Where is the Plan for our Regional Food Plan?
We can create a regional food plan.
Food as a verb thanks
for sponsoring this series
Two Thursdays ago, the Chattanooga Food Coalition - a devoted group of "volunteers who care about the local food system" - held its January meeting at the Avondale Community Center.
The invitation was intriguing:
Dan Reuter, the Executive Director of the Regional Planning Agency, will be sharing an overview of comprehensive plans for Chattanooga and Hamilton County, and where/how our food system fits into the picture.
One year ago - January 2024 - I spoke to Reuter for the first time. He'd joined the Kelly administration as the Regional Planning Agency (RPA) head after three decades of planning in Atlanta and north Georgia.
Last winter, I called Reuter to ask:
Can regional planning play a role in creating food policy for the city and county?
It's the same question we carried into last week's Food Coalition meeting at Avondale.
It's the same question I'm still asking today.
Why?
I can't get a straight answer.
Last week, at Avondale, maybe 20 of us were there. Outside our conference room, neighborhood kids played pick-up hoops and 2K on big screens. Outside, garden beds were covered from the winter cold. On tables in the back, stacks of Lupi's pizza.
Reuter began his talk a few minutes before 6 pm. He presented 60 slides, all about regional growth. Finished around 6.18 pm. Said some really interesting things.
Most importantly, though, was what Dan Reuter didn't say.
Very little of his talk directly involved food.
It wasn't until the Q-and-A that we asked the ongoing question:
What role can regional planning play in supporting urban access to food and protecting rural farmland?
His answer was telling.
But first?
Some B-roll from the event.
Reuter and the RPA are working on Plan Chattanooga and Plan Hamilton - the first official planning documents for the city and county, respectively. (Plan Chattanooga will be presented to the City Council in March.)
Yeah, the very first. Strange, huh? We've never had a comprehensive planning doc for either the city or county. Reuter - he's got a pedigreed career, no doubt - and team deserve hearty applause for this work.
The time is definitely ripe. According to Reuter's presentation:
- The population in the city, county and unincorporated areas will hit 600,000 soon, if it hasn't already.
- Last year, Hamilton County's population grew three times the national average; it is the fifth-fastest growing county in Tennessee's 95 counties.
- Approximately 21% of Chattanooga streets have sidewalks.
- By 2040, it's possible we've added 60,000 new jobs and 46,000 households within the county.
(Last week, the Times Free Press reported that Reuter, a Tennessee resident, had voted in Georgia during the November elections.) "Growth is going to keep coming at us," he told the Avondale crowd. "I’m very positive about the future. Don't get sad about this presentation."
Months ago, Food as a Verb reported on the frightening rate of regional farmland loss.
- In Tennessee, we're paving over 10 acres of farmland every hour of every day, according to Tennessee's 2024 Economic Report.
- One million acres of Tennessee farmland are in jeopardy, the American Farmland Trust declares.
- Nine years of Hamilton County cropland remain, warned the former Director of Conservation Impact for the Land Trust for Tennessee.
(Note to readers: the above data was assembled using satellite imaging and LANDFIRE Existing Vegetation Type data which comes from the USDA/US Forest Service and the US Department of the Interior."It’s about the most comprehensive and granular data available for land cover on a large scale," said Luke Iverson, former Director of Conservation Impact for the Land Trust for Tennessee.)
Reuter's presentation didn't show this. He included agricultural land-use records from the county assessor's office, which are formed from tax records.
(Plus, Tennessee's Forestry Division is a subset within the Dept. of Agriculture, which means forested timber-growth can be counted as "agriculture" thus skewing a picture of what actually counts as food-producing land.)
Three slides referenced both Georgia and UT Ag-Extension offices, the state-wide Tennessee Farmers' Co-op and a logo for TN Local Food and food conference in Atlanta.
"We still have lots of farmland left," he said on the phone Friday.
He also said he'd talked with farmers and folks at the Co-op. "I’m sorry I didn't reach out to David Cook to let him know," he said. (Reuter often alternates between condescension, contradiction and kindness. It is quite a dizzying ride.)
