Violence and resulting protests this summer have many organizations seeking to understand our role in bringing about the equitable world we feel so far from right now. 
As part of seeking this understanding and change, MCA staff have been reading, and strongly recommend, "Farming While Black" by Leah Penniman of Soul Fire Farm in upstate NY. This is one of a series of posts about racial justice with resources we've found helpful from this book and elsewhere. 

Soul Fire Farm and their work to train BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color) farmers was covered in this CNN article. The piece shares a startling statistic:

"There were only 45,500 Black farmers — roughly 1.3% of all US farmers — in the United States in 2017 according to the most recent USDA Census of Agriculture. A century ago that figure was much, much higher. In 1920, the USDA counted 925,708 Black farmers, amounting to about 14% of all farmers at the time. Over the years, Black farmers have been driven off their land and faced discrimination from the Department of Agriculture.— roughly 1.3% of all US farmers — in the United States in 2017 according to the most recent USDA Census of Agriculture. A century ago that figure was much, much higher. In 1920, the USDA counted 925,708 Black farmers, amounting to about 14% of all farmers at the time. Over the years, Black farmers have been driven off their land and faced discrimination from the Department of Agriculture."

In fact, as mentioned in a previous post, the largest civil suit award in history - $2 billion went to Black farmers who for decades lost land, opportunities and other resources at the hands of the USDA as part of the 'Pigford' case. 

"Farming While Black" highlights farming  by BIPOC folks as "cultural reclamation," and a way to help ease what many call food deserts, but Ms. Penniman calls "Food Apartheid" - to highlight the fact that healthy food outlets are not placed by the wind or other natural system, but by the choices of people in power. Knock on effects of access to healthy food include stemming the tide of health disparities in communities of color. 

It all starts by securing land. We are proud to have connected over 500 acres of land with new and expanding farmers in Montgomery County. Farmers are looking for anywhere from 1-50 acres. To learn more about leasing or renting land visit our Land Link program.  

Two new Reserve farm markets are up and running this summer. Despite the Ag Reserve's local food production, it is in fact a food desert as the last grocery store closed some years ago. Like in urban areas, farmers markets can bridge the gap when full service groceries are not available.  ​
​First up, Cozzi Family Farm Co-Op Market. We connected the Cozzi Family crew with about 2 acres in Poolesville to expand their pastured poultry operation through Land Link. They have gathered a number of other farms, crafters (including face mask makers) and another Land Link match - Wildflower Farm of Dickerson. The market is happening both days each weekend in the Bassetts parking lot on Fisher Ave. See the flyer below:

Next up - Locals Farm Market with produce, pastries and pottery ordered online and either picked up or delivered for a fee. 

If you are full up on produce from your own backyard and have extra to share - here is an opportunity to share with hungry folks in MoCo. 

Thrilled to get word of a new volunteer venture that connects folks with extra garden produce (and honey and eggs, not meat, dairy). See the flyer here for details of easy drop off locations and contact info.  The organization involved also host drop-offs down county - find those here. 

Summary: ZTA 20-01 is a proposal to allow 3 square miles of commercial scale solar on farmland in the Ag Reserve. The ZTA was voted out of committee on 7/22 without meaningful protections for forests, water quality or productive soils in the only area of the county set aside for farming. The report of the county's own climate change working group needs to chart the way forward - a report that suggests taking farmland out of production for solar is not the way to achieve carbon cutting goals. This ZTA will be taken up by the Council in September, stay tuned. 

On 7/22 the T+E and PHED joint committees met for a third time to discuss ZTA 20-01. Of interest in this hearing were discussions on soils, forests and slopes. 

Soils:  In the previous hearing, the committee members discussed soil classifications 1-3 being productive soils. At MCA we thought that discussion was missing something and created this table to shows that many farms in the Reserve are growing bountiful table crops on zones 2 and 3.  Councilmember Glass must have been unclear on our aim and mentioned our table as his vote made a majority to protect just class 1 soils (the red spots below, mostly river banks that are not farmable under water conservation measures.)

