 Welcome to the Ag committee, Senate Ag committee, January 4th, which is my son's birthday today. Well, how does it... Yeah, so I can always remember that day pretty well. And so we have a group of folks here to talk about food security and how that's all going. We'll run a committee to introduce ourselves and then we'll call on you folks. I don't know. We've got an order, but if that doesn't affect your schedule for any recent... Yeah, probably call a more representative of Rutland's district. Irene Reber, Senator Ford, Chittenden North, Wishing for the Surface. This is Brian Campion from Denny Tech, and I'm Rich Westman, and I'm the Senator from Lone Point District. And Pauline Starr from Orleans to Cali. Welcome all of you to the committee. Yeah, you've got plenty of time this morning, so everybody should be able to be heard. Is there any particular order that you'd like to go in? Yeah, I'll be... Good morning. I will be emceeing our presentation today, so I'll give a start and then I'll call on whoever is next. Yeah, that sounds like a plan. Thank you. Thank you for the opportunity to testify today. My name is Becca Warren. I live in Heartland, and I work at the Vermont Sustainable Jobs Fund. I'm the Farm to Plate Network Food Security Project Manager, and I'm here with other Farm to Plate staff and Farm to Plate members. I wish I was there in person to demonstrate how we are bursting at the seams with excitement to bring you the Vermont Food Security Roadmap to 2035, which I see Jake passed out. Thank you, Jake. So the roadmap charts the path for the state of Vermont to make policy choices that will ensure food security for everyone who lives here by 2035. To ensure everyone in Vermont has the food they need every day. And we are particularly glad to share our excitement with the Senate Committee on Agriculture today. It was your decision to create the Farm to Plate Network 13 years ago that has built the partnerships and strategies that led to this food security roadmap and will lead to food security by 2035. Sorry. The Vermont State, the Vermont Farm to Plate Strategic Plan directed us to improve access to healthy local food for everyone by creating a detailed implementable roadmap to food security. We have spent two years developing this document and surprised ourselves with how powerful and impactful a roadmap we made. So it's your Farm to Plate vision that has led to a powerful coalition committed to working with you to achieve this transformational plan. And today we will give an overview of the roadmap. We will talk to some of our organizations about their commitment to executing the roadmap. And we'll share how our collective action is accessible because the state took leadership on food security. So we'll start with testimony from Anor Horton of Hunger Free Vermont who's in the room. Joey Lehulier of Footbrook Farm who's on Zoom. And Monica Collins of Feeding the Valley who's also on Zoom. So we have a lot of detail and a walkthrough of the roadmap document. And then we'll hear from Abby Willard and Stephanie Bergen about the commitment of the Agency of Agriculture and Department of Health. I do respectfully request that we wait for questions until we finished our prepared testimony. We've timed our presentation. So we have ample time for discussion and we're really looking forward to that. The roadmap shows us how to ensure everyone in Vermont has the food they need and is organized under three goals that we will achieve by 2035. The goals and the objectives and strategies they contain are based on the expertise of over 600 people in Vermont who took the time to share their opinions, expertise and personal knowledge of food security. So the three goals we'll reach by 2035 are government ensures food security for all in Vermont. Vermont farms have the resources to be resilient. Communities have the tools to support food security. And Anor, Joey and Monica are here to kick us off with how these goals are important to their work in the state. So Anor, can you, are you ready to go? All right. Thank you. Becca, we, we don't operate like a lot of committees we have short memories. And sometimes we, we usually ask questions as we go through the witnesses. I'd ask the members that you have questions, jot them down and we'll, we'll try to go by the rules that Becca's had. So, welcome. Good morning. Good morning senators it's so lovely to be back in the Senate committee on agriculture with you all thank you for having me this morning. I'm Anor Horton, I'm a resident of Williskin, and I'm the executive director of hunger free Vermont. And I'm also a member of the steering committee that took those that all that feedback from the 600 people from all around Vermont and expertise from a lot of different experts and has been part of the group that has turned all of that into the food security roadmap that you have in front of you today. And also here today as a founding member of the mass feeding group. And that was established by Vermont's SCOC in the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic. When it became clear that the pandemic was also a hunger crisis. And really a hundred crisis that hasn't abated yet. And that food access and food security were not effectively woven into our emergency response systems in the state. The mass feeding group continues to this day as a place where state agencies and nonprofits that are together accountable for ensuring food security can keep in regular communication and strategize together. The value of the mass feeding group and the realization that the goal of food security is not consistently well integrated into government operations. That was something that led directly to my own personal passion for committing time over the last two years to help to create the Vermont food security roadmap to 2035. And all of us are here today. We're not here to like explain everything in that roadmap to you because that would take even longer than the generous amount of time that you've allowed us today. But we're here to infuse you with the same passion that we all feel for creating a future of food security for everyone in Vermont. So, every time that we got together as the steering committee to work on creating the food security roadmap, we paused and we tried to imagine what it would be like if we were actually standing in 2035. And we knew that everybody in Vermont had food security and climate resiliency, and that our agricultural sector was thriving and providing for our people. And I invite everybody in this room right now to imagine that day. Imagine that hidden hunger does not exist in Vermont because everybody has the food we need. Imagine the possibilities available when nobody in Vermont is hungry. Imagine that we had all worked together in our mutually supporting roles to create permanent, equitable, Vermont grown food security for all. How proud, how joyous, how fulfilled we would all feel to know that we have dedicated our lives and our work to achieve this outcome, and that we had succeeded. And we are here today because we believe that this roadmap, if we follow it, we will actually succeed. We will actually achieve that amazing outcome in 2035. So the Vermont Food Security Roadmap leads with the goal that our government ensures food security for all in Vermont. And none of us would be here today, and you're certainly not shocked to see me here today, representing that goal. But none of us would be here in this room today if we didn't believe that food security is a policy choice that we can make. We know this is true because of all the policy choices that this committee and this legislature has already made, and that have already put us on the road to food security in Vermont. So we're already on this roadmap. We're on the road. You created and funded the state Farm to School and Early Childhood Grants