PrintBELLOWS FALLS -- Post Oil Solutions is working with the Bellows Falls community in a continuing effort to help people in the region "basically feed themselves" through the production of their own food.
The Greater Falls Regional Food Center Project is seeking to open a "food hub" that will make locally produced food available and affordable to all people in the Bellows Falls area.
Though it s still in the planning stages, the first meeting of the project s interim working committee July 21 was attended by 16 community members who want to participate in the process, which Tim Stevenson, executive director of Post Oil Solutions, said he took as a good sign that the community is interested.
"This has been one of the most gratifying experiences just in terms of the enthusiasm and the reception with people stepping forward saying, I want to work on this. I want to do something, " he said.
Stevenson said he believes summertime is not an ideal time to bring people together -- several people wrote him letters asking to be kept on the list of people interested in participating, he said.
One person who recently joined the collaborative effort is lawyer Ray Massucco of Massucco Law Offices in Bellows Falls.
"I m really impressed by the group they ve put together," he said. "There are people who have done marketing, written business plans, and I ve suggested a whole bunch of other resources."
Massucco said he immediately wanted to help out when he heard there were efforts to start a food hub in Bellows Falls.
"We ve got a couple small markets [in Bellows Falls], but there is not a grocery store type of operation, with the notable exception of the Putney Co-op," he said.
"We use out-of-town stores," he said. "I think we need that kind of outlet on a bigger scale in Bellows Falls, offering this service to local farmers and other agricultural providers," he said.
"Bellows Falls doesn t have a food store, so people typically have to go to Walpole to do their shopping," Stevenson agreed. "People with some income can afford to get local food from co-ops, but often lower-income families can t afford that food."
The food hub, Stevenson said, would serve a variety of purposes with the ultimate goal being to provide important infrastructure that would enable local agriculture to grow and supply the region with increasing amounts of food.
It would include food storage facilities and a licensed, commercial food-processing kitchen.
The kitchen would give growers the opportunity to make added-value products such as salsa and applesauce, and new entrepreneurs could use the kitchen to start local food products businesses.
The operation would provide a fair return to area farmers, Stevenson said.
"It has to be very intentional that we provide food at a very reasonable cost while striking a balance with farmers so that everybody gets a fair return," he said.
One of the first jobs that Post Oil Solutions is tasked with, he said, is data collection and surveying of local farmers to find out what their needs are and if they are interested in producing more food for the food hub, Stevenson said.
Post Oil has already received the endorsement of Paul Harlow of Harlow Farm in Westminster, who stated he had been thinking about starting a community kitchen himself but was happy to see others take it on.
"He has volunteered to consult with us on the project," Stevenson said.
Other farmers had some concerns that Stevenson said he hopes to address in the project s design.
"We ve heard from some farmers that storage is an issue," he said. "They couldn t store extra food if they produced it, so we want to provide that storage in appropriate facilities, whether it s a dry facility for winter crops or food that s been processed and preserved or frozen food."
Stevenson said that providing local food to consumers all year round is one of the project s basic goals.
"We re very dependent on imported food in the winter, and it s increasingly expensive," Stevenson said.
He said the ability to store food is a big reason why Post Oil is looking at a number of buildings to house the project, not just one. They hope to create a network of facilities.
In addition to the warm reception the idea has received in Bellows Falls, Stevenson said the village is also a prime candidate because of its location.
"The Amtrak station is there and I-91 is on either side," he pointed out.
Massucco said that he was happy to be a part of something that would be a win-win situation for both local farmers and consumers.
He said that with all the food coming from a relatively short distance away, he would imagine that the lower cost of storage and transportation would affect the price of the goods.
He stressed his belief that the food hub needed to be a sustainable project.
"There s all this time and effort to get this up and running," he said.
He said that he plans on using his experience as a lawyer to look into ways in which Post Oil can get support for the project without becoming financially dependent on outside help.
He and Stevenson both noted that there are similar projects around the state, some of them nearly 20 years old.
Though the Bellows Falls facilities will most likely be substantially different from those other food centers, Stevenson said, Post Oil needs to find out what will make the project successful in Bellows Falls.
"We need to figure out how we can make it work on some level," he said.
"We re drawing from a fairly wide area," he said. "The potential [for growers and vendors] has to be in the hundreds, and I would think the number of potential consumers would be in the tens of thousands."
The project could take as long as four years to complete, Stevenson said, but if all goes according to plan it should be worth it in the end.
"Putting together the business plan is an arduous task and a complicated one," he said, "but I m confident that choosing the Bellows Falls area is a great decision."
Jaime Cone can be reached at jcone@reformer.com or 802-254-2311, ext. 277.
