On Wednesday, while the Mobile Market is open at Common Good City Farm in Ledriot Park, we invite you all to get a first-hand look and learn more about the program. There will be an informal meet & greet with the Arcadia team and sponsors that have made this groundbreaking program possible. A bounty of spring produce will be on display and on sale, while educational and nutritional programming and cooking demonstrations will also be taking place. Light snacks and refreshments will be provided.

When:  Wednesday, May 16 from 5 PM to 6:30 PM

Where:  Common Good City Farm at Elm and 3^rd Street NW

Over 200 DC schools will feature fresh strawberries and salad greens in their school lunches on May 23rd – all from local farms!  The D.C. Farm to School Network is also helping 50 schools set up hands-on educational tables in their cafeterias to remind students where food comes from and to get students excited about eating healthy, local food.

We’re also working with school gardens all over the city to celebrate the spring harvest.  Hundreds of school stakeholders will be involved in this city-wide event.  We’ll need volunteers to help out, too!  Learn more and get involved at www.strawberries-salad.blogspot.com.

CGCF’s programs provide hands-on training in food production, healthy eating and environmental sustainability. CGCF’s presence in a multi-cultural, multi-racial, multi-generational community creates an opportunity for people from all walks of life to spend time learning about healthy food, gaining access to it, and exercising in the process of growing it.

What We Seek: We are looking for a well-rounded and outgoing individual who brings strong youth development background and is interested in and committed to the food justice movement. We seek individuals with a strong desire to become fully invested in our enterprise during their time with us. We hold high expectations for our youth and in order to foster their potential we require our Crew Leaders to be strong role models. Ideal candidates possess enthusiasm for working with youth, interest in Common Good City Farm’s mission, a strong work ethic, and a good sense of humor. While our organization is deeply committed to building a sustainable food system, we do not require candidates to be well versed in agriculture or the food production system. Show that you can bring energy, and an open mind to the table and we will teach you the rest!

This is a very competitive position, and Common Good City Farm strives to maintain a diverse and inclusive team. Candidates from diverse backgrounds are strongly encouraged to apply.

REQUIREMENTS:

• Strong familiarity with Washington, DC
• A high school diploma
• Prior experience working with teenagers
• 20 years of age by June 21, 2012
• Ability to perform rigorous and demanding physical labor
• Interest in community service, the environment, and multicultural teambuilding
• Ability to motivate a group of young people while fostering their potential
• Openness to one’s own personal growth
• Background and experiences that reflect the rich diversity of the young people who participate in the program
• The capability to uphold high standards set by the community
• Ability to work in a team as well as independently
• Strong administrative and recordkeeping skills
• Be dependable, organized, flexible, and have a sense of humor
• Available to commit to full eight week period, working 7 to 8 hours per day

RESPONSIBILITIES:

• Lead youth in fieldwork: planting, weeding, harvesting, and other farm chores
• Build raised beds in backyards and housing complexes
• Co-lead workshops in assistance to Youth Coordinator
• Accompany youth on at least two field trips to farms outside DC
• Supervise and motivate a group of 8 teenagers and a youth assistant, giving them weekly feedback on performance
• Keep good attendance and performance records on youth

SALARY: Weekly stipend

START DATE: June 2012

REPORTS TO: Youth Program Coordinator

HOW TO APPLY: Attach cover letter and résumé to an email to jobs@commongoodcityfarm.org. Applications are due by May 7, 2012. Common Good City Farm is an Equal Opportunity Employer and seeks to maintain a staff that reflects the diversity of our community and the population we aim to serve. We welcome applicants of all races, ethnicities, socio-economic statuses and sexual orientations. Common Good City Farm is an Equal Opportunity Employer and seeks to maintain a staff that reflects the diversity of our community and the population we aim to serve. We welcome applicants of all races, ethnicities, socio-economic statuses, and sexual orientations.