program. You created and funded the Vermont Farm to Plate Network, as Becky said. You created and funded the local food purchasing incentive program for our schools. You've begun supporting our critical meals on meals and charitable food networks with base funding and budget funding. You have made Vermont, my personal favorite, of course, the sixth state in the country to provide permanent universal school meals for all students in our public schools. You supported Vermont farmers and Vermont producers in many innovative ways that other people in this room are more expert to provide you of an item, but you know that you've done that. And in this current legislative session, we have a lot of new opportunities to take down this road to food security and get to the next hut together. You can provide additional base funding for the Vermont Food Bank Network and for meals on meals. You can provide funding to NOFA Vermont to support the crop cash program. You can pass S215, which is a bill that would launch the SNAP restaurant meals program here in Vermont and move toward giving three squares of Vermont a boost. So food benefits are more adequate for more Vermont households. When it passes over to your side, you can pass what's now H701 to expand to the Vermont earned income and child tax credits. So lower income working families can keep more of what they earn and have that money available to create food security for themselves. You can support the land access and opportunity board and working lands. And those are just some of the key pieces of legislation and appropriations requests that are on the table and that are directly contributing to taking us further down the path laid out in this roadmap. So you can see that our collective action has already begun and it is more necessary than ever. People are struggling with hunger in Vermont. I know I need to tell you that because you talked to your constituents and you know that that's the case. And so we it's more necessary than ever that we work together to ensure food security across Vermont. In times of crisis, as we had with the pandemic and with the flooding this past summer, and also times of calm, which I hope we get some of soon. We look forward to continuing our work together and we thank this committee for leading the way as you are doing now and as you always have. And I'm now going to hand things over to Joey. Thank you. Thank you. Joey, I think it's going to be on. Hi. Senators, thank you also for letting me come and talk to you this morning. The first thing, so if you don't know me so footbrook farm. Johnson Vermont. Tony and I run the farm and we do about 30 acres of organic vegetables and fruit. And we have a farm stand that is more run like a store from June to November. We have it fully staffed seven days a week. And we also do wholesale through deep root and we have some wholesale accounts in Vermont. And so that's us. The first thing I want to say is when I read this roadmap. I was like, wow, this is amazing if we could actually put this in place. It would just absolutely be amazing. And I really want to thank everyone that was involved in putting this together because it was obviously a tremendous amount of work and a lot of thought put into the problem with food security, but also the problems that farmers face and trying to make that happen. I see every day at the farm stand, obviously when we're open, the challenges that my community has in getting food, especially since you all know that in July with the flood, the grocery store was flooded and went out of business and decided not to return. And since then, we had somebody interested in that location, but they after December flood. So we had the second worst flood and then the fourth worst flood and Johnson. And after that December I don't, I don't see, there's no, nobody that's interesting coming back to that spot as I understand it right now. So it became very important in my community for local whole vegetables and fruit. We do have two convenience stores and a dollar general, but those are not great for if we want people to eat super nutritionally. So, one of the things in the roadmap talks about Vermont farms need the resources to be resilient. And some of those resources are, are through, you know, there's a NOFA farm match program and you know we accept SNAP and ABT at the farm stand and we have for many years I want to say since 2016. And then we've been part of the match program since 2019. And those programs are in, in the roadmap. And they are essential for me being able to help make sure that our community that has a very low budget for food can come into the farm stand and feel that they have the resources to buy it. So, in the short term, you can fund there's $478,000 that's being asked to put that into the budget that will help fund that program. And that's the short term and if you can help make that happen that will help us immensely to be able to get you know anybody that walks into the farm stand right now, whether they have the money on their ABT card or their debit cards or in their pocket. Nobody walks out of this that farm stand without food, whether they can pay for it or not. But as a business as you might, as you know, I need to be sustainable so that I can take care of my employees. During the flood, right after the flood, of course, having it be in July is like the worst time every farmer will tell you, worse time to have something happen because you're just about to harvest you're just about to make back all the money that you just invested into your season. So one of the things in the roadmap is, you know, making sure that we're resilient and that there's an emergency fund available. Had we not had our community, and our people and a go fund me, I would have had to have laid off all our employees within two weeks. I didn't. There was, again, worse times in the year to have a flood. So, this roadmap is something that really could keep us in business because we would have, we would have to send everybody home. So I just that there's some things in this roadmap that are hugely important. Tony and I, as the farm, as a business, we have the responsibility to be ready for the next weather event, and we're putting a lot of things in place to make sure that that happens. But we really could use some extra help to make sure that the next thing that inevitably will probably happen that we're that we're ready for and that we can count on on you to help get us through it. And like the, like the roadmap says, Vermont farms need the resources to be resilient. So, thank you very much for letting me speak today and considering putting this roadmap into action. Thank you. Thank you. Where's your farm located? St. Johnson, Vermont. South of Johnson or. We're actually just west of the village. So we're in Lemoyle County. We're in the middle of the river. Did you flood out? Do you lose everything? Yeah, we, so all of our, we lost about, I think we're still trying to figure all of that out, but we lost at least 75% of our crops, which is devastating all by itself. But our biggest problem was that the flood came into our equipment shed. So we had 13 tractors underwater and we buy feet of water in our barn. And what I can tell you is that we were going to be moving that equipment shed as soon as we possibly can. And we also had we, had we known what that flood was going to do, we would have moved the equipment. The, the things that are in place to give us, you know, an idea of how much flooding we're going to see the NOAA sites and all that were really not, they were so wrong for that particular event. But we will not just be counting on that next time. Thank you, Mr. Chair. So Joey, can you just be a little more specific about one of the things that you are going to do looking ahead to sort of get ready for the next event. You mentioned moving