Chattanooga Pulse

For years there has been talk of an emerging “Chattlanta.” Our city’s urban sprawl is predicted by some to spread through North Georgia and melt into Atlanta’s ever-expanding borders; creating a sort of “super metropolis,” with neighborhoods and commercial development gobbling up acres of pastureland and small farms in between. Amid a sea of bumper stickers and marketing campaigns urging us to save everything from historical buildings to song birds, one could argue that there is no sentiment more important than “save our farms”…or more precisely, “save our food.”

Our region is not unique. No area of the country is immune to development. Even on a drive through a section of northern Illinois’ fertile farmland, one can see an abundant new crop of cookie-cutter houses, in perfect rows, right in the middle of dwindling cornfields. Next to the garish announcements for new neighborhoods, massive commercial sale signs line the road.

According to Sequatchie Cove Farm owner Bill Keener, it is not only difficult to make a living farming, it’s not an easy business to start. “Farming is an expensive business to get into,” says Keener, who has been farming full-time for the past ten years, “You need infrastructure and access to land. Young people usually don’t have that kind of capital.”

To Keener, protecting farmland is important—but preserving the integrity of the land is vital. Keener, his family and those that assist him at the farm consider themselves “agro-ecologists”, farming in a way that enhances the eco-system. They make decisions based on this environmental awareness and use a method called “sustainable grass farming”, an international movement that involves working closely with the soil, grass and animals by using rotational grazing. “As humans we are embedded in our environment. If our environment goes down, we go down with it,” says Keener.

Keener’s goal is to make farming a viable career path for upcoming generations. “It’s not an easy thing to make a farm really sustainable. It’s good to intern on an existing farm, learn what to do and then slowly grow into it,” says Keener, “We also need to figure out how to stimulate and assist in creating rural non-industrial agriculture based enterprises. We have been working to begin our cheese production and the state regulations have made it very difficult for us to get started. These types of enterprises need to be made easier so that farms can survive.”

“Responsibly run, well-maintained farms should be part of an area’s robust ecology,” says Joel Kimmons, whose doctorate is in nutrition. “Food and our relationship to our food is something we all share. There are so many reasons that we need a safe, secure, fair and healthy food supply.”

Kimmons points out that the existence of farmers is just as important as the existence of the land. “We are losing this human resource at a faster rate than we are losing the land,” he says. “We need to preserve our farmland—but we also need farmers to farm it and they are going broke because they can’t make a living in the current food system.”

“This mentality of turning everything into pavement and strip malls is just silly,” adds Kimmons, “Land has been in my family for several generations and as a landowner, I know we need to take care of our land.” The Kimmons family is dedicated to preserving land and educating the public. The family homestead in the Cumberland Plateau has evolved into the Sequatchie Valley Institute (SVI), a learning center and model for sustainable living.

Trish King recently spoke at SVI’s Food for Life event on the importance of preserving our area’s farmland. “I feel we need to maximize our area’s food production capability, especially when you consider things like food security and food transport. When you think about how far the majority of our food has to travel, it is just a waste of resources,” says King.
Through her work with the Tennessee Land Trust, King helps landowners ensure that, among other things, their family homesteads will not be subdivided and sold to developers. The TN Land trust carefully considers each preservation request to determine the property’s conservation value. Some determining factors include working farms, prime agriculture land, presence of wildlife and historical significance.

Nancy L.C. Steele, D.Env., points out that it is important to consider functionality of land when planning development. As the Executive Director of the Los Angeles & San Gabriel Rivers Watershed Council, Steele has studied the changes brought on by urban sprawl. “Los Angeles County used to be one of the highest producing agricultural regions in California and our Silicon Valley was once renowned as the best region for stone-fruit orchards. Those high-quality soils are under concrete and asphalt now,” says Steele, “I find it amazing that many people think that all land is the same, and that you can build on high-quality agricultural lands while expecting farmers to move to lands marginal for farming.”

Steele had a chance to visit Chattanooga as part of the Sustainable Design Assessment Team (SDAT) and will present her findings in the team’s report this summer. “In general, America’s farms provide Americans with greater food security and safety,” says Steele, “When we can buy our food direct, which can only happen if the farms are close to our cities, we can chose riper, fresher food and talk to the farmer about their practices.”

The environmental ramifications of replacing our farms with neighborhoods and commercial business go beyond the additional pollution due to excessive food transportation. “Working farmland, like all vegetation, not only emits oxygen, but also filters out the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide and other pollutants,” says Chattanooga’s Air Pollution Control Bureau Director Bob Colby. “In addition, as people move farther into the country, population density increases resulting in more cars on the road. These cars have to travel longer distances, which causes even greater amounts of pollution to enter our atmosphere. All of this negatively affects our air quality and the environment.”

Colby adds, “In my parents’ day, they simply ate whatever fruit or vegetable was in season at the time. I think the availability of quick transport and the global economy has been both good and bad. Yes, we can go to the store and get a cantaloupe in the middle of winter—but at what expense?”

