Visiting the Central Valley

Farming and the Fight for Clean Air and Water

Food Commons Fresno

Out of a small facility just south of downtown Fresno, the Food Commons continues to pursue its mission of sustaining local and regional farms using the best ecological practices while providing affordable and healthy food to communities that have historically lacked access.

OOOOBY (Out of our own backyard)

Fresno Food Commons Trust acquired the CSA business from T&D Willey Farms and launched local operations as OOOOBY in May 2015. Since then, OOOOBY has continued to grow and provide healthful, responsibly grown food to 2,300 families across the Central Valley.

Beyond the Box

The future for Food Commons is bright, taking on farming operations on the site of T&D Willey Farms in 2017 and serving restaurants and institutions to extend their reach beyond households. Through a recently launched Direct Public Offering members of the community and Californians who believe in a future where small farmers and farmworkers make a meaningful livelihood and communities have access to affordable, fresh, and healthy food can invest in the next phase of Food Commons development.

Fres-yes!

Underneath the stories of environmental degradation and poverty, there is more to Fresno and the Valley than meets the eye. Not only is Fresno full of some of the most talented organizers and advocates in the country, it is also home to a homegrown art scene thriving with creativity.

Agroecology at the margins

In a vast desert of industrial agriculture, small farmers like Antonio, create an oasis through agroecology and responsible management. Small farms like these, often managed by immigrants on rented land without long-term security, face an uphill battle to build viable businesses. Typically farms like these feed into large-scale and anonymous supply chains, which do not value the quality and ecological practices embedded into these farming methods. A short walk on the farm underlines the importance of growing new, values-oriented market outlets like Food Commons.

Matheny tract committee

In Matheny, a small unincorporated community at the edge of the city of Tulare, the Leadership Counsel for Justice and Accountability provides policy expertise and legal advocacy capacity to a community that leading the fight for clean air, water, and recognition of their rights in the face of environmental injustice.

“I’ve never seen poverty like here”

At its founding, Matheny represented the American Dream – a place where poor people of color could buy some land and find work in the fields or in the nearby city of Tulare. Today, it represents disinvestment and a government that would prefer to ignore the impacts of poverty rather than address them head on.

After a struggle that lasted many years, with the support of Leadership Counsel, the Matheny Tract community was finally able to secure piped water from the county in 2016. Caught between city and county governments, the community still struggles to secure sewer services – basic needs those of us who live in wealthy coastal cities take for granted.

“Real” California Milk

A far cry from the idyllic “happy cows” of the industry’s advertisement – the stretch of Tulare and Kern County between Metheny and Delano winds through some of California’s densest dairy lands.

Mega Dairies of Tulare County

hint: if it looks like muddy water, it’s probably manure

No words to Describe

the overwhelming odors of thousands of cows crowded into concrete paddocks, or the sense of barren wasteland as we criss-crossed the county roads of Tulare hardly encountering a single human.

Allensworth has no water

A historic African- American community outside of Corcoran, Allensworth is one of many small communities dotting the San Joaquin Valley for whom access to basic services and the right to live free from pollution seems like a daily fight.

Prisons on the horizon

On the edge of Delano, birthplace of the United Farm Workers, this is a familiar site in the Valley. Prisons dot the landscape of the San Joaquin Valley – an implicit representation of the state’s all-too-common attitude toward the region. It’s where we put the bad, the poisoned, and the hopeless – and for those of us by the coast it’s “out of sight, out of mind.”

Crpe community organizers

When we settle into Delano we can feel the power of the community coming together. Like the residents of Metheny and the LCJA, CRPE brings together dozens of community leaders to support them in their ongoing fights for environmental justice and civil rights. It was an honor to break bread with such inspiring community leaders, on the front lines of the battle against consolidated industrial agriculture and the oil and gas industries.