On March 28th, local food advocates, farmers, and citizens from across the state will come together in Springfield to encourage their legislators to support local food and farms. Illinois Stewardship Alliance invites you to join us for our 3rd annual local food and farm lobby day in Springfield on March 28th at the Illinois State Capitol Complex in Springfield.

Local Food Awareness Day will consist of a legislative update, orientation, lobbying training, and lunch at the Pasfield House. Following lunch we will descend upon the capitol to educate legislators about the importance of local food systems and advocate for positive policy solutions that promote and support local food systems in Illinois.

Cost: TBD

Registration: more information coming soon, check back later.

Payment: more information coming soon, check back later.

For more information contact ISA's Policy coordinator, Wes King at wes@ilstewards.org

The cottage food bill changes Illinois’ food safety laws to allow homemade non-potentially hazardous baked goods, jams and jellies, fruit butter, dried herbs, and dried tea blends to be sold at farmers markets provided they are properly labeled as homemade products, annual gross receipts from sales are $25,000 or less, the “cottage food operation” is registered and the person preparing and selling the food has a valid Illinois Food Service Sanitation Manager Certificate.

To make things easier for potential conttage food operations we have put together a Cottage Food Guide that describes what the law does and doesn’t allow and what you have to do to qualify to become a cottage food operation. More importantly the Illinois Department of Public Health has created a Technical Information Bulliten for local health departments and potential cottage food operators. The TIB put together by IDPH can be found here.

If you are planning on starting a cottage food operation please read and review TIB #44. In addition, it is highly recommended that you reach out to your local health department early and start a conversation about your cottage food related plans.

If you have any questions, comments, or concerns please feel free to contact me, wes@ilstewards.org or 217-528-1563.

SB 840 the bill that created Illinois Cottage Food Law was sponsored by Senator David Koehler (D-Peoria) and Representative Lisa Dugan (D-Kankakee). Both Senator Koehler and Representative Dugan deserve our thanks for all their hard work because without it, the passage of SB 840 would not have been possible.

What do homemade jams and jellies, baked goods, and dried herbs have in common? They will all be eligible to be made in home kitchens and sold at farmers markets when the Cottage Food Bill goes into effect January 2012.  Illinois joined the growing list of states across the country that are supporting the growing local food movement by crafting risk and scale appropriate laws regulating local food businesses.

On August 16, 2011 in honor of Agriculture Day at the Illinois State Fair, Governor Quinn signed into law Senate Bill 840, the Illinois Local Food Entrepreneur and Cottage Food Operation Act, also known as the Cottage Food Bill. The Cottage Food Bill is a step in an ongoing effort to create policies that support the burgeoning local food movement.  The cottage food bill will create new opportunities for farmers to engage in value-added processing while making it easier for aspiring entrepreneurs to start new local food businesses selling at one of Illinois 300-plus farmers markets.

The cottage food bill changes Illinois’ food safety laws to allow homemade non-potentially hazardous baked goods, jams and jellies, fruit butter, dried herbs, and dried tea blends to be sold at farmers markets provided they are properly labeled as homemade products, annual gross receipts from sales are $25,000 or less, the “cottage food operation” is registered and the person preparing and selling the food has a valid Illinois Food Service Sanitation Manager Certificate.

SB 840 was sponsored by Senator David Koehler (D-Peoria) and Representative Lisa Dugan (D-Kankakee). Both Senator Koehler and Representative Dugan deserve our thanks for all their hard work because without it, the passage of SB 840 would not have been possible.

On January 1st, Illinois Cottage Food Law officialy went into effect. There is a lot of questions and of course kinks to work out regarding the implementation of the law however the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) has been doing a great job putting together guidance for local health departments to make sure the implementation and first year of the program goes a smooth as possible. 

To make things easier for potential conttage food operations we have put together a Cottage Food Guide that describes what the law does and doesn’t allow and what you have to do to qualify to become a cottage food operation. More importantly IDPH has created a Technical Information Bulliten for local health departments and potential cottage food operators. The TIB put together by IDPH can be found here.

If you are planning on starting a cottage food operation please read and review TIB #44. In addition, it is highly recommended that you reach out to your local health department early and start a conversation about your cottage food related plans.

If you have any questions, comments, or concerns please feel free to contact me, wes@ilstewards.org or 217-528-1563.

• Developing tiered regulations to eliminate legal and regulatory barriers burdening the local food and farm economy.
• Developing local food and farm infrastructure through technical assistance, funding streams, and regulatory reform.
• Leveraging support of citizens, legislators, organizations, and other farmers through education about policy ramifications and engagement in the policy making process.
• Increasing access to local food for low-income and underserved populations through the support of Illinois Fresh Food Fund, support programs and policies to provide SNAP/EBT Infrastructure at Farmers' Markets and other farm-direct enterprises
• Supporting appropriate food safety rules and regulations through engagement with regulatory agencies and support for appropriate legislative reforms.
• Increasing access to land and farmland preservation by supporting and developing progressive reforms in land use policy.