the shed. Is there, are there other things that you're contemplating? We're contemplating a lot of things. Some we do have, so most farmers will tell you that flood plain soils are the best to grow in. Trying to convince my husband not to grow on, you know, we don't grow within a quarter of a mile of the river. And we have, you know, we've worked with NRCS and everybody. We have a wonderful bank. We have all the proper bushes and trees and everything that are protecting it. So we don't grow down by the river, but we are definitely trying to get some soils that are, we have a couple of higher up fields. So we're trying really hard to get those soils ready so we can plant more uphill. And also just, you know, move stuff around the best we can as far as the crops go. But again, crops are something that you can, you can lose every year to all kinds of different things. And we can be pretty resilient with that because we're really diversified. But moving the equipment, making sure that we move the equipment no matter what that flood is saying it's going to be, is going to be huge. And then also protecting our barn. We're going to do some things to put more things up higher, put pallets, you know, we'll just be way more ready for the next one than, than we were this time. Had we known it was going to rise to, I think it's 21 2223 feet. We understood where the water was going to go, but we just wouldn't have that kind of, that kind of information. So we're going to put our own cameras and all kinds of different things around so that we can see what's happening for the next event. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Joy. Thank you. Who's next. Good morning. Thanks for the opportunity to be here. My name is Monica Collins, and I am a resident of Hancock and the director of a local nonprofit. It's all volunteer feeding Valley Alliance. We serve the communities of Rochester Hancock in Granville by distributing fresh food at no cost to residents in need. Funding comes from grants and donations, mainly. So, I also work at Vermont law and graduate school with master students, helping them find jobs, and many of them focus their work on food and agriculture law and policy. I'm involved with the steering committee of the roadmap because it was critical to have representation from small rural organizations and communities, given the different challenges that we face. I've worked on farms. I'm a former select board chair. I'm a current regional planning commission rep for my community. And I'm also someone who's experienced food insecurity. The focus of my message today, though, is that there are existing tools for communities to work with to ensure food access in general, and in the context of emergency preparedness and resilience. An example is the farm to plate networks local planning for food access toolkit. That was published in 2019 it came out just a couple months before the pandemic hit so obviously the focus shifted through that but now it's 2024 and I think it would be very helpful for communities to know that this toolkit exists. So that they can incorporate food access into their town planning. This information will help them keep issues like access to farmland. Economic development for local food stores, which is something our community has faced when we lost our only grocery store. And emergency management in mind as they update their plans. What I see the disconnect is that there is often funding available for planning. But that same level of funding is not readily available for implementation. Town plans, hazard mitigation plans, local emergency management plans, those are all wonderful tools that can incorporate food security but they don't at the moment. Unless the community specifically works to do that. But smaller communities don't often have dedicated employees to do this work, and they can't afford them. They operate mostly through volunteers. And frankly, it's proving very difficult to find people who have the time, the energy and as the issues increasing complexity, the skills to do all the work that needs to be done on the community level. But you can help us make this work a reality by supporting local decision makers who know their villages and towns. Help us with capacity building and funding to empower the participation of local citizens who know their communities. I really believe that this roadmap will lead to food security with your support. Thank you. Thank you, Monica and Joey and a nor. It's been, we just have a great team I just like so excited about collaborating with these folks in our coalition. And so now I'm just going to take some time to give a short overview of the statewide engagement process we use to create the roadmap, and then how to read the document itself. So to make the roadmap farm to plate network members. We had about people representing over 120 organizations. Those were joined by UVM researchers partner organizations from other sectors and Vermonters who contributed their personal experience with food security. So here we design and implemented a statewide community engagement effort to gather the successes and obstacles we experience in Vermont by Vermonters. So we gather people guidance from people food shows farmers markets at the hunger councils and other locations from farmers professionals and individuals who are building food security for themselves and their communities. This particular effort was made to gather guidance from people who the Department of Health has identified as most impacted by the lack of food security in Vermont. This is people who identify as black, indigenous or people of color, people who are lesbian gay transgender have other queer identities, people who live early, people who live with poverty, and people who live with a disability. So from all this feedback outreach about 600 people gave their ideas and opinions about how to create food security in Vermont. We worked with a UVM professor who analyzed all the community feedback, and then small groups built the goals and objectives that are within the roadmap out of that feedback. So the organizations testifying today participated in the final writing as an or shared, but the contents of the roadmap are completely drawn from the statewide feedback. So let's look at the roadmap now and I will just explain very quickly how it's organized so you all have a copy. Thanks to Jake. And if you turn to page 14 and 15. We just had this printed so you actually have copies and I do not have one to hold up. Yeah, I'll be the visual reference. Jake, if you can hold up. Yeah. So okay, we're on pages 14 and 15. I can see them there. So all the pages before page 14 give more detail on the background of creating the roadmap so more detail on what I just quickly breezed through there. All the pages after page 15 outline the objectives and strategies that will get us to our three goals and create food security in Vermont by 2035. Then on page 14, you can see there is a graphic that's titled the anatomy of an objective. So that shows you how to read all the pages after page 15. So on the top of the anatomy of object of the objective it shows there's the goal area. Then the words of the objective itself. And then some texts that succinctly explains why the objective is important and how it will create food security in the state. Then you can still see on this anatomy of the objective if we're looking at it the strategies follow on the right hand side. And then for each objective and throughout the roadmap we provided direct quotes from the community feedback across the state that related to those topics that are in that spread. On page 15, you can see a list of the three goals and all the objectives that are underneath them. So honor Joey and Monica touched on a few of these goal and objective areas that are important to their work and their