Councilmember Friedson made a motion to protect soil classes 1 and 2 (red and orange and in the map above, class 3 is peach- green is higher than 3) but did not have the votes though Councilmember Jawando joined him to protect slightly less land under a different definition of prime soils. Councilmembers Friedson addressed key points on the consequences not just for soils but also economics in the Ag Reserve. Friedson urged caution and seemed to understand the Reserve's purpose - when Councilmember Riemer said "the Ag Reserve was not meant to last forever, it can change." Friedson retorted that indeed it was supposed to last forever. MCA for our part is helping the Reserve get the next generation of farming growing, the Reserve does need to change but in a way that grows more farmers and more food under the purpose it was established for - Agriculture. 

Councilmembers Friedson and Jawando also called out Councilmember Riemer's comments that attempted to negate the importance of soil classification - Riemer equated the different classes of soil to different colors of roof that solar panels might be affixed to. "Why not just only limit it to blue roofs?" He asked sarcastically.  His statement is of course ludicrous and shows a complete lack of understanding (or care?) for Ag Reserve farms, while at the same time insisting that "agrivoltaics" (growing crops in the shade and drought conditions created by beneath solar arrays) is the way of the future.  

Forests and Water Quality:
Council staff Jeff Zyontz finally highlighted what MCA has been saying for a long time, the ZTA as written has no real protections for forests. The committee added "tree removal should be minimized" and left the rest up to forest conservation efforts already in place in the Ag Reserve. On water quality, the committee declined to go beyond prohibiting arrays on 15% slopes, which still leaves lots of slopes where the channeling of water off the arrays, hitting the naked soil below them will cause extensive runoff. When wetlands were discussed, the protection of them was left to the Planning Board's site plan process, where Chair Casey Anderson has already wondered aloud why putting them in wetlands would be a bad idea. 

This ZTA is not substantively improved by this committee and serious concerns are still held by people that are otherwise supportive of renewable energy - both urban and Reserve residents. This issue is controversial as it pits environmental factions against each other. The path forward is an acceptance of the nuance and care needed to green the grid while protecting existing natural systems - which includes forests, water quality and agriculture. We can get solar right - we must first do no harm. 

Stay tuned, the ZTA is headed to the Council in September. 

MCA is the lean, tenacious and award winning organization born of and for Montgomery County's Ag Reserve. Since 2001 we have been the boots on the ground focused on the protection of the small farms in the Ag Reserve, local food production and the protection of our shared water supply. We would be honored by your financial support. 

ZTA 20-01 - a push for commercial scale solar siting on up to 3 square miles (1800) acres of the the County's Agricultural Reserve- has been a controversial proposal from the start. Reasonable people can agree that regenerative energy needs to be scaled up to meet the challenge of our lifetime (climate change) but disagree about where these commercial uses should be sited and the protections required for existing natural systems. 

At first this ZTA had no protections for habitat/forest/water quality or productive soils - in the area set aside for the protection of these things - the Ag Reserve. Councilmembers Jawando and Friedson offered amendments to try to put some of these protections in as the complex and controversial proposal was inexplicably speeding through committee despite concern from urban rural residents and unanimous opposition from the farming community. 

The second T+E (Transportation and Environment Committee) hearing took place on July 16 (full wrap up here). County staff had prepared a GIS map that showed how many acres remained for industrial solar if it were prohibited on fragile lands of different types - slopes, forests, stream buffers. 

 Once the forests, buffers and slopes where taken out, then Councilmembers had to learn more about the difference between prime soils and the different classifications of soils 1-3.  Jeremy Criss of Ag Services said that for the Ag Preservation program they do not use the "prime" designation but instead focus on classes 1-3 as "productive". 

