you could buy, and starting bids.  Individuals signaled if they were interested in making a purchase, and, just as quickly as each sale began, it ended and the auctioneer moved onto the next item.  A crowd of people gathered around the products and the auctioneer and we followed him from product to product.  Andrea purchased Romaine, curly leaf, and red leaf lettuce, a few boxes of yellow squash, and several green cucumbers for a few schools.  After some fresh pie and ice cream from the small food stand, we left and loaded up with boxes upon boxes of fresh produce in tow.

The next day was the Strawberry and Salad Greens Event.  I volunteered at the E.W. Stokes Public Charter School, one of the schools that received lettuce from the Auction.  I worked with two other volunteers to set up a table in the cafeteria before the first students arrived for lunch.  We displayed a blossoming strawberry plant, a photograph of a strawberry farm and a lettuce farm, lettuce seeds, a small lettuce plant, a large head of lettuce, gardening tools, and a map of the local farms where the strawberries and lettuce from the kids’ lunch had traveled from with respect to the District.  The students were served lettuce we had just bought from the auction and strawberries from a West Virginia farmer.

After eating their meals, students and teachers approached us and were pleasantly surprised by the small green strawberries growing on the strawberry plant.  Some kids told us that their families had just started vegetable gardens at home and others stared in awe at the baby lettuce plant and tiny lettuce seeds.  Enticed by their friends’ excitement and the promise of Strawberry and Salad Greens event stickers, more students approached us as we inquired how their salads tasted and explained where the food came from. Kindergarteners came to play with the gardening gloves and watering can, but stayed to examine lettuce seeds and the petals on the strawberry plant.  One student ate her strawberries while peering at the strawberry plant in front of her.  The students tasted the freshness and crispness that resulted from the hard work, effort, and motivation the farmers put into their crops.

I will continue to volunteer with the D.C. Farm to School Network regularly in the upcoming months, and look forward to making events like this one successful.  One thing I learned from the whole experience–hard work, effort, and motivation tastes pretty good.

Save Virginia Avenue Park from Roadside Organics on Vimeo.

I recently returned from a four-month culinary tour of Southeast Asia.  Since stepping off the plane, folks ask about what impressed me most.  My answer is always the same:  farms, farmers, farming.  I can’t count the number of farmers markets I’ve visited in the US.  I loved the farm-to-table idea, but the act of farming itself – painstakingly coaxing treasure from dirt – seemed remote and abstract.  Until I trekked distant Asian roadsides, far from the reigns of the supermarket.

Kneeling in dusty, sun-baked fields, just a few miles from where I had enjoyed my last meal, I could feel that food wasn’t just a product of rich soil.  It grew too on the care and passion of those who grew it – who in turn seemed to find an important piece of themselves in providing for their neighbor’s table.  So different from home – where grazing is limited to supermarket aisles, and farms so remote they seem almost a literary fiction.

It needn’t be this way.  In fact, in some fortunate parts of our city, it isn’t. Just days after returning from Asia, I read that the Marines might occupy one of the city’s premier growing spots, the Virginia Avenue Community Garden.  From the controversy that erupted, you’d have thought the Marines had choppered in, already locked and loaded.  After four months walking and talking with farmers half-a-world away, I could understand why.

For years, the land the park now occupies withered with urban decay—an unused city lot at 9^th and L Streets SE.  But the Barracks Row neighborhood now buzzes with hip new restaurants, bars, and boutiques.  Just a few blocks away, the Virginia Avenue Park has undergone a stark transformation too, from derelict lot to fruitful garden.

Over the past six years, a diverse caste of District families banded together to rebuild the Park. When I visited this past weekend, the spirit of the gardeners was intoxicating: a resolute group that believes this space is central to their revitalizing neighborhood. The gardeners represent a broad cross section of the city – old punk rockers, young families, government workers, retired military personnel – each with their own stories.  But all their stories share a common theme:  how the park with its fertile soil grew and enriched the soul of their community.

Sure, you can spend fifty dollars at the Dupont Circle farmers’ market, and gather ingredients for a special meal.  But for fifty dollars a plot per year, the Virginia Avenue Community Garden not only makes fresh, organic food available to a far-broader cross-section of District families.  Its beauty, its shared sense of growing something important together, can anchor a community far better than any number of new bistros and bars.  We should keep the Garden.

We’ll work on Saturday, July 24, from 10 a.m. – 1 p.m. So bring your enthusiasm, good company, and a dish if the fancy strikes you. We’ll help out with things such as:

• mounding potatoes
• securing drip tape with hangers
• woodchipping
• weeding
• planting!
• securing tomato plants
• processing cured garlic
• potentially helping dig a rain garden

RSVP to Xi Wang at cele8stial@gmail.com by July 18 if you are interested in helping out and let us know if you can bring some food to share. Let’s get dirty!