communities. And we have many more that we're going to achieve together. At this moment just to get us through our presentation and make sure we have time for questions and whatever details you want to be talking about more fully. I'm going to move to introduce Abby and Stephanie. They have been incredible partners representing the agency of agriculture food and markets and the Department of Health throughout this entire process. The agency recognized the urgency and need for shared path of food security in Vermont and provided significant funding and staff support. And our collective action has been successful because the state of Vermont took leadership on food security. So we'll start with Abby Willard from the agency of agriculture who's there in the room and then she'll be followed by Stephanie Bergen from the Department of Health, who is on zoom. Good morning, Abby. Good morning. All right, Abby Willard from agency of agriculture. I'm really excited to see this roadmap. This is sort of the first time obviously we're seeing it in print and true your eyes are really drawn to that. I just want to add an image that Senator can't think was just looking at in Montpelier really reminded of how much water came through that watershed into our communities and and on our farms. I also look at like page nine that Coleman farm was kind of continuously shown through part of our social media and drone footage of the agency, but yeah, it's really exciting to see all the thoughtfulness and the public perspective. Kind of captured all the hard work into this, this roadmap here. So yeah, the agency of agriculture is really excited to see the roadmap, very proud of the work and both the bold and attainable goal of ending under in Vermont by 2035. I'm proud of the states that can get behind such an objective. From the agency's perspective, the strategies in this roadmap that make that critical link between food security and food production and really elevate the important message that food security depends on viable agricultural sector is really important to us. So I know I think you would likely agree that we can't talk about community viability without addressing hunger and we can't talk about supporting families without talking about food production. We can't talk about Vermont's culture without investing in our future farmers. And we really will likely be unlikely to achieve economic viability as a state. If we can't find a way to feed ourselves. And we know that that will require viable and productive agriculture and farms. So that's like a heavy responsibility and and very complex systems that we're asking to act in unison. And I think that's where this roadmap is such an accomplishment because it really focuses on providing resilient resources to our communities, to our families, and to our farms. And this inextricable link between ending hunger and supporting viable farms really resonates with the work that we do in the ag agency for the development division. And what I think we talked about this committee on a regular basis here after care. And because as I mentioned, the agency of agriculture contributed money out of our fiscal year 23 appropriation so $150,000, which has also matched with the Department of Health resources to the Vermont Sustainable Jobs Fund to watch this roadmap process a few years ago. And as others have spoken and and Joey attested and I just want to just real heartfelt support for the farm and for Joey and Tony, they were one of the most tragically impacted farms during the July flood and kind of result in growing season and not the only farm by any means or any business but only business but but devastated with the amount of water that or through their farm in Maryland. But I think we all have learned that through the COVID experience and through the July flooding event, you know we've talked about the fragility of our food system and the value of local producers to sort of care for one another and provide for community members. The importance of having reliable and accessible systems that ensure we can support feeder communities. So the agency was involved in this roadmap process so as a member of the steering committee representing the agency. You know we were part of some of the early public engagement efforts and some of the first collection of voices and perspectives from our monitors, and then throughout the process of developing the strategies and so you'll see I think starting at page 32 is where not that the other strategies and focus areas aren't critical as well but starting on page 32 is where the very specific agricultural strategies begin under the kind of the focus area of Vermont farms having the resources to be resilient. And so the agency played a role in helping design and kind of guide along with many other voices the focus area of these four areas and the 12 resultant strategies. And yet the strategies in this plan are not really new. So you'll see a lot of and probably become be familiar with a lot of the recommendations of language in here that were previously highlighted in the climate action plan were included in strategies and in the future of ag commission reports that have been submitted over the past few years and provide, you know, further detail from what was outlined in the Vermont Ag and Food Systems Strategic Plan also led by the Vermont Sustainable Jobs Fund support for the agency of agriculture. I think collectively what all of those efforts and all of those strategies and plans outline is the policy choices that we need to make to ensure that farms have the resources to be resilient. And the focus on viable solutions to really ensure that that everyone in Vermont has the food that they need. So they feel like a sound like basic goals and I think we all know how complex they are and the consequences of trying to achieve that goal, or I shall say, to achieve that goal since that is that is a lot of my time. I'm sure your master for sure. Yep. No, I can go after. Sorry to interrupt. That's what happens. But can you just remind me what percentage I'm sure it was mentioned when I came in late. I apologize. Are we trying to trying to get to in terms of the number of people that are hungry that are food insecure. We have that. Like the actual number. Yeah, where we are now versus where we'll be in 2035. I mean, I think the goal vision is that there will, the hunger would be eliminated by 2030. What does that look like? Yeah, I don't know that I know that. 40% right now, right? It's a percent now or it's food insecure. I think someone else in the room might be better prepared to offer that. What percentage of people are food insecure right now? I mean, I'm sure it's a moving number. Yeah. Yeah. So, so based on the most recent data that we have from researchers at UVM, which is more recent than the USDA data we often use over the course of the last 12 months. Two and five people. So that is where that 40% comes from have experienced food insecurity. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. chair. Your work. Yeah, I appreciate that. Just by putting in context. How many families and children and individuals are talking about. Yeah. Yeah. So there's strategies in this plan. From the agricultural perspective or in this roadmap that address the supply chain infrastructure development efforts that we've been collectively working on. And this committee has supported with resources for the working lands program for the development grants for meat, maple, and through these. And are also supported through the new resilient food system infrastructure federal resources that Vermont received. That's the 455 million to focus on that middle of the supply chain. So looking at aggregation and storage and distribution and processing solutions. There are strategies in this roadmap that address land access models that are really going to require some more focused and creative attention to how we want to conserve and access agricultural lands. And this feels like a really pivotal time to be thinking about that as we see the pressure mounting around how open and access accessible land can be used for either food production. And or for housing and development. So the agencies engaged in a project to catalog and quantify the active 50 onsite mitigation parcels and ensure that those are engaged in active agricultural production. So those other efforts. There's also strategies in this roadmap that highlight the appreciation for farmers and agriculture for their wise use of our natural resources and their stewardship of our land and their active management of our land. So the agency along with many partners through the payment for ecosystem services working group working group created the Vermont farmer ecosystem service stewardship program. And that program sort of provides payments to farmers that recognizes and compensates them for their whole farm benefits and stewardship that's building upon a federal program within NRCS called the conservation stewardship program. So my last comment before I right handed off to the next would be just, you know, sharing with you how committed our agency is to ensuring that the strategies outlined in this roadmap are achieved that invest in agriculture that support economic viability that ensure our families community and farms collectively have their resources they all need to be resilient. So in advance, thank you for for your support and enjoy the program. I think it's Stephanie, there's hopefully online steps. Good morning, and it's a pleasure to virtually be with you today. I'm Stephanie Bergen, and I live in Colchester, and I'm a registered dietitian with the Vermont Department of Health's division of health promotion and disease prevention. The Department of Health has been a proud partner on this roadmap from the start, helping to launch the road maps development with $125,000 of CDC COVID health disparities funds, because we recognize that food security is imperative for human health and health as well as chronic disease prevalence. Our research shows that food security has a significant impact on quality of life, including physical health, mental health and social emotional support. We also know that food security disproportionately impacts members of our community, or I'm sorry not having access to food disproportionately impacts members of our community. As Becca previously mentioned, this includes our BIPOC and LGBTQIA plus communities, as well as Vermonters living with a disability have a harder time putting food on the table. Examples of the Department of Health's work as it pertains to the roadmap and food security generally included ministering direct service programs like you first, and the well known women, infants and children program or work program. It serves 7000 families across the state and provides nutrition education, nourishing food, breastfeeding support and health care referrals. Additionally, SNAP ed funds and our healthy community design work supports organizations and municipalities across the state to enhance consistent dignified access to nourishing adequate and culturally responsive food today and in the future. This roadmap is so impactful and exciting, in part because it brings all of the elements of our food system together to elevate a crucial need. And that's for monthers having enough food, and not just having enough food but having nourishing and culturally appropriate food to thrive. The Department of Health supports the roadmap comprehensive strategies to achieving food security, all of which are derived from the voices of people living in Vermont, and many of which are already underway. Thank you all for the opportunity to speak today, bringing to life the public and private collaboration that needs this roadmap possible. And thank you so much for your time and I believe I turn it back to Becca. Thank you, Stephanie. And thank you, Abby. We're all just pretty much done with our prepared testimony and just want to say this roadmap is here to guide you and all of us in making policy decisions to ensure that all people in Vermont have the food they need at all times in all the circumstances that we are facing. And all of us here today and our coalition partners who are watching on YouTube are committed to the actions recommended by this roadmap and committed to working with you. We, the roadmap coalition will continue to be housed within the farm to plate network and staff by the jobs fund. We are already on the road to food security as a north end. And with your leadership, we know our collective impact will be successful. And I just want to personally thank you for the opportunity that I have had to work with these collaborators and with people statewide to develop this roadmap. It's been truly an amazing process and very moving to hear input from people across the state. And I of course really appreciate the opportunity to share it with you today. And we are ready for questions. Thank you so much for helping us carry on to the end of our testimony. So thank you, Becca. And we'll move on to questions. I think one question that Brian asked, you know, how many people are we actually talking about and we get, you know, we got the statistics of two and five. What does that translate into numbers is that so that's less than if we've got 600 and say 600,000 people in Vermont have would be 300,000 we're under that so would it would it be as many as 200,000. Is that number realistic? I think, Mr. Chair, that a nor and is able to address more closely as she did earlier than the data that we currently have. And one issue that we have identified as an early need in this roadmap work is to consolidate and think deeply about what kind of data we want to be gathering to answer this question. We are very fortunate to have a team of UVM researchers who are working on food security research in the state, and the data that a nor was able to share comes from that project. There is also some federal research, and the methods by very amateur understanding is the methodology there differs. And so that is one reason why we're never quite sure what the numbers are. So in order for us to really make decisions and measure our progress and celebrate our successes, we will need to work with existing researchers and perhaps think about what data we want to be measuring in order to move toward our vision. Nora, I'm wondering if you have anything to add since you're more familiar with the research on quantitative hunger and food security in the state. Yes, and John Sales is also here. So the Vermont Food Bank is also a member of the Food Security Roadmap Coalition. So I hope John will jump in also. But so one thing that makes all of this very tricky is that people move in and out of food security. You know, we are a lot of people in our state who are seasonally employed. There are people who may be just getting by and the flooding in the summer that we experienced put that over the edge. And for rarely, perhaps we hope into losing their food security. So it is challenging to have a stable number. And I think that if we're really going to bring as we're committed to doing food security to zero in our hunger to zero and food security to 100% in our state in 10 years, then we have to build systems that really reach folks who are on the edge and going in and out of experiencing hunger. And there's many, many folks in that situation in our state. And that is why the best data that we have right now is that at some point over a 12 month period, this household has reported experiencing hunger. But they might not be experiencing that at this particular moment, but they might not have been experiencing that nine months ago. And so, you know, one, one