Seeing that taking out all soils 1-3 (again, all called "productive") would leave only 3000 acres where industrial solar could be sited seemed to frustrate ZTA architect Councilmember Hans Riemer - "well, it just isn't worth doing if you take all this land out of consideration - solar providers will have to find a needle in a haystack". Riemer would rather protect soils by capping the number of acres that can be under solar as a way to protect farms. To which Councilmember Friedson said, "It's not how much solar we want, it is where we want it. There are consequences."

Watching the hearing, the map of soils looked like  a sea of colors - there was no on-the-ground nuance provided about what the different classes of soil look like and what they can grow- the consequences for failing to protect soils Friedson so rightly pointed out. This does a disservice to the discussion and the decision makers having it. 

That is why we at MCA did a bit of digging (sorry;)) and correlated the Reserve's farms to the types of soils they possess to better show the impact of this proposal. See the list of which farms are on which soil below or click here to see it bigger. 

An on the ground example - the intersection at 28 and Peach tree road as seen by the Councilmembers on the map in the hearing vs Google satellite view is instructive:
​

At left - blobs of color:
Orange= Class 2 soils
Peach=Class 3 soils
Green= higher/ "worse" than class 3
At right, the same view on Google Satellite view of two legacy table crop producing farms, Kingsbury's Orchard to the North and Lewis Orchard to the South. The blocks of dark green in the lower part of the google map (on those class 3 soils) are rows upon rows of table crops grown by Lewis Orchard, farming since 1888.  From the ground it looks like this (Lewis Orchard Facebook): 

A small sampling of  the 25+ crops they grow look like this:

Why this matters: 
Most Reserve farms are growing bountiful local table crops on soils 2 and 3 and "worse". We are looking to grow the next generation of farmers in MoCo. In our expensive region, land leases are the way to get new farmers started. All our Land Link matches in the Reserve so so far are on mixed class 2, 3 and worse soils. The landowners offering land for lease in the Reserve have the same 2/3+ soils. Under this ZTA, the landowner could either site an industrial use on that acreage or lease to a new table crop producer in the only part of the county set aside 40 years ago for that purpose. All "productive" soils class 1-3 need to be protected under this ZTA so that Agriculture can be protected in the Agricultural Reserve.

What's Next? 
The Committee will again meet on this issue at 9:30am on Wednesday (7/22) - click here to watch on YouTube. 

If you have not yet let the Council know your concerns - take two minutes to do so here- we thank you!

"Actually, it's more complicated than that." The County's GIS mapper Chris McGovern summed up the tenor of this second Transportation and Environment hearing on ZTA 20-01 which would allow industrial scale solar in the Ag Reserve without protections for soils/forests/water quality/habitat and no stipulations that the energy stay in the state much less the county.  View the whole hearing on you tube here. 

This hearing was marked by a more deliberate pace for discussing these very complicated issues. Before today, the proposal seemed to speeding toward discussion by the whole council despite robust concern expressed by residents both rural and urban and the unanimous opposition to the plan from the farming community. 

Some observations from the two hour hearing:
Haven't taken action, take two minutes to do so now:

The committee started by taking up issues on which there was much agreement. Unfortunately on the first item, that agreement is flawed. "Agrivoltaics" is the fancy word given to crops that can be grown under solar arrays. Councilmembers spent some time on this topic saying that pollinator species, table crops and even grazing can happen under these arrays. This despite the fact that a number of local farmers have written in to the contrary. While some plants may be able to be grown in the low light and reduced water under arrays, calling it agriculture is a real stretch. The Climate Change Working group has called for a pilot program to see what crops grow in our zone under arrays - a far more prudent approach.

