Homegrown Minneapolis: Building a Healthy, Local Food System for All Minneapolis Residents

Presentation to New Partners for Smart Growth Conference Seattle, WA, February 2010

by

Cara Letofsky, Policy Aide to Mayor R.T. Rybak

Minneapolis, Minnesota The Milling City on the River

What is Homegrown Minneapolis?

  A city-wide initiative to increase the growth, sales, distribution, and consumption of healthy, locally grown foods.

  Great partnership between city efforts and community initiatives

Values behind Homegrown: What do we mean by “local”?

  W.K. Kellogg Foundation states that local food systems are built around the principle of “good food,” defined as food that is:   Healthy, as in it won’t make you chronically ill   Green, as in it was produced in a manner that is environmentally sustainable

  Fair, as in no one along the production line was exploited for its creation

  Affordable, as in people of all socioeconomic backgrounds are able to purchase it and have access to it

Homegrown Phase 1: Community-driven process to develop recommendations on what the City can do to improve the local food system:

Farmers’ Markets

Community, School, & Home Gardens

Small Enterprise

Urban Agriculture

Commercial Use of

Local Foods

Stakeholder Group (over 100 partners!)

Steering Committee

Phase I Recommendations: 75 recommendations, with 125 specific action steps

  City Resolution: Adopt an official position statement supporting healthy, locally grown, sustainably produced foods and establish a task force that will implement additional recommendations

  Regulatory Policy: Revise City plans and codes so that they provide a hospitable environment for growing, selling, and distributing local foods

  Systems, Tools and Education: Offer programs and tools to build food production capacity at the neighborhood level and that facilitate small-scale food production, processing, & distribution of food

  Green Jobs: Include urban agriculture in the City’s workforce and small business support programs

  Land Use Policy: Revise City’s Comprehensive Plan to include more land use policy supporting community gardening and urban ag activities

  Communicate: On the benefits of local food, existing resources, and Homegrown as a whole

City Council Resolution: “Recognizing the Importance of Healthy, Sustainably Produced and Locally Grown Foods.”

  On June 26th, 2009, the Minneapolis City Council adopted the Homegrown Minneapolis report and established an implementation task force

Homegrown Phase 2: City partnership with community to begin implementation of recommendations

  16-member Task Force of City staff and community partners meets monthly to guide implementation efforts

  Will advance work on short- and mid-term priorities

  Including working on designing and establishing a local food policy council to take work into the future

Advancing Homegrown: What we’re working on (partial!):

  Sustainability Indicator and Local Food Policy Council

  Urban Agriculture Policy Plan   Community Garden program

  Expanding Food Access

  Easing the Regulatory Environment

Advancing Homegrown: Sustainability Indicator & Local Food Policy Council

  Integrating Homegrown Minneapolis goals into the City’s work

Advancing Homegrown: Urban Agriculture Policy Plan   Developing more land use

policy support for community garden and urban agriculture activities

  Include best practices review and analysis of economic boost

  Recommendations around zoning changes, urban design guidance, specific land uses

Advancing Homegrown: Community Garden program   Developing an easily accessible

way for gardeners to lease city-owned land

  Will include identifying specific parcels, soil testing, access to city water source and city compost

  Includes connecting them to local nonprofit resource Gardening Matters

  Lease is being finalized as we speak, for role out by EOM!

Advancing Homegrown: Expanding Food Access

  Expanding availability and use of Electronic Benefits Transfer systems (EBT) at farmers markets

  Inventory of community and commercial kitchen facilities

  Minneapolis Mini Farmers Market Project

Advancing Homegrown: Expanding Food Access: Mini Markets •  Referenced by First Lady Michele Obama in her recent

speech on childhood obesity •  In neighborhoods with limited access to healthy food •  All participate in Farmers Market Nutrition Program

(FMNP), which has represented 30 – 60% of sales •  Led to changes in City’s licensing for Farmers Markets •  Limited to produce grown by local farmers •  Since 2005, grew to 12 sites in 2009 •  City in partnership with IATP

Advancing Homegrown: Easing the Regulatory Environment   Recently passed in 2009:

  Local Produce Market licensing change for markets with 5 or fewer vendors (2009)

  Staple Foods Requirements for Grocery Stores newly requires corner stores to carry “food for home preparation or consumption” (2009)

Advancing Homegrown: Easing the Regulatory Environment   In development:

  Institutional Food Service License to ease regulatory licensing burden on community and shared commercial kitchens

  Mobile Food Vendors to allow for larger carts that expand the food options available to be served

Advancing Homegrown: Easing the Regulatory Environment   Looking ahead:

  We want local food enterprises to grow and expand in Minneapolis, and don’t want city regulations to get in the way!

  Convening focus groups to hear directly from entrepreneurs about what barriers they have to opening or expanding their business in the city.

  Aiming towards developing an omnibus package of changes

Common Roots Cafe

Front

Back

For more information:

  Visit the Homegrown Minneapolis website: http://www.ci.minneapolis.mn.us/dhfs/homegrown-home.asp