RPA, admittedly, as stated in a letter to city + county governments, has access to "the most extensive sources of information and knowledge on the region than has ever occurred in our history."
The larger point?
The city has funded a new Parks and Outdoors Plan.
Over the years, we've had multiple variations of blueprint plans designed to end homelessness. More plans designed to encourage affordable housing.
Multiple variations of anti-violence gun and gang plans. All of these are vital and needed. Thank you, genuinely, local government.
So, why not food?
What would it take for city and county governments to fund a Comprehensive Food Plan that evaluates the state of regional food?
- Challenges facing growers and producers
- Insecurities, vulnerabilities and food deserts
- Farm-to-table pipelines
- Access to regional food and markets
- Farmland loss, conservation and protection
Marrying regional planning and food is nothing outlandish. The one system that keeps us all alive - the single system most foundational to our existence - can also be central to our regional planning.
In 2007, the American Planning Association (APA) adopted a policy guide that "provides a vision and suggests ways for planners to become engaged in community and regional food planning." (Reuter's an APA member and authored multiple policy guides.)
Back to Avondale. During the Q-and-A, Reuter was asked, again:
What role can regional planning play in supporting urban access to food and protecting rural farmland?
His answer?
"We have never really had a constituency that really has tried to sustain this issue," he said.
Meaning? Our region has never had any united, effective and powerful body of food advocates.
Know what?
He's right. We haven't.
Homebuilders do. Developers do. The tourism industry does.
But not local food.
Imagine a civic and political body comprised of chefs, farmers and growers, vintners, restaurateurs, hotel owners, bar owners and every backyard gardener under the Hamilton County sun that runs for office, fundraises, networks and pushes our elected officials to take regional food seriously.
"This food coalition?" Dan said. "We need to have folks on city council and county commission."
His response is insightful, but - sorry, stick-in-the-mud here - doesn't really answer the question. (Plus, Councilwoman Marvene Noel is a core member of the Food Coalition.)
"That's bullshit," he said, when I summarized his Avondale response back to him on the phone Friday. "That is what your notes are saying and your interpretations. I don't believe that ... I disagree with your take on what I said at that meeting."
I agree. About the bullshit part.
Here's the chicken-or-egg runaround that has, frankly, caused some bruising conversations between us.
- Can RPA take the lead initiative and create this food policy plan?
"We're an umbrella organization. We're here to help create a table if there’s not a table," Reuter said, adding: "I make my own judgments about what is important.
"So ... yes?
- Or does it first need the willpower of concerned elected officials, who then direct RPA to create a regional + comprehensive food policy plan?
"If you think RPA on their own can do something that’s mind-blowing in terms of this issue, on its own, it’s not possible. We have to have everybody else at the table," he said.
Argh. Heavens-to-Betsy. Am I the only one confused here?
Whose initiative comes first? RPA or city + county governments?
We've put 10,000x more attention on minor league baseball stadiums than studying, evaluating and - hell, just talking with - local farmers and growers.
This dynamic predates RPA or Reuter. Local governments historically overlook food as part of policy and planning. (Admittedly, so did I, during my columnist years at the Times Free Press.)
Thankfully, Tim Kelly's administration has shown genuine interest - there's talk of an Urban Ag Specialist position within the city - in elevating regional food as a regional policy issue.
In no small way, Mayor Kelly's the first mayor to attend the Main Street Farmers' Market in recent memory.
Reuter and I tangled throughout the day on Friday with phone calls, texts, interruptions, frustration and apology. (For the record: tangling is part of the work. RPA's carrying a heavy load right now. And, as I've told him: I support his work, which is urgently needed. So, thank you.)
Near the end of our last call, Reuter said this:
"If I am directed by ... elected officials, I will do what they ask me to do," he said.
There you have it.
Can we encourage our local officials to create a comprehensive food policy guide that is also used in planning and policy-making?
Let's start today (click links below).
Join the Chattanooga Food Coalition
Story ideas, questions, feedback? Interested in partnering with us? Email: david@foodasaverb.comThis story is 100% human generated; no AI chatbot was used in the creation of this content.
food as a verb thanks our sustaining partner:
food as a verb thanks our story sponsor:
The Robert Finley Stone Foundation
A private foundation in memory of Bobby Stone.