After going over a number of small details including screening and fencing, the maps of the Reserve were pulled up. The question was how many acres were removed from possible solar projects by the scant ZTA protections as written and the more protective amendments proposed by Councilmembers Friedson and Jawando. First County GIS staff Chris McGovern took out slopes, stream buffers and parkland from consideration. Then Councilmembers had to learn more about the difference between prime soils and the different classifications of soils 1-3. Here at MCA we are working on an infographic to explain the difference in fertility between these soils. Jeremy Criss of Ag Services said that for the Ag Preservation program they do not use the "prime" designation but instead focus on classes 1-3 as "productive". 
As the coming infographic will show, most of the beloved Reserve farms are growing bountiful local table crops on soils 2 and 3. Examples include Land Linked farmer Jared of Wildflower Farm who moved here from Massachusetts and grows table crops on a few acres of leased exclusively class 3 soils. 
Also on the Reserve's class 3 soils:

• The county's first cidery (also an apple pick-your-own), Waters Orchard
• The nation's first voluntary robotic milking operation at Rock Hill Orchard/Woodbourne Creamery
• Long standing produce and orchard standby Lewis Orchards
• On class 2,3 and worse is multi generational Oak Ridge Farm of the Scott Family (Royce Hanson Award winners for their decades of farmland preservation efforts). 

As more and more protections were put on the map for slopes, forests, stream buffers and productive soils, more and more land was taken out of the running to host large industrial solar arrays. Taking out soil classes 1-3 left just under 3000 acres of the Reserve where these arrays could be sited. This frustrated ZTA architect Councilmember Hans Riemer - "well it just isn't worth doing if you take all this land out of consideration - solar providers will have to find a needle in a haystack". Riemer wants to just cap the number of acres that can be put under arrays as a way to protect farming. 
This was when Councilmember Friedson got to the crux of this issue: 
​"It's not how much solar we want, it is where we want it. There are consequences."

Friedson and Councilmember Rice both being the designated councilmembers for the Reserve then spoke to how protecting soils protects the purpose of the Reserve. "Planting food is protecting our environment, we need to see more farming in the Reserve," said Craig Rice. We heartily agree. Which brings us to-

The upshot:
As Councilmember Glass rightfully noted toward the final minutes of the hearing, a vote on this ZTA at next week's hearing is premature as he and the other non-sponsors of the ZTA are in as he says "education mode". There is a lot to learn, but the big take away must be that to protect farming in the area set aside for the purpose 40 years ago, you need to protect the soils. The 500+ acres of leased land matched through our Land Link program are on class 2,3 and higher soils. Allowing a non-Ag use to compete for this acreage will mean fewer of our next generation farmers will be able to get started close to massive (and in covid times massively increasing) demand for local food on the land set aside for farming. 

If you have not let the Council know your concerns, please take 2 minutes to do so here: 

We are proud to report that Land Link has made another match! 2 acres in Poolesville is now being farmed by the Cozzi Family Farm! Will and Alicia needed more space for their growing poultry business. On a meeting with another potential landowner match, they met Jared who started Wildflower Farm in Dickerson after a successful Land Link match last year. Now both farms are among the vendors at the Cozzi Family Farm Co-Op market each weekend in Poolesville (10-2 Sat +Sun at Basset's). Despite the Ag Reserve's local food production, it is in fact a food desert as the last grocery store closed some years ago. Like in urban areas, farmers markets can bridge the gap when full service groceries are not available.  

We celebrate every Land Link match and the landowners who join the program to lease their land, but another issue MCA is working on now could have real effects on the amount of acreage that is available to get these new and expanding farmers growing.

ZTA 20-01 is proposing 1800 acres of industrial solar be allowed in the Ag Reserve with no protections for prime soils/forests/water quality and no stipulations that the energy stays local.

Among many deleterious impacts of this ZTA, one is a chilling effect on leasing to these new farmers. In comparing the income generated by industrial scale solar to lease income from a table crop producer, there is no contest. When large scale solar is allowed in the Ag Reserve, old farmers are priced off the land and new farmers are completely shut out in the only part of the County set aside for farming.  Please take two minutes to take action.