So what do we do? As individuals and as a community, how can we ensure the survival of our local farms? Along with those previously mentioned, many of our other neighbors are taking steps to change our local food culture and preserve our small farms. Among them are several members of the Leadership Chattanooga class of 2009, who took on the task of assisting Crabtree Farms and a senior design class from UTC to produce and launch Chattanooga’s first local food guide, TasteBuds, this past spring.

For group member Jaime Melton, the food guide project was the catalyst needed to begin changing her own household’s food habits. “After learning about the importance of the local food economy, my family is participating in a CSA (Community Shared Agriculture) for the first time,” says Melton, “Considering the freshness of our food has changed the way I shop and prepare meals.”

Classmate Tara Poole was surprised to learn about the effect of food on the local economy. She says, “The Ochs Center conducted a study of the Chattanooga foodshed in 2008. It states that if we were to increase our spending on local foods to 5 percent of our overall consumption, it could mean as much as an additional $100 million for the regional economy.” She adds, “While we celebrate the coming of VW and other industry, we need to remember that individuals also have the power to boost the local economy.”

Rachel Fee-Prince, who works as an herbalist and food educator, buys all of her family’s milk, meat and eggs from local farmers and supplements her homegrown produce with their fresh fruits and vegetables. “I like to take my kids to the farms and talk about where our food comes from,” says Fee-Prince, “Plus, I prefer to give my money to a human being, not a far-off corporation. I like the human interaction, no chemicals, no preservatives, no shipping.”

To Fee-Prince, the farmland development dilemma has a simple solution. “As a community, we need to stop thinking that our produce and other food just come from a grocery store. If we start buying from farms, our local farmers can make a living and won’t need to sell their land to developers,” she says.

Local artisan and Bratsacks owner Jessi Harris also depends on several local farmers to supply her family with fresh milk, meat, eggs and produce. “We are members of Crabtree Farms. We support their plant sales for our garden, their food stand and by a membership donation.  We shop at the Chattanooga Market and get our milk directly from a local dairy farm.  We also shop at a co-op that has local raw cheese, butter, chicken and beef, along with hens and eggs and we purchase a quarter cow from Sequatchie Cove or another local farm,” says Harris.

The growing demand for and dependence on locally produced food stretches into the commercial market as well. Terminal Brewhouse co-owners Ryan Chilcoat and Matt Lewis firmly believe in using local products whenever possible. In addition to serving bison from Eagles Rest Ranch in Flintstone, the Terminal team has also been taking advantage of the Main Street Farmer’s Market for seasonal side items. “Not only does the local food taste better,” says Chilcoat, “It also helps to build a sense of community which is important to us. I believe that we need to embrace our local farms now because the time will come when we need them.  Events over the past couple of years have shown us that the current food system is not sustainable forever.”

Our diminishing farmland is not just a local problem. It is an issue nationwide. It is a dilemma that we need to solve; not only to rescue our current food culture and preserve one of our greatest resources but also to care for our upcoming generations. It is a challenging predicament, but is it an unsolvable problem? Some say yes, that it is too late to stop the progression of development; that overpopulation and over-availability have made this wave unstoppable. Yet there are a growing number of people saying no, that this wave can be and needs to be controlled and the momentum of development slowed down. For this to happen will take careful planning, foresight and a genuine concern for the well being of future generations. Simply put, it will require all of us to be aware and care.

Editor’s note: This is the third in our ongoing series on sustainability, connected to the Sustainability Design Assessment Team (SDAT) report. The report’s final version will be released in July.

Chattanooga’s New Food Economy Week

A week of events presented by Main Street Farmers Market focused on local food and its impact on our culture, community, ecology and economy.

• Thursday, June 18:
Movies on Main, 9 p.m.
Main Street Farmers Market will present a series of short films about Southern culture projected on the side of a building under the stars on Main Street.

• Friday, June 19:
Chattanooga’s New Food Economy public discussion at green|spaces, 6 – 8 p.m.
Partner restaurants will offer special local farm menu items.
212 Market
Lupi’s Pizza: Downtown, Hixson, and East Brainerd
St. John’s Restaurant/St. John’s Meeting Place
Tienda Jalisco
More info at green|spaces, (423) 648-0963 or greenspaceschattanooga.com

• Saturday, June 20:
Local farm breakfast specials at Niedlov’s and Greenlife.
Greenlife will be offering a farm tour to Sequatchie Cove Farm. The tour will include a cheese-tasting workshop followed by a sneak peek at the new Sequatchie Cove Creamery. A special lunch, prepared by chef Charlie Loomis, will be served at the farm. Contact Greenlife for more info at (423) 267-1960 or www.greenlifegrocery.com

• Sunday, June 21:
Visit the Chattanooga Market to celebrate Fathers Day and the summer solstice.  More info at (423) 648-2496 or www.chattanoogamarket.com

• Tuesday, June 23:
Farm tour and potluck dinner at Crabtree Farms, 5-7:30 p.m. Contact Crabtree Farms for more info at (423) 493-9155 or www.crabtreefarms.org

• Wednesday, June 24:
Main Street Farmers Market celebration with music, food, and farms.  More info at www.chattanoogafarmy.com