Get Involved

Here are some ideas for ways to help build a more vibrant local food system in your community:

Learn

• Choose a book on a food-topic for your book club or invite neighborhood kids over for a story hour with books on food topic
• For one day, every time you purchase something to eat, ask the merchant where it was grown — share what you learn.
• Learn to compost your food scraps at home.
• Learn what vegetables are in season locally throughout the year.
• Take an organic gardening class.

Build Community

• Give an elderly neighbor a ride to the farmers market or grocery.
• Ask your regular grocery store to carry locally grown produce.
• Organize your neighbors to start a new P-Patch community garden
• Ask your child's school to provide healthy local food for snacks.
• Host a heritage food dinner and ask each neighbor to bring a food special to their family or culture.
• Get to know people in your neighborhood by hosting a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) pick up location for your area
• Apply to the Neighborhood Matching Fund from the Department of Neighborhoods for money to support your great idea

Grow

• Plant an edible garden in your yard, parking strip, or get a plot at your nearest community P-Patch.
• If your yard is shady, offer to grow greens for your neighbor and ask them to grow tomatoes and peppers in their sunnier yard or garden their sunny spot in exchange for a share of the bounty.
• Help a neighbor start a garden or tend a small garden for an elderly or busy neighbor who can't do it on their own
• Plant heirloom vegetable varieties, save the seeds and share them with your friends and neighbors.

Share

• Have a community canning day in your kitchen, invite your neighbors.
• Host a potluck and ask guests to bring a food they've grown.
• Donate produce from your garden to your neighborhood food bank or meal program.
• Start a neighborhood fruit tree harvest and share the bounty with neighbors and food banks
• Organize a neighborhood pie-making night and make pumpkin or other pies from scratch using local ingredients. Serve the pies for Thanksgiving or donate them to a local Thanksgiving meal program.
• On the next special occasion, take your family to a local restaurant that uses local produce.

For more information:

Take the "Eat Local for Thanksgiving" Pledge. Learn how to put more local food on your Thanksgiving table, find recipes, local farms and farmers markets.

Farming and the Environment: Keep farming profitable and Ecosystems healthy. http://www.farmingandtheenvironment.org/

Neighborhood Farmers Market Alliance: Helping keep farmers farming by operating 7 farmers markets in Seattle. Find out how you can get involved: nmfa@seattlefarmersmarkets.org, http://www.seattlefarmersmarkets.org,
206-632-5234

Seattle Tilth: Learn and be inspired with organic garden classes and community activities http://www.seattletilth.org/ 206-633-0451

Seattle Department of Neighborhoods P-Patch Community Gardening Program: Connect with community while tending your own garden plot http://www.seattle.gov/neighborhoods/ppatch/
206-684-0264
&
Neighborhood Matching Fund: Access money to fund your great neighborhood project idea http://www.seattle.gov/neighborhoods/nmf/
206-684-4520

Lettuce Link: Help increase food access and share the bounty with fresh produce donations from city gardens and fruit trees http://www.fremontpublic.org/client/food.html#LettuceLink
206-694-6754

Acting Food Policy Council: Get involved with local businesses, organizations, farm groups, community members, and local government to create a local food system that's good for people, the environment and our economy. http://king.wsu.edu/foodandfarms/foodpolicycouncil.htm

Cascade Harvest Coalition: Support productive farmland and successful farms in Western Washington http://www.cascadeharvest.org/