recommendation, one priority recommendation in the Food Security Roadmap is actually to really to create an office of food security in our state government that would over that would help to coordinate and oversee this kind of data gathering and determining what kind of data needs to be gathered. And also to make sure that all state agencies and the legislature are talking to each other about food security, and all the different programs housed in all the different agencies that contribute to food security are communicating together and are all easily accessed through the same easy one door access for people. And that that would also be a place where emergency food response, you know, could be better coordinated hunger free Vermont partnered with the SCOC during the aftermath of this summer to try to help figure out where were prepared meals needed in this Washington County region that was so hard hit. And what we really realized is that individual towns weren't collecting information about who needed emergency food support in their communities. They didn't have that written into their emergency town plans. It's not actually part of the template that towns are provided. And, and nobody really like realize that until until its absence was very serious and very detrimental. And so it's things like that, that that have to get better coordinated, all of us, we have to better coordinate that at the state level to make sure that we know, we know what we're talking about and who we're talking about and what how to implement in the best possible way. These, these the programs that we already have and new programs we might need to start to really reach everybody. But that, that last suggestion, like adding food hunger to the town emergency plans. I should think that would be a pretty simple thing, and uncapsulated thing to do. We had john and last week, I guess it was and, and from what I gathered from your testimony is that you supply food to all the individual like food banks throughout the state. And, you know, like in, in my area, the Northeast Kingdom, we have several distribution points where people can go and get food and, you know, we're at the end of the world where we are. And I would, I assumed from that that other counties had similar outlets for food and I hope you wanted to comment again on that john to reassure us. Sure, the record John sales and the CEO of the Vermont food bank. And I just want to second everything the door said, point out this actually page 21 of the plan there the strategies under G three, which include the office of food and nutrition security and also developing and maintaining a data system so that we can have better information. So they asked your question, Senator star of the food bank works with about 300 community based groups all around the state. So food shelves meal sites out of school programs senior centers on the shelters, basically anyone who distributes our groups who feeds people and works with with folks in crisis or in very low incomes. We also as the food bank do direct distribution programs or veggie van go and, and distributions of sash sites, which I talked about before. It's and it's really challenging. We talk about all those partners that we have. We are actually working with our national organization feeding America to develop data gathering systems. And there are tools out there that we're starting to implement. Of course, it takes resources to set those systems up. So we have to set up our, you know, the, you know, the, the folks in the Northeast community action. So they have a food shelf that they running came in. And so they would need to have, you know, a tablet and the people who come into the food shelf would have a swipe card and, and so we'd be able to to have some real time data. But we have to be able to get all that technology to the people train them to use it and make sure it gets used and that the data gets downloaded. I think one of the other data challenges is that it's it's the agency of human services that owns all the information about people and their income level that the services that they're getting access to. And I know that hunger-free Vermont works very closely with DCF and AHS. And yet we as nonprofits can't access a lot of that information. And AHS doesn't have the capacity or the systems in place to be able to crunch that data in a way that gives us a better idea of our food insecurity numbers or are the folks who need some more help with food in Vermont. So I think the roadmap is going to help us have a vision of where we want to get by 2035. And hopefully we can start now taking steps to get there. Yeah. I mean it. That seems like a long ways away. We can do it quicker. We can do it quicker. Well, I mean, I guess, you know, I look at it differently coming from a very rural area. You know, if you've got somebody in your community that's lacking food, you take them. Yeah. Where in cities or communities where people don't know everyone, people could get very hungry real quick. Yeah, I was trying to think through, you know, the different steps and step one. I mean, it's how you set up your steps is determines how long it takes you to get to the end. The, you know, it's critical that that we address this. I mean, it's really sad to think that somebody has to go to bed hungry and you know, just last week, guys ordered gas and not the local gas station. And you know, I was just pumping the gas and standing in this guy comes out. Hey buddy, you wouldn't, you wouldn't have a dollar or so so I could, it was a cold night so I could go in and get a cup of coffee. And, you know, so there are people out there and, you know, I told him, I said, well, you know, I haven't gained all the bills. I got a five with that quarter. And so hopefully he went and got something to eat with his coffee, but I didn't have any single bills. But, you know, so there, you know, he's probably one of 50 here in the city that that was having trouble. But, you know, now the agency's the health and do you have some money in your budget to push your part of this along or is it something that that we need to deal with legislators to try to get into the budget. Well, the budget address was yesterday. So, so you know, the agency supports the governor's budget. They are worried about hunger in there. Maybe I, maybe I'm just sure. I mean, I think there's strategies in here that address infrastructure investment for food security and for food production. So we have some resources so you know really we're focusing on implementing the programs from the resources that we've received in fiscal year 24. So that's the meat, people in produce grants, which are really about how to be resiliency in those diversified agricultural sectors. We have a good fortune of, you know, ARPA dollars for the working Lance program. So the Lance program just received $10 million in demand for 2 million that they're going to put out and just like the demand and the idea of wanting to support vibrant and viable agriculture still is at a all time high in Vermont. And then we have the opportunity of these additional federal resources that will focus on the supply chain. So helping businesses, you know, access markets outside of Vermont, which is around business viability, not necessarily solely about feeding Vermonters, but it can help businesses be more viable so that they can do both they can both expand to reach new markets and new customers and be able to be kind of community focused and some of their food production. I think we can speak more about the demand that we're receiving, but certainly the demand is out stripping the resources that we have available. Working Lance and the grants program. Yeah, do you have quite a few? Great. Yeah, we do. We have been fortunate to have both federal and state resources. You know, the fiscal year budget for 25 