This becomes an equity issue. As reported in the Washington Post profile of Dodo Farms, matched with an acre through Land Link in 2018, many of the farmers seeking land through Land Link represent demographics that are currently not well represented in local farming. Currently, farmers on the Land Link site looking for land include a family of Syrian refugees, immigrants from a number of different countries and a little more than half of land seekers are women and People of Color. As Woody Woodroof of Red Wiggler Farm said in our Growing Legacy film, an acre of farmland is already out of reach for many in Montgomery County, despite one-third of the county being set aside for this purpose. This was the impetus for starting our Land Link program that has led to the 500+ acres of land we have matched so far. Non-Ag uses being permitted in the Ag Reserve make these matches harder to come by.

Land Link has more in common with another MCA program, Re-Leaf the Reserve, than we previously realized. Much like the acres of tree plantings we have done so far, we aren't planting a certain number of trees, we are planting a forest. Humans are learning much more about how the trees of the forest are connected by an intricate web of mycelium, a network of fungal strands. The mycelium form links between each tree in the forest and pass resources between them as you can see in this stunning video.  

​To truly have an impact on the wider food system, it is these lateral connections that need to form just like the Co-Op market, but first we need to grow the next generation of farmers. Industrial solar is not an agricultural use and would take land out of production now and in the future. Again - please take two minutes to take action here. 

Short Background: ZTA 20-01 seeks to cite industrial sized solar arrays of up to 2MWs (around 10-12 acres a piece) on up to 1800 acres of Montgomery County's Agricultural Reserve. This is a problem because:
-The ZTA has no protections for water quality/habitat/prime soils/forests.
-Despite clims to the contrary, there are no stipulations that this energy would be part of the "community solar" portfolio for use in the County and could be sold to other states. 
-Industrial Solar is not an agricultural use. Full stop.
-The county's own Climate Change Working Group has said that putting industrial solar in the Ag Reserve could be counter productive to carbon reduction goals. 
After a public hearing in early March, the ZTA was put on hold as a result of the pandemic. The Transportation and Environment Committee (T+E) had their first meeting on the ZTA on July 9. You tube video here. Here is a wrap up.

Of the nearly 3 hour hearing here are some observations:

- Kudos to Councilmembers Jiwando, Glass, Rice and Friedson for their understanding that this issue is controversial. Renewable energy generation is necessary, but there can be disagreements about how and where it is sited to balance other carbon sequestration methods (like reforestation and regenerative ag being undertaken in the Reserve right now). 

-The Councilmembers who had not co-sponsored this ZTA also expressed the sheer volume of questions and information they needed to understand the issues at play. Councilmember Friedson at one point said, "I know nothing about the electrical grid." Cheers to our decision makers who are willing to admit what they don't know and find the answers on these complicated issues. 

-Councilmember Jiwando rightly spoke to the defensive feeling Ag Reserve stewards have to this type of proposal, a feeling that results from many, many non-ag uses being proposed for what some consider to be "empty" or "open" land. The Reserve is not a place to put what Royce Hanson, architect of the Ag Reserve has called "inconvenient infrastructure". It is, however, a place that could benefit from more small table crop producers to meet local food demand in line with it's agricultural purpose, check out our Land Link program. 

-While given very little time to make his case, Jeremy Criss of the Office of Agriculture spoke to the reasons for the unanimous opposition to this ZTA from local farmers. Half of the Reserve's farmers are leasing land and allowing large scale solar arrays would kick many of them off their leased land because of the much higher return landowners can get with solar than crop production. This is not just a commodity problem (corn,soy wheat)-  while we seek more landowners to lease small acreage to new and expanding farmers through our Land Link program, an acre of solar panels could easily be chosen over giving a new farmer their start in the only area in the county set aside for agriculture.  

-While some issues raised by testimony in the public hearing were taken up in this committee session, precious little time was spent on water quality, protection for forests or habitat. MCA and our supporters strongly oppose this ZTA as industrial solar is not a agricultural use, but at a minimum arrays must be very carefully sited to not cause environmental problems in solving another. 