GPAC will be holding our first conference call of 2012 on January 19^th at 10:00 a.m. If you are interested in getting more involved with GPAC and ISA’s policy advocacy efforts please contact Wes King.

With the demise of the Super Committee and its deficit reduction bill that never happened, attention has now turned to crafting a new farm bill as a stand alone measure in 2012.  This week Senate Agriculture Committee Chair Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) said farm bill action will begin again with some hearings in late January or February, noting that the outline of the bill she and House Chair Frank Lucas (R-OK) crafted for the Super Committee would serve as the foundation for a new 2012 Farm Bill.

The draft bill aimed at Super Committee consideration has not been released, nor has an accurate detailed summary of its contents.  It appears that will remain the case.  We summarized some of the key ingredients in the draft bill for our readers last week.

There continues to be speculation about the possibility of attaching a farm bill, either the draft 2011 Stabenow-Lucas measure or a variation on it, to a resuscitated government-wide deficit-reduction measure or as an offset to another spending or tax cut measure, as an alternative to proceeding to a stand alone farm bill under a more regular legislative process.  The verdict for now is to head into the new year looking at a more normal farm bill process as the default setting but at the same time keeping options open as Congress grapples with larger spending, stimulus, tax, and deficit reduction measures.

Some policymakers have suggested starting all over next year from a clean slate.  That seems highly unlikely.  To the extent that sentiment is more than rhetoric, however, it appears to be aimed primarily at the commodity title of the bill, and there is little doubt that it was the most problematic aspect of the bill and will likely remain so.  There may be some hope that a return to more regular order, with the prospect of the amendment process in committee and on the floor, will tamp down some of the wilder elements in the draft commodity title.   For starters, perhaps, interest groups and Members will possibly think twice about provisions that would have distorted planting decisions and increased payment limits, knowing the difficulties they would face defending such propositions on the floor.

Another big area for changes, albeit one that has received little attention, are all the titles that were not at all fleshed out other than simple date-changing re-authorizations in the rush to complete a bill in time for Super Committee consideration.  These include among others the credit, rural development, research, and trade titles.  There are both funding issues and policy issues to be faced in all of these titles.  Though they do not generally receive the same attention as the big money titles (nutrition, crop insurance, commodities, and conservation), there is major policy work to be done that by and large was not attended to in the hurry-up 2011 draft bill.  Even in some of the big money titles there is more work to be done on the policy front than there was time for in 2011.

The new fiscal reality facing the 2012 Farm Bill is the automatic cuts to government spending that will trigger in January 2013 as a result of the Super Committee’s inaction.  There continues to be lots of talk about possible ways sequestration, as the automatic cuts are know, might be un-triggered, either yet this year in some mega-negotiation over the remaining FY 2012 government funding bills and big ticket items like payroll tax cuts, alternative minimum tax rules, and Medicare payments to doctors, or next year as part of a new try at a deficit reduction deal.  As of now, however, the betting line would still favor sequestration hitting in 2013.

If that betting line holds, any farm bill written next year will have to assume sequestration will in fact take effect.  The biggest loser in that scenario is the crop insurance program, the largest of the farm subsidies.  It is also one of the more perplexing items in the farm bill-sequestration interface.  Crop insurance policy changes to meet the sequestration budget cut target will be determined by the Administration and will be formulated at the same time that the Agriculture Committees will be trying to write crop insurance provisions for the new farm bill.  That dual and possibly conflicting process might in turn lead to some intriguing negotiations.

As we discussed in an earlier blog, there are many possible scenarios under which a farm bill gets finished next year and others in which it is not completed until 2013.  It may be months yet before the ultimate path to the new farm bill becomes clear.  Our position will remain to work for a new farm bill that addresses the pressing needs for programs and policies that promote a more sustainable farm and food system and to get that new bill completed on schedule in 2012.

"We are urging all farmers to consider enrolling in CSP," said Claudia Emken, conservation policy advocate at Illinois Stewardship Alliance. "Applying for the program now will put farmers in a position to receive funding for the good conservation work they are already doing and NRCS will help them decide what additional conservation work they can do to solve resource issues on their farm."

Self screening is available on the NRCS website and will help determine if the farm under consideration is eligible. "We encourage producers interested in learning more about CSP to contact their local NRCS office," said Ron Ziehm, NRCS Assistant State Conservationist for Area 1 (23 counties in Southern Illinois). "NRCS staff will help the producer complete a resource inventory for their farm that will identify existing and possible new conservation activities for their farm."

