Policy

  • Martin & Ebony talk about healthy food access with Sen. Paul Hornback in 2020
  • Josh, KC, Kelsey, Salena, and Wayne meet with Senator Reggie Thomas in 2019.
  • CFA farmers market leaders–James, Molly, and Jen–testify on the cottage foods bill (HB 468) in 2019.
  • Kelsey, Sheryl & Seth Long, and James in front of the Kentucky Capitol building after meeting with Sen. Hornback & Rep. Heath in 2019 about cottage foods.
  • Heather & Cassia pose with Tamara of Kentucky Association of Food Banks at the Hunger Rally in 2014
  • CFA members rallied in Louisville to protest USDA NAIS hearings in 2009. Protest leads to a meeting between Secretary of Agriculture Vilsack and CFA leaders.
  • Ivor and John pictured with a legislator before winning passage of HB 120 which allows farmers to sell cooked food at farmers markets.
  • Janet Jenkins testifies in support of HB 391 in 2003, which becomes law, allowing home-processing, micro-processing, and in-state certification.
  • CFA members lead a tractorcade through Frankfort in 1999 to bring attention to Phase I allocated of Tobacco Settlement monies.
  • CFA promotes a tobacco reinvestment proposal in the halls of Congress and helps repeal a special tax imposed on tobacco farmers in 1994.
  • Kenny Mattingly Jr. Traveled to France to stand in solidarity against GATT in 1992.
  • CFA fights for a new dairy policy in 1991 to protect family farmers.
  • CFA members stop construction of a landfill and medical waste incinerator for out-of-state waste in 1989.

During the Farm Crisis of the 1980s, a group of Kentucky tobacco and dairy farmers came together to face the fallout of Secretary of Agriculture Earl Butz’s industrial agricultural driven policy of “get big or get out!”

They concluded that the problem wasn’t “on the farm”, but was a result of public policy. With the prospect of so many farmers losing their farms, their first action was direct service to their neighbors by setting up a suicide hotline. To keep farming, and to allow their sons and daughters to keep farming, CFA’s founders realized that they must organize to change public policy.

In 1985 Community Farm Alliance was formed to bring the grassroots voice to public policy.

That work has continued for over 38 years in support of Kentucky’s small, disadvantaged family farmers and the communities that depend on them. Over the years, much of CFA’s policy efforts have been focused on fighting bad public policy and regulations, often against the “one size fits all” policy that penalizes small farmers in favor of industrial agriculture.

But CFA has also been proactive in creating public policy to address issues that have been identified by CFA members and our collaborators.

Since 1985 CFA has passed or defeated over two dozen bills in the Kentucky Legislature, contributed to six Farm Bills, submitted an average of a dozen federal letters of support per year, and issued numerous Op-Eds about food and farming issues facing Kentucky.

Occasionally, CFA has participated in legal actions such as in 2021 CFA joined the Amicus Brief by Rural Coalition, Intertribal Agriculture Council et. al, represented by Southern Poverty Law Center, in support of the USDA in defense of Section 1005 of the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 to provide funding and authorization for USDA FSA to pay up to 120 percent of direct and guaranteed loan outstanding balances for socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers.

CFA has so many passionate, committed members from across the Commonwealth. Our members are a mix of urban and rural, farmers and non-farmers, rich and poor, young and old. The “community” in Community Farm Alliance is not defined by geography but by values that govern good stewardship of land, family, and community.

CFA has rebuilt much of the “policy muscle” it takes to do the proactive policy work at both the state and federal levels.

CFA’s 2023 Policy Agenda

Kentucky

  • Continue to build and support a robust Kentucky Food Policy Network
  • Lay the groundwork to introduce a Healthy Farm and Food Incentive Fund in 2022
  • Work with the soil health coalition to tweak proposed healthy soils legislation
  • Take the lead from the Thrive KY coalition to oppose harmful safety net bills
  • Take the lead from KY Solar Advocacy Network to oppose harmful anti-solar net metering bills

National

  • Continue advocating for adequate federal COVID-19 support/relief for farmers and food insecure folks
  • Continue working on national meat processing bills and strategize around state policy needs
  • Develop shared language around climate change and agriculture — we released our Climate Declaration in April 2021