As I am poised to leave my job after 16 years as executive director of CISA (Community Involved in Sustaining Agriculture), naturally, I’ve started to reflect. My takeaways so far are: local farms are still challenged to keep farming, maybe even more so; the local community is solidly behind farms and CISA, yet that support is more likely to appear in times of trouble; and the number of folks who care deeply about farms has grown along with the desire for a more just local food system.
When I took the helm at CISA, I didn’t come in with a deep background in agriculture. What I did know was how to grow an organization and create community. The timing was a bit scary because it was right when the 2008 recession began, and I spent many sleepless nights worrying that local farms would go out of business because consumers had less to spend and donors might have less resources to fund CISA’s support of farms in their time of need.