The next Committee Meeting is Thursday the 16th. Please take action today.

She was in the middle of making a solid point when the screen went black.
MCA Executive Director Caroline Taylor was on zoom, making the case for protection of Ten Mile Creek, the backup water supply for 4.3 Million. Assembled in a tower of square screens were a coalition of civic organization leaders and a County Councilmember. After the two minutes it took for her to get back into the meeting, she asked when she cut out and then proceeded. In the space of an hour this happened twice. "And this," she said, "is why public participation is difficult for us out here." 

While it may surprise residents who live just down the road in Gaithersburg or Potomac, much of the 93,000 acre Ag Reserve does not have access to high speed internet and those that do find it slow and spotty. While much of the county is preparing for next generation fiber optic connectivity, parts of the Reserve don't even have broadband (which became widely available elsewhere in the early 2000s). 

The pandemic has put a fine point on the digital divide, as school, health care and nearly every other facet of life is now happening online. This poses a problem of equity, both for low income folks who can not afford the monthly price of internet and those in the Reserve  for whom reliable internet is simply not available. 

Given this barrier to connectivity, it is a worrying trend that both the planning commission and the county council are taking up proposals with far reaching and irrevocable impacts on local farms and water quality by fast tracking proposals for industrial solar on productive farmland, reneging on protections for Ten Mile Creek and subverting the adequate school capacity policy (If you have not taken action with our two minute action tool, click the links to do so.)

From behind eternally loading screens, we request that important conversations about big changes wait till everyone can be fully involved. 

At MCA we have been a organization focused on assisting farmers equitably but protests against structural racism have put a fine point on the ways that BIPOC (Black, Indigenous and People of Color) have lost out on opportunities across our society, including opportunities to own land and farm. The discrimination from the USDA against Black farmers was so well documented that in 1998 they had to settle two class action lawsuits with black farmers to the tune of  $2 Billion.  To learn more, staff is reading "Farming While Black" - an acclaimed book by Leah Penniman, Co-Owner of Soul Fire Farm outside Albany, NY. We want to not just recommend this book but share things we've learned. This is the first in a series of posts on "Farming While Black".

Each February, during Black History Month, the life of George Washington Carver is highlighted. Dr. Carter was a scientist who showed the world the many uses for the humble peanut. What does not get taught in these history lessons is why Dr. Carter was so focused on this one legume. Peanuts, like other members of the pea family fix nitrogen in the soil to make it available to other plants. In the early 1900s, cotton had stripped southern soil completely of nutrients. and rotating crops with peanuts could put fertility back into the soil for sharecroppers in the South. So, patenting 101 uses for the peanut was not a sign of a man obsessed with one crop, but the father of regenerative agriculture being savvy about the economics of crop rotation.

CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture), another modern pillar of the local food movement was popularized  in America by another Tuskegee University Alum, Dr. Booker T Whatley. During his stint in the Korean War he operated a 55 acre hydroponic farm to feed the troops. Once back home, he set up “clientele membership clubs” akin to the modern subscription style CSA. He saw these clubs not as just ways to feed people but also let them see farms up close - the beginnings of the Agrotourism movement. He said, "We're bringing up whole generations in this country today that don't even know how collards or chickens are raised. So some parents see a farm visit as a wholesome and pleasant educational experience for their youngsters . . . one that the entire family can share. The average middle-class city person likes a chance to get out on a farm. It's a form of entertainment, and those folks can save money while they're having a good time.”  
Dr. Whatley suggested that these farms offering clubs should be no more than 40 miles away from population centers to keep connections with club members. This of course reminds us of the Ag Reserve where residents can really know their farmer and participate in modern CSA programs (find your farmer here). 
​
​Read more on Dr. Whatley in this great article here.

Modern farming owes a lot to BIPOC. We will continue to share what we are learning in hopes we can move toward a more equitable food system. Thanks for reading along.