will be, you know, level funded based upon base allocations. Previous years. Yeah, there's a three and a half percent. I think that we're talking about available funds. Yeah. Yeah, thank you. I just wanted to point out that the you mentioned neighbors helping neighbors that that is happening in Vermont. The Vermont food bank alone raised $9 million in philanthropy for our operations last year. That doesn't include what hunger-free Vermont is raised. And as as Mora said, each of our partners are out there raising money in their communities. And so it's, you know, well over $10 million just that I could put my finger on right now. And that's not including the acceptor. So the, you know, people of Vermont are very generous and they aren't stepping up to help their neighbors. And I think this plan is how do we coordinate that with a state government effort to really take us to a goal? And I think, yes. I think Monica might be able to really speak to that, the relationship between kind of these steps that can be taken. And then, but what communities might need to actually implement that. Yeah. Do you want to join in, Monica? Yes, please. Thank you. So town plans are a great way to incorporate food access planning. And not just for emergency situations, but also long term, because food access is not just food insecurity, but it's also, do you have a viable grocery store in your community? Do you have, do our local farms able to sell their produce, their meat, dairy in the town they live in? So strengthening those local food systems is really key to having resilient communities. But my concern is that there's already funding available for towns to put together their town plans and having that information about food access and how to incorporate it into a town plan is important. But then the piece that I always found was missing when I was on the select board was that there's no assistance either in training, capacity building, or just implementation funds for after that plan is put together. So there's all these amazing plans sitting on the shelf and some communities have the resources to do that work. Others, like my community, you have 350ish people. And it's an all volunteer select board. We get, I think I got paid more like $1200 a year and when you break that down by the hour, it's pennies. And it's almost a full time job in addition to my own full time job. So there's difficulty in having people who know how to do this work and who have the time and capacity to do it. So that is something that you really need to think about when talking about planning as a mechanism to help this is that there needs to be that next step as well. And in my community, we have just anecdotally, I don't have hard data, but I can tell you that we have been serving. We do once a month distributions of veggie van go bags, and we have had 35 families on the average. We've been accessing our services from Hancock, Brandville, Rochester, and sometimes Stockbridge, its field and Goshen, and, and that's 35 families not 35 individuals for November and December that shot up to 57. On Friday, we will be distributing to 42 families. Most of these are folks who are working folks or seniors who just have a hard time making that social security check stretch out for the whole month. Thank you. Pretty telling numbers for that little valley. That's for sure. Other questions. The, I was wondering, we're on our third, I think year was three school meals. This is a third year or third. Because the pandemic, I think it's the fourth count man. And I know maybe some of you folks know that I've heard that schools have implemented like a pantry type deal that after hot lunch is over. The food that's left from the hot lunch is put on containers and on a rack where the hot lunch is and his kids, children leave school in the afternoon, they can pick up food from that. And I'm wondering if that has helped to reduce hunger amongst our youngest citizens of the state who have having a universal meals. And both Senator column or his committee in our committee, the two of us, two committees played a pretty key role in pushing the universal school meals. You know, when I go to meetings, usually a parent will mention that if it's not a school meeting, and if it's a school meeting, you know, you hear it from the teachers as well as the administrators, how well that that is all working. Do you have any numbers on if that reduced our hunger numbers and do many, do you know many schools have like a take home program from the hot lunch program? Yes, well, yes, so absolutely this this committee and Senate education without without you all, we wouldn't be in this really exciting place that we are today with permanent universal school meals. It is a program that has been very well implemented by our agency of education and we have also heard from from teachers and others that it's really been a game changer for them in terms of student health and student village focus and student mental and emotional well being during these really challenging years. We don't have, I don't have data to say universal school meals has reduced hunger for children or families by a certain specific amount. I think when you look at what happened in Vermont with child hunger compared to other states nationally, especially when a lot of the economic supports for families like the expanded child tax credit at the federal level, the expanded SNAP benefits at the federal level went away. And, and all across the country, child hunger spiked by 20 percentage points in some states. And while those the end of those programs was also also caused increased hunger for families in Vermont. We did not see that dramatic spike in our child hunger numbers and that is because of universal school meals and the other programs like summer meals and after school meals that that we have and also enhance some bills to childcare providers that helped to support children's nutrition. And, and I, you know, also, and I would love us to do more studies on this, but we know that children are in families and you can't, you know, it's a whole family system, and when families are not having to spend the money to purchase the food they need to make lunches and breakfasts for their children five days a week, or they're not having to put to spend that money to pay for school meals, school breakfast and lunches. That is additional money that those families can deploy to create better food security for everybody in that family at home. And we know that that's how that's how household economics works. I mean that's how my household economics works. And that's how your household economics works. And that's how it works for everybody in Vermont and so absolutely the universal school meals program is a key piece of tackling hunger in Vermont and ensuring food security for everyone. And then in terms of your question about how are schools addressing food that kids are not eating. So, of course, there's a lot of health and safety concerns, which once food has been, you know, cooked in a, you know, you got a big tin of lasagna you have to be really careful about what you do with those leftovers you can't just leave them sitting out all day for kids to take that's just not really safe. But there are components of the meal like, you know, whole pieces of fruit or, you know, things that are in a, in a, you know, wrapped up in something that can be put on a sharing table for other kids to take. And that happens in many, many of our schools. And then also our school nutrition professionals are experts at how you don't waste that extra cooked food. So they will they turn those ingredients into part of the next day's meal. And I do think that there are schools that, you know, one thing I think we learned in in the flooding disaster this summer is that is that schools can also be better integrated as places