Politics of Food: Grassroots Meets the Pavement

The Kansas City Food Policy coalition met today to discuss distribution and production policy as a committee of the group. As meeting facilitator Katherine Kelly with the KC Center for Urban Agriculture indicated in her email announcement, the meeting focused "on policy issues that affect the production, distribution, and access of healthy, local food...which will be taking the lead on figuring out what city/state/federal policy initiatives we could create or get involved in that would help strengthen the local farming and distribution community."

As a newcomer to the group interested in their direction and progress, I noted there was a good collection of representatives from many different types of organizations: local growers, CSA distributors, government health educators, financial foundation sponsors, environmental groups, and university agriculture programs. Several individuals addressed jobs for urban core youth and economic development for the same area. The food policy group knocked around policy ideas suggested by members of the group, including helping small rural farmers adopt cooperative models to leverage purchasing power.

Tina Wurth with the Lincoln University suggested the group support different policies for the urban core, noting the incorrect perceptions about a high level of vandalism and stealing in urban grocery stores. She suggested supporting small businesses in the urban area as a way to improve access to affordable food and counter trends of large stores bailing on the inner city. She also highlighted the financial support for an agriculture program at Kansas City's East High School as a way to engage youth and develop positive concepts about food access and consumption in the city.

Another discussion revolved around how to get produce from gardens or farms, like the one at 1900 East 23rd Street developed by Marty Kraft. He indicated the lack of car traffic as a hindrance to selling the produce. Another person was developing a mobile market and suggested connecting the mobile function with gardens like Kraft's as a way to bring the produce to market.

The facilitators -- Katherine and Becki DeRusseau  -- tasked with getting people involved in drilling down further into the policy ideas committees came up with several categories: institutional procurement practices, land in urban settings, WIC/SNAP/Senior feeding programs, food safety at farmers market, and lack of farmers and youth involvement.

The policy group's fresh energy includes a vast and diverse array of groups and individuals, and seems to stand up to their expansive vision to "advocate for a healthy food system and promote policies" around health in KC. Looking around the room at familiar faces shows their effort starts with a grassroots approach that meets the pavement ready for serious work to make a difference in Kansas City.

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