Illinois has nearly 1,000 participants in CSP now, covering almost 600,000 acres "As an organic farmer I enrolled in CSP to enhance field borders and improve nitrogen levels through cover crops. I encourage all farmers to look at CSP to enhance their operations," said Harold Wilken, a farmer from Danforth, who enrolled in CSP in 2010.

Conservation Stewardship Program contracts run for five years, and nationally pay an average of $18 per acre for cropland and pastureland and $4 per acre for privately owned forestland, although payments vary significantly depending on the level of conservation. Farmers and private forestland owners can apply to the Conservation Stewardship Program anytime by going to their local NRCS office. To be considered for funding in this ranking period, applications must be submitted prior to January 13, 2012.

Advocating for Local Food and Farms in Illinois

In any given year, dozens of state and federal policies are developed that affect small farms in Illinois.  Illinois Stewardship is on the frontlines working to support small farms and local food systems in Illinois.  Good food and farm policies can support small farms that are feeding our communities.  Illinois Stewardship Alliance occupies a critical niche in grassroots advocacy for sustainable food and farm systems.  Your support makes all the difference. 

Make a difference to Illinois farmers. Give to Illinois Stewardship Alliance.

We are the hub of local food and farm advocacy in Illinois. Serving Illinois food producers, eaters, and food system stakeholders across the state, we are working to increase access to locally produced food; support community food efforts from farmers markets to institutional local food buying and develop policies that conserve our precious agricultural heritage.

Your gift to Illinois Stewardship Alliance is a direct investment in promoting fair food and farm policies in Illinois. Every gift, no matter the size, will make a difference to Illinois local food producers and consumers.

Make a donation now or become a member. Here's how:

1. Donate online: 

Use your credit card to join or make a donation to Illinois Stewardship Alliance using Caring Habits a secure and verified credit card processor serving non-profit organizations.

Use Paypal to join or make a donation: 

Membership Options

Individual $25.00 USD Farm $40.00 USD Student/Low-income $15.00 USD Organization $65.00 USD Supporter $75.00 USD Steward $300.00 USD Lifetime $1,000.00 USD

Learn more about the benefits of becoming an ISA member by clicking here.

2. Mail a check:

Illinois Stewardship Alliance

401 W Jackson Parkway

Springfield, IL 62704

Please include your address, phone number and e-mail address.

 

3. Work Place Giving:

Illinois Stewardship Alliance is a member of Community Shares. Learn about Community Shares, including how to contribute through a payroll deduction, by clicking here.

How to Sign Up*                                                                                                                           BFBL Central Illinois Counties

Membership Information will be available in January 2012

*ELIGIBILITY INFO: Farm or Business must be located in one of the following counties: Knox, Stark, Fulton, Peoria, Marshall, Woodford, McLean, Livingston, Ford, Iroquois, Mason, Tazewell, Champaign, Vermillion, Cass, Menard, Logan, Dewitt, Piatt, Douglas, Edgar, Coles, Moultrie, Shelby, Macon, Christian, Sangamon, Montgomery, Macoupin, Morgan, Jersey, Greene, Scott and Calhoun.

Farms: Eligible for membership are farmers that grow or raise foods or other agricultural products (e.g. ornamental plants, bedding plants or Christmas trees) in Central Illinois primarily for consumption in that same region. The main market for products promoted with BFBL Central Illinois materials must be in the designated chapter region. BFBL Central Illinois products must be traceable to a specific farm BFBL Central Illinois materials should be used only for locally grown products. BFBL Central Illinois members who also sell non-locally produced items are expected to take care that such products are properly labeled to distinguish them from local foods. e.g. Missouri Peaches. Sustainable practices are encouraged and preferred and/or a plan to become sustainable. Click here to read more about sustainable practices.

Other Business:: Eligible for membership are businesses (Farmers Markets, Restaurants, Retailers, Institutions, Other) that buy from BFBL member farmers for food preparation or resale.

• A commitment to purchasing and promoting local foods should be a stated marketing strategy/message or value/principle of the business.

• Membership requires participation in an annual survey to demonstrate a commitment to local purchasing and gauge economic impact.

• BFBL materials should be used only for foods that feature BFBL farm-produced ingredients. It is expected that BFBL materials not be used in a misleading manner.

The goals of GPAC are to:  

• Develop policy statements and policy positions that can be used to direct staff and board members on a wide range of issues applicable to ISA’s mission of promoting ecologically sustainable, economically viable, socially just local food systems through policy development, advocacy, and education.
• Develop strategies for responding to new and proposed legislation
• Develop legislative priorities based current legislation
• Identify areas where new or improved legislation is needed
• Develop policy proposals and legislation
• Engage stakeholders in the policy process

Join the Grassroots Policy Advisory Committee:

Membership Options

Organization/Farm $50.00 USD Individual $25.00 USD

For more information about GPAC or how to get inovled with the committee's work, contact ISA's policy coordinator Wes King.