Two Thursdays ago, the Chattanooga Food Coalition - a devoted group of "volunteers who care about the local food system" - held its January meeting at the Avondale Community Center.
The invitation was intriguing:
Dan Reuter, the Executive Director of the Regional Planning Agency, will be sharing an overview of comprehensive plans for Chattanooga and Hamilton County, and where/how our food system fits into the picture.
One year ago - January 2024 - I spoke to Reuter for the first time. He'd joined the Kelly administration as the Regional Planning Agency (RPA) head after three decades of planning in Atlanta and north Georgia.
Last winter, I called Reuter to ask:
Can regional planning play a role in creating food policy for the city and county?
It's the same question we carried into last week's Food Coalition meeting at Avondale.
It's the same question I'm still asking today.
Why?
I can't get a straight answer.
Last week, at Avondale, maybe 20 of us were there. Outside our conference room, neighborhood kids played pick-up hoops and 2K on big screens. Outside, garden beds were covered from the winter cold. On tables in the back, stacks of Lupi's pizza.
Reuter began his talk a few minutes before 6 pm. He presented 60 slides, all about regional growth. Finished around 6.18 pm. Said some really interesting things.
Most importantly, though, was what Dan Reuter didn't say.
Very little of his talk directly involved food.
It wasn't until the Q-and-A that we asked the ongoing question:
What role can regional planning play in supporting urban access to food and protecting rural farmland?
His answer was telling.
But first?
Some B-roll from the event.
Reuter and the RPA are working on Plan Chattanooga and Plan Hamilton - the first official planning documents for the city and county, respectively. (Plan Chattanooga will be presented to the City Council in March.)
Yeah, the very first. Strange, huh? We've never had a comprehensive planning doc for either the city or county. Reuter - he's got a pedigreed career, no doubt - and team deserve hearty applause for this work.
The time is definitely ripe. According to Reuter's presentation:
- The population in the city, county and unincorporated areas will hit 600,000 soon, if it hasn't already.
- Last year, Hamilton County's population grew three times the national average; it is the fifth-fastest growing county in Tennessee's 95 counties.
- Approximately 21% of Chattanooga streets have sidewalks.
- By 2040, it's possible we've added 60,000 new jobs and 46,000 households within the county.
(Last week, the Times Free Press reported that Reuter, a Tennessee resident, had voted in Georgia during the November elections.) "Growth is going to keep coming at us," he told the Avondale crowd. "I’m very positive about the future. Don't get sad about this presentation."
Months ago, Food as a Verb reported on the frightening rate of regional farmland loss.
- In Tennessee, we're paving over 10 acres of farmland every hour of every day, according to Tennessee's 2024 Economic Report.
- One million acres of Tennessee farmland are in jeopardy, the American Farmland Trust declares.
- Nine years of Hamilton County cropland remain, warned the former Director of Conservation Impact for the Land Trust for Tennessee.
(Note to readers: the above data was assembled using satellite imaging and LANDFIRE Existing Vegetation Type data which comes from the USDA/US Forest Service and the US Department of the Interior."It’s about the most comprehensive and granular data available for land cover on a large scale," said Luke Iverson, former Director of Conservation Impact for the Land Trust for Tennessee.)
Reuter's presentation didn't show this. He included agricultural land-use records from the county assessor's office, which are formed from tax records.
(Plus, Tennessee's Forestry Division is a subset within the Dept. of Agriculture, which means forested timber-growth can be counted as "agriculture" thus skewing a picture of what actually counts as food-producing land.)
Three slides referenced both Georgia and UT Ag-Extension offices, the state-wide Tennessee Farmers' Co-op and a logo for TN Local Food and food conference in Atlanta.
"We still have lots of farmland left," he said on the phone Friday.
He also said he'd talked with farmers and folks at the Co-op. "I’m sorry I didn't reach out to David Cook to let him know," he said. (Reuter often alternates between condescension, contradiction and kindness. It is quite a dizzying ride.)
RPA, admittedly, as stated in a letter to city + county governments, has access to "the most extensive sources of information and knowledge on the region than has ever occurred in our history."
