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Farmers say it helps secure their bottom line, and officials, both in and outside the Legislature, say it’s vital to curbing hunger.
By Sam Hartnett, for the Community News Service
Funding may be at risk for a nonprofit program that buys local food and gives it to Vermonters struggling with money — so its leaders are backing a bill that would solidify its budget through a state agency, rather than grants and donations.
Vermonters Feeding Vermonters, created and run by the Vermont Foodbank, helps get locally grown produce and protein into the hands of food-insecure Vermonters.
Started in 2018, the program provides money to purchase food wholesale from local farms, offers grants to community organizations and buys shares of community-supported agriculture programs, or CSAs.
The program is two-pronged: Farmers say it helps secure their bottom line, and officials in and outside the Legislature say it’s vital to curbing hunger.
“Rather than investing Vermont dollars in fruit from Florida or potatoes from Maine, this program designated funding to support local Vermont producers,” said Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun, D-Westminster, introducing H.167 to the Senate’s agriculture committee last Tuesday after it passed the House.
The bill looks to continue funding for the program through the Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food and Markets, with $2 million in general funds floated as a price tag.
“Food insecurity is increasing again as pandemic support programs have come to an end and with recent changes in federal funding,” Bos-Lun told the Senate committee.
According to nationwide food bank network Feeding America, 1 in 9 people in Vermont face hunger.
“The number-one thing is to reduce food insecurity, which is far too high in a very wealthy state in a very wealthy nation,” said lead bill sponsor Rep. Esme Cole, D-Hartford, in a phone call.
Since its inception, Vermonters Feeding Vermonters has been run by the Vermont Foodbank, a private nonprofit. The state has provided direct appropriations to the food bank in the past because “it’s good at what it does,” legislative counsel Michael O’Grady said in a February meeting in the House.
Officials outside the Legislature agree: The program is included in the state’s 2021-2030 agriculture plan, which states, “There is universal agreement that support for food and farm businesses must be coupled with funding and policy to enable low-income consumers to access this local food.”
Carrie Stahler of the Vermont Foodbank said the proposed legislation “codifies the relationship” between the state and the food bank. Stahler believes the bill would have an impact beyond food insecurity.
“This is part of Vermont making a commitment to farmers, local farms of all sizes and community members,” Stahler said.
The federal agriculture census reported that in 2012, Vermont had 7,338 farms. That number dropped to 6,537 in 2022, the most recent survey, with many of the closures being small dairies.
The bill originally aimed to continue the program with $2 million from the general fund, money included in the Vermont Foodbank’s total ask of $5 million. But the latest version of the bill strips away a specific dollar amount and says the state’s running of the program is contingent on an appropriation from the 2026 fiscal year general fund.
Farmers participating in the program see it as vital for their businesses, giving them a chance to compete with larger out-of-state producers.
“Produce in Vermont at this point is not making a whole lot of money … and the Boston market is very competitive,” said Melissa Mazza of Sam Mazza’s Farm Market in Colchester.
Vermonters Feeding Vermonters can give local farms an edge over those competitors by paying market value for Vermont produce specifically.
Christa Alexander of Jericho Settlers Farm has been a member of the program since its inception. The food bank provides the farm with a stable market to sell around 10-15% of its root crops.
“It’s nice to just have a known market, so that we can plan out our workflow, plan out pricing schemes,” said Alexander. In addition, the program matches her philosophy about local food.
“Being able to feed the community with food that is grown here is such a win-win,” Alexander said.
Graduate students from a University of Vermont’s food systems policy class presented a project to the House agriculture committee last week on the program, saying it has contributed $3.8 million to Vermont’s economy.
The students identified limited funding as the core issue challenging the program’s efficacy.
Small farms in particular have trouble accessing the program, as they often don’t produce large enough quantities for the Vermont Foodbank to purchase wholesale. To combat that, the Vermonters Feeding Vermonters program includes mini-grants for organizations to distribute food from smaller farms.