The Friday session will occur  at UDC’s Fine Arts Theater and is free and open to the public. The Saturday and Sunday sessions will occur at Muirkirk Farm in Beltsville, MD. For more information and to register use this link http://www.udc.edu/causes/usas.htm

Are you interested in fixing DC’s broken food system? Do you have a passion for fighting for food justice? Then come network with others who share your passion at the New Member Orientation and Community Brainstorm Training. This conversation is for anyone who’s interested in working toward food justice in their communities, or who wants to better facilitate conversations about the food system with their neighbors, co-workers, or faith community.

New Member Orientation & Community Brainstorm Training
March 26, 2012 6:00-8:30pm
Center for Green Urbanism, 3938 Benning Road NE
RSVP to Angie Stackhouse, astackhouse(at)breadforthecity.org or 202-480-8916

The DC Food Systems Organizing Workgroup is a group of advocates, activists, and service providers who are working on laying the foundation for the creation of a food policy council in DC. See our previous blog post about the work that we’ve done over the past year. Right now we are reaching out to individuals and organizations that share the vision of creating a nourishing community in which all Washington, D.C. residents can enjoy a nutritious, safe, and culturally appropriate diet provided by a local sustainable food system that fosters health, equity, interdependence, and self-reliance.

The New Member Orientation and Community Brainstorm Training is part of this outreach effort. The first half of the session will focus on the recent history of organizing around the food system in DC, what actions are planned going forward, and how to get involved. The second half, starting around 7:00pm, will be a training on how to host a Community Brainstorm session, which is a community conversation about the food system that’s used to recruit, gather information, and build relationships. Learn more about what the community brainstorms are here.

Come for the whole evening or just the half that interests you. The event will be held on the evening of Monday, March 26th from 6:00 to 8:30 pm at the Center for Green Urbanism (3938 Benning Road NE). Please RSVP to let us know if you plan to attend. Hope to see you there!

You can find the flyer for this event here: http://goo.gl/LYfNk. Please pass it along to anyone you think might be interested. Let’s get the conversation started and ignite a DC food revolution today!

Directions and note on accessibility: If driving, from Benning Road turn onto 39th Street to come up driveway to the property. There is parking on site. If taking public transportation, Minnesota Avenue (Orange Line) is the closest station. There are steps from the street to the building. Please let us know if you need any accommodations!

With high levels of food insecurity, disparities in access to food across the city, and 13 different city agencies playing a role in shaping our local food system, a group of advocates and service providers has proposed the formation of a food policy council with the intention of improving DC’s fragmented food system. One of the approaches we’ve taken is something we’re calling “Community Brainstorms.”

We came up with the brainstorm sessions idea because those most affected by the failures of our current food system are those that tend to be left out of the decision-making process. Right now our meetings are primarily composed of staff of organizations. Those organizations are diverse — from direct service to urban farms to labor rights coalitions — but we’re still mostly working with staff paid to participate. We want to change that.

At first we considered a city-wide survey, but community brainstorms will better allow us to build relationships with people and organizations who want to take action to build a food system we are proud of. Also, the more open-ended and free-form conversations allow all ideas to come out, where they might have not in a standard form.

The three main goals of holding these two hour community brainstorm sessions are:

1. To introduce a “food systems” perspective on issues like food insecurity, hunger, and obesity, and the idea of a food policy council as a way of tackling them.
2. To solicit input from a wide range of people, in particular those most impacted by the challenges in our current food system, in order to shape the formation of a leadership body.
3. To recruit volunteers and get more people involved.

This spring we are planning to hold two community brainstorms at Bread for the City, as well as several more in partnership with Groundwork Anacostia and other organizations. We are always looking for more partners to host these sessions (and individuals to participate as community members or volunteers).

If you can’t participate in a community brainstorm, you can still share your story of food. In the last year, we’ve published everything from the story of an urban gardener to a former Bread for the City intern. These are important pieces to the puzzle of figuring out what our food system looks like and how it affects peoples’ lives. Share your own traditions, memories, hopes, and dreams related to DC’s food system at Bread for the City’s story bank.