The larger point?
The city has funded a new Parks and Outdoors Plan.
Over the years, we've had multiple variations of blueprint plans designed to end homelessness. More plans designed to encourage affordable housing.
Multiple variations of anti-violence gun and gang plans. All of these are vital and needed. Thank you, genuinely, local government.
So, why not food?
What would it take for city and county governments to fund a Comprehensive Food Plan that evaluates the state of regional food?
- Challenges facing growers and producers
- Insecurities, vulnerabilities and food deserts
- Farm-to-table pipelines
- Access to regional food and markets
- Farmland loss, conservation and protection
Marrying regional planning and food is nothing outlandish. The one system that keeps us all alive - the single system most foundational to our existence - can also be central to our regional planning.
In 2007, the American Planning Association (APA) adopted a policy guide that "provides a vision and suggests ways for planners to become engaged in community and regional food planning." (Reuter's an APA member and authored multiple policy guides.)
Back to Avondale. During the Q-and-A, Reuter was asked, again:
What role can regional planning play in supporting urban access to food and protecting rural farmland?
His answer?
"We have never really had a constituency that really has tried to sustain this issue," he said.
Meaning? Our region has never had any united, effective and powerful body of food advocates.
Know what?
He's right. We haven't.
Homebuilders do. Developers do. The tourism industry does.
But not local food.
Imagine a civic and political body comprised of chefs, farmers and growers, vintners, restaurateurs, hotel owners, bar owners and every backyard gardener under the Hamilton County sun that runs for office, fundraises, networks and pushes our elected officials to take regional food seriously.
"This food coalition?" Dan said. "We need to have folks on city council and county commission."
His response is insightful, but - sorry, stick-in-the-mud here - doesn't really answer the question. (Plus, Councilwoman Marvene Noel is a core member of the Food Coalition.)
"That's bullshit," he said, when I summarized his Avondale response back to him on the phone Friday. "That is what your notes are saying and your interpretations. I don't believe that ... I disagree with your take on what I said at that meeting."
I agree. About the bullshit part.
Here's the chicken-or-egg runaround that has, frankly, caused some bruising conversations between us.
- Can RPA take the lead initiative and create this food policy plan?
"We're an umbrella organization. We're here to help create a table if there’s not a table," Reuter said, adding: "I make my own judgments about what is important.
"So ... yes?
- Or does it first need the willpower of concerned elected officials, who then direct RPA to create a regional + comprehensive food policy plan?
"If you think RPA on their own can do something that’s mind-blowing in terms of this issue, on its own, it’s not possible. We have to have everybody else at the table," he said.
Argh. Heavens-to-Betsy. Am I the only one confused here?
Whose initiative comes first? RPA or city + county governments?
We've put 10,000x more attention on minor league baseball stadiums than studying, evaluating and - hell, just talking with - local farmers and growers.
This dynamic predates RPA or Reuter. Local governments historically overlook food as part of policy and planning. (Admittedly, so did I, during my columnist years at the Times Free Press.)
Thankfully, Tim Kelly's administration has shown genuine interest - there's talk of an Urban Ag Specialist position within the city - in elevating regional food as a regional policy issue.
In no small way, Mayor Kelly's the first mayor to attend the Main Street Farmers' Market in recent memory.
Reuter and I tangled throughout the day on Friday with phone calls, texts, interruptions, frustration and apology. (For the record: tangling is part of the work. RPA's carrying a heavy load right now. And, as I've told him: I support his work, which is urgently needed. So, thank you.)
Near the end of our last call, Reuter said this:
"If I am directed by ... elected officials, I will do what they ask me to do," he said.
There you have it.
Can we encourage our local officials to create a comprehensive food policy guide that is also used in planning and policy-making?
Let's start today (click links below).
Join the Chattanooga Food Coalition
Story ideas, questions, feedback? Interested in partnering with us? Email: david@foodasaverb.comThis story is 100% human generated; no AI chatbot was used in the creation of this content.
Food as a verb thanks our story sponsor:
Food as a Verb Thanks our sustaining partner:
A private foundation in memory of Bobby Stone.