where food can be prepared for people who lose the ability to do that in their homes because they their kitchen flooded out. And that's another part of the coordinated coordination that we could be better at. That would really make a difference for us in times of crisis. So I don't think I totally gave you the answer you were looking for but I hope I gave you some of what you would. Yeah, you did. Well, I'll sue the fire. Thank you. Yeah, it's important to this committee and Brian's committee that we try to take care of our children and, and our less fortunate and just this morning prior to this meeting. We had a meeting with folks from the Aniford store company out of Maine in regards to food, New England's food security and, you know, whether they would buy products from our farms if if we convert to, you know, whatever vegetables and and it was that was a good, a good meeting and, you know, they're, they're really getting geared up to fly local. And so they were going to meet with Hanson later this morning. So the only thing I didn't get to ask them all is what, what do they do with their food that's near outdated or is outdated because that that could be utilized. I think John, you mentioned that you get food through the other day when you were. Yeah, the food bank, we have relationship with Aniford and with all the other grocery stores in Vermont, Shaw's and Price Chopper and the, the independence and co-ops, and either the food bank itself or one of our partners, a food shop or meal site will go and several times a week and pick up it's called at the store if there are dining pans, if there's dairy that's close to code, if there's produce that's coming off the shelves. So as much as possible of that does go into the charitable food system already. We have a great relationship with Aniford and all the other, the other chains in Vermont. Yeah, I was pleasantly surprised with, you know, they came down from Maine and so they had, you know, they came down yesterday and had to stay over because it was an early meeting. And I'll end up, that's good. But there are other questions. No, it's very helpful. Anything else from any of you folks that you want to offer? You know, we've taken quite a lot of testimony this early in the session is kind of unusual really to get, you know, to take as much as we have in regards to food security and, you know, the New England feeding, New England issue, food bank. And so as we move forward, we'll be reaching Senator Westman and I are also on appropriations, so we'll be in there scratching for every dime we can get if there's any around. We usually do well for this. Better start, balance better. I'm at that very point, Ellen, Caleb, my single just one, I was just wondering, do you think that the Senate Appropriations Committee would be open to having an abbreviated presentation about the roadmap, given how many, like over the long term how much we are looking to the state to be a major partner in this is that I think that that's the committee might be open to. I don't know. I think I would. I would speak to the chair about that. I mean, many of you should we could mention but we don't do it. I mean, generally, for the policy committees to waste. And get back on lunch from us on advocacy day I don't see why you couldn't do a little steal later. I think, you know, at the bus, but that ends up in three minutes. So, yes, and I would suggest that write something to see. Yeah, and then send it to the committee. And it will go in the list of requests. Yeah. Yeah, we don't, we don't usually hear from like, like we do in here. We don't really get in. Jane on, you know, there is a trash and Dr. the joint fiscal teams. And so if there's a succinct document that comes from the group. It will be included in, you know, they'll make that measure. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm wondering if anybody has seen the town successfully put. Resilience and security in the town plans the towns that I had that are overall. Are mostly I think focused on develop. I don't see that. Tax revenue that seems so attractive and for getting the right services to any of your split up into town. I guess much better use of our land, but that's me. And I don't know how. I as one resident, or even enough as an other towns in my district could successfully sell this idea. Yeah. And it's, do we know towns are just sort of a new concept that. It's going to take a while. To infiltrate into town. Planning. Yeah, I'm not thinking of an example town right now. But if anybody wants to get back to me with a strategy or, you know, if anybody wants to come talk to planning questions, I think that would be a great way to tell them it's not just that. I can, I can talk to that a little bit. I'm sorry. I can't see the people in the room. So am I interrupting someone? No. Okay. Good. I mean, I can't see the, I can see all of you senators, but not the others who might be speaking. Chris Campion, who is the director of the Wyndham regional commission has been very involved in this project. And I think he would be an excellent person who would really appreciate that. I think that's a great question. As Monica has testified, she has been involved the local. Her local bodies that work on planning. And so she has some localized knowledge. And we do have this toolkit that we referenced that farm to play did create with in coordination with the regional planning commission collaborators. But the pandemic did really. Stop the planned rollout of that. And I think that would be a great way to work. You know, you wouldn't, in many cases, no better than I that relate to resilience about waste. It's often about wastewater is my understanding. And then, you know, development planning in other ways, but I think Chris would know more details and I can reach out to him. Great. I mean, one kind of related piece that I'm thinking about would be. You know, I think there are a number of backgrounds that have engaged in developing bylaws around accessory on farm business designations. So I feel like that's not, you know, maybe specifically around food access in the kind of like, maybe the most direct way that you may be thinking about it, but encouraging communities to help farm businesses be able to offer farm stands that carry product from other businesses or other businesses. So I think that's one of the things that I'm thinking about. And I think that's one of the things that I'm thinking about. And I'm thinking about it processing to make, you know, different food types available within their community could be part of. And we are seeing towns that have developed, you know, specific bylaws support of. That. Back 143 accessory on farm business designation. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. Okay. So I'm going to go back to the council's regional. He's at the Lomao regional planning commission. And they've done a lot of work around accessory. On our businesses, but also just really, I think creative. And regional and town planning. That's oriented towards food systems working landscapes that may have some specific. Any. Thing else. Any other guests. Having in off to. I just want to say thank you and we're very much looking forward to continuing our collaboration and creating food security for our for our neighbors by 2035. I hope we get there. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you. We have our great committee. I wish we could understand this. Yeah, you know, Michael's, I thought best you know, Michael, I like to be loved. I used to run the same. So he's done years. Although I study the water. So, you know, you need to take a little break. Can Michael come over? I don't know. I'll check and see. He did comment. The house will come into us or is that our bill? I thought so we are going to take a little break. Yeah, check back in 15. Yeah, I'll come.