Please contact Angie Stackhouse (astackhouse(at)breadforthecity.org) for more information, to get involved, or to share your story.

This past week Bread for the City was awarded a grant from Kaiser Permanente of the Mid-Atlantic States for the DC Food System Organizing Workgroup. This grant will provide the resources and support needed to build upon the almost a year and a half of work by a group of advocates, activists, and service providers, including several Bread for the City staff. (It also means we’re hiring!) This group convened to investigate ways to address food insecurity and injustice and lay the foundation for a food policy council in DC. We have a vision of a nourishing community in which all Washington, D.C. residents can enjoy a nutritious, safe, and culturally appropriate diet provided by a local sustainable food system that fosters health, equity, interdependence, and self-reliance.

To achieve this vision, the group looked to examples such as Detroit’s Food Policy Council that have worked to engage the community of stakeholders and activists already working to better their food system. We believe that policy-makers, non-profit service providers, and other sectors of the food system must be equal partners with grassroots leaders in the effort to re-imagine a nourished DC. It is only through grassroots organizing paired with our institutional collaboration across the food system that we can break down structural injustices, create healthy and sustainable alternatives, and become partners with city leaders in formulating solutions.

Over the past year or so, over 50 individuals and more than 30 organizations have become part of the core group that has been meeting monthly to work towards this vision. The actions taken have fallen primarily under four categories: research, communications, community participation, and clarifying our mission.

One of the first steps was to do our research — to assess what information is already out there and what work is already being done. The group looked into the District government’s fragmented approach and explored structures of food policy councils. The DC Food Finder was updated and information was compiled about what is happening and what has yet to happen. A project to create introductions to key food policies in DC was started, and should be up online soon.

Our primary method of gathering input and engaging the community has been through “community brainstorms.” The idea was born out of the recognition that we need to be hearing from individuals and communities who are deeply invested in the fixing of our food system, but may not be able to participate due to disparities in resources and time constraints. To date, eight sessions have been held at ROC-DC, Rooting DC, Capital Area Food Bank, Farmers Market Collaborative, ONE DC and the People’s Co-Op.

A lot has been accomplished since we first gathered around the table and began these discussions of a fair and just food system for the nation’s capital. Moving forward in this new year, we will hold more community brainstorms, further strengthen our relationships, and establishing a web presence to connect with more people and increase transparency. (A website housed within dcfoodforall.com will be coming soon.)

As we move forward with our mission to transform the DC food system, we would love your involvement. Be a part of the DC’s food revolution! Contribute by telling your story, volunteering at a community brainstorm session, or sharing information with your neighbors, coworkers, family, and friends. Learn about these and other opportunities to take action for food justice through the DC Food For All Google Group. And please take a moment to fill out this online form to let us know how you would like to be involved: http://goo.gl/AEDkJ.

Contact Angie Stackhouse, Food System Organizer, with any questions or for more information. You can reach her at astackhouse(at)breadforthecity.org or 202-480-8916.

Finally, a big thank-you to everyone else involved in the project thus far — Accokeek Foundation,Capital Area Food Bank, Center for Social Science Research at George Mason University, Common Good City Farm, DC Hunger Solutions, DC Central Kitchen, DC Food Justice Coalition, Early Childhood Obesity Prevention Collaborative, Ecolocity, Groundwork Anacostia, Field to Fork Network, DC Farm to School Network, Healthy Solutions, Metropolitan Washington Public Health Association Health Disparities Committee, Neighborhood Farm Initiative, ONE DC, SHARE Food Network, Summit Health Institute for Research and Education (SHIRE), and Restaurant Opportunities Center DC.

Henderson:Preparing meals is not a core competency for schools

In a chilling rebuke, Chancellor Kaya Henderson has disavowed the ambitious plans for improved D.C. school food set forth by DCPS food services Director Jeffrey Mills and instead has ordered her staff to proceed immediately with a new contract to outsource cafeteria operations and try to stem the mounting deficits attributed to the system’s current vendor, Chartwells.