The graduate researchers said mini-grant funding often varies, and the grants would be more effective with constant support.
Via Community News Service, a University of Vermont journalism internship
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Categories: State Government, Vermonters Making A Difference
Taxpayer funded everything and where will this state money come from???????? There is no free market economy in this state and the grant sucking will never end.
Tax money should not go to any non-profits. We can’t be forced to pay taxes to non-government agencies regardless of how honorable and good they are. This is a common practice that needs to stop immediately. This is unconstitutional.
They change the laws to suit their purposes; Bush did this for “faith based” charities. and that gave us charities making billions of dollars bringing, bussing, housing and flying people not legally supposed to be in the country.
Their purposes are subversion.
If this program to benefit Vermont’s needy and to create more opportunities for Vermont farmers and food processors is so valuable and worthwhile, the argument should be made that it’s funding should be provided by Vermont taxpayers. If that argument doesn’t hold water, then we should not be making the plumber from Peoria and the auto mechanic from San Antonio be paying for it. Better yet, stop taxing Vermonters additionally to subsidize favored non-profits. It is beneficial to prefer locally-produced staple food, so take the funding out of the existing 3SquaresVT budget which primarily doles out garbage food.
There is also a game played every year by our legislators. And here is the classic example, we have 8 billion dollars in the state budget. Somehow, we’ve spent 8 billion dollars, and we have no money for food. If we don’t raise taxes people will starve!
See how this works?
If your neighbor was always asking for lunch money because he was broke and starving to death, yet he drives a new car, has a big house, cable tv, huge tv entertainment system, boats, etc…….and chastised you for not helping a brother out when he was starving, what would be your response?
This is the game they play in Montpelier. They have billions of dollars for all their friends and buddies, for their pet projects, for their TIFF projects, but suddenly no money for anything NEEDED. Got lotsa money for solar panels and charging stations, sorry your stomach is rumbling from no food for weeks.
It’s all a big scam. Montpelier, here’s your sign.
I think the very first thing people need to see before they agree to funding anything it’s the salaries that are being paid to people in each non profits..
That should be a required transparency for the voting public..
All we are doing is fattening the pockets of these people in nonprofits that seem to be doing pretty darn well…
Most non profits are political in nature And by funding them we are encouraging them to violate their nonprofit status.
Efficiency Vermont is a fine example of taxpayer dollars paying an entity To supposedly do good for the people in the state of Vermont.
How many middle class or lower class people have this entity help VS those that use tax breaks for Electric vehicles and solar panels that most people can afford…
We need all of the information up front not just the part of it that appeals to the bleeding hearts..
Two or 3 years ago Mark Zuckerburgs wife donated number of million to the VT Foof Shelf & they havecstill continued to cry poverty. Where did that money go on top of the fed funding we have been getting???????
https://twitter.com/i/status/1914669779928883632
Interesting thoughts
1 in 9 face hunger here in VT. Boy I got to say we have the fattest starving people in the world. We should be proud
The SNAP/3SquaresVT program allows and encourages the subsidized purchase of all manner of garbage food, so the taxpayers get to buy someone their sugary beverages through that program and then pay for their insulin through Medicaid. It’s a comprehensive program.
Richard Ley: https://www.indeed.com/cmp/Vermont-Foodbank/salaries
This link may shed some light on your initial question about salaries. This is the link I found when I googled Vermonters Feeding Vermonters.
Well, that’s interesting, so it’s a business, run by government funding, by threat of foreclosure and jail of the Vermont taxpayer. See keeping people poor is good government business. It would be much cheaper just to pay people to buy food rather then running many new entirely different non-profits or NGO’s but that would stop the grift. That would stop providing homes for Marxists in training. But they can do this, because if people realized how much was being given out for free food there would be a mutiny within the state. So instead, we do this, which costs the taxpayer probably 50% more in taxes.
Vermont is the epitome of inefficiency.