In a letter to D.C. Council Member Mary Cheh (D-Ward 3), Henderson distanced herself from some 1,500 pages of documents Mills’ staff had recently sent the Council detailing how Chartwells has helped run up some $14 million in red ink over the past year. Meanwhile, Henderson and her key management staff have refused to hear Mills’ proposal to ditch Chartwells and bring much of the system’s food service operations in-house.

Mills sent the proposal, in the form of a PowerPoint presentation, to Cheh. But Henderson withdrew it, saying “the views in the PowerPoint do not reflect the direction that DCPS food services is moving in….”

Henderson told Cheh that “some of my staff members may not necessarily agree with my decision” and that she was sending a revised response to questions generated by Cheh. Echoing former Chancellor Michelle Rhee’s decision to hire Chartwells four years ago, Henderson wrote that “food service (like facilities maintenance and construction) is not a core competence of ours,” adding that “the option of bringing food service back in house is premature at this point.”

Henderson is scheduled to appear for questioning before the Council today, and Cheh, author of the city’s Healthy Schools Act, plans to ask the chancellor a number of food-related questions. School officials have yet to explain whether annual deficit spending–now averaging more than $12 per year–is supporting better food, high labor costs, waste and inefficiency, corporate profits for Chartwells, or some combination of all of the above.

The emerging schism between Henderson and Mills casts a pall over a food service operation that otherwise was thought to be showing great progress since Mills was hired two years ago. Mills had forced Chartwells to completely revamp its menus, removing things like Pop-Tarts, chicken nuggets and strawberry milk in favor of low-sugar cereals, fresh vegetables and more lunch items prepared from scratch by school kitchen staff. But while Chartwells ostensibly was hired to gain control of budget shortfalls in school food service, the deficits according to Mills have only gotten worse.

For instance, in 2007-2008, the last year DCPS self-operated food service, the average loss per school totaled $80,000. That jumped to $115,447 the first year Chartwells took over, and in subsequent years has run around $90,000 per school.

The total food service deficit for the current school year is expected to reach $14.35 million, or more than double the red ink DCPS cafeterias generated in 2004, when the schools ran their own food service.

According to Mills’ staff, Chartwells’ average cost per meal is $4.21, compared to $3.06 for D.C. Central Kitchen, which prepares meals for seven schools under a pilot program, and $2.87 per meal for Revolution Foods, which caters to another seven schools. Officials said Chartwells runs up the cost with numerous contractor fees, and by paying inflated prices for many supplies and ingredients. Mills’ plan to sever ties with Chartwells called for eliminating food service deficits by 2016.

Chartwells also collects millions of dollars in rebates from its suppliers. Under federal law, Chartwells is supposed to pass those rebates on to the schools, but officials said they still aren’t sure they are receiving all of the funds to which they are entitled.

Chartwells has a “cost reimbursable” contract with the schools, meaning it is reimbursed for all of its expenses, as well as being paid an annual management fee and a small fee for each meal it services. Under its contract with the schools, Chartwells is supposed to hold deficit spending to no more than $6 million annually or forfeit its management fee. But according to one official, Chartwells has forfeited its management fee every year the contract has been in place while deficits have ballooned out of control.

Mills, whose background was in developing restaurant concepts in New York prior to being hired as food services director for the schools here, has chafed under the Chartwells contract, hoping eventually to build a system in which the schools produced their own meals from whole ingredients. In anticipation of such a system, the Healthy School Act called on the city to provide a central kitchen and food processing facility that has yet to materialize.

According to Mills, only 8 of the nation’s 135 largest school districts outsource their cafeteria operations to large food service companies such as Chartwells, Sodexo and Aramark. Neighboring Fairfax County, for instance, runs its own food service without creating deficits. But the food served there also is regarded a far inferior to the meals children in D.C. receive.

But in light of the school chancellor’s latest move, Mills’ vision for meals cooked fresh by local chefs may be a long way off.