Stacey Conn –
General Manager
Orly Munzing
– Founder & Executive Director
Orly:
Heifers is from the German word and are cows, as
you know cows are inseminated these days artificially. Until a heifer has a
baby, and its provides milk for its baby it is called a heifer, once it has the
baby and feeds it milk it is cow.The Story: I am the founder, and the executive director and I came up with the idea. It has been about 14 years close to 15 years ago since I started it. I was walking with husband on our lovely trails which connect to a beautiful orchard in Dummerston, Vermont called Millard orchard. We have walked trails for years, so about 17 years ago I stopped and talked to my farmer neighbor Dwight Miller and I felt guilty we were his neighbor and enjoyed what was around and we did nothing. I thought to myself you do all the work and we just enjoy it. What is it we can do? At the time I was a consultant and I chose to live in Vermont for a better quality of life when raising my kids. He said you know what (in his Vermont slang), “You do this, why don’t you go tell all your friends that they need to start supporting local farmers because if you like seeing this, you won’t see it in 10 years.” I went home and looked at the news and statistics, and it really hit home. Later, I was entertaining merchants at my house for a casual dinner and listening to conversation and noticed that they all were talking about how the town needed to be rejuvenated, what is it we have that no one else has? We have abundance of cows. At 19 I visited Spain and visited this small little town in 1972 where they had the running of the bulls. I said to my friends at that table; want to put Brattleboro on the map? I looked to capture people’s attention. Why don’t we stroll a bunch of cows down the street to capture people’s attention, and supporting farmers and connect people with the food they eat? I went to Dwight with the idea and asked him what he thought. “Best idea I have heard since mom’s apple pie,” he told me. Dwight had a big personality. He then went to a meeting about this rejuvenation of the town and mentioned the idea there. The local paper covered it in about one paragraph and then it went viral, everyone loved it and kept calling Dwight about it. “I am going to have them call you, and tell them that you are going to do it for me in June,” he said. I said June? That soon? But it happened so fast. I was everywhere with the news and media, took a bunch of heifers to NY with me to go on the news. It was crazy. Strolling of the Heifers is really an engine that supports all the work that is done. \
We raise money and every two years the giving of the money changes. Regards to farmers in the early stages we also wanted education for kids about farms. We ran program for this for 5 to 6 years. Now there is huge initiative almost across the country with connecting school to food education which we support and try to do. Being an educator I knew I would have to do that through the back door. Then we started the Beginning Farmers Program which went on for 2 years and has now been taken over by other programs. And now there is a career center that has an agriculture program and has helped developed careers. We then moved to agriculture microloans since 40% of new farmers and 20% of old farmers can’t take loans because most banks don’t understand the lifestyle. We worked with banks which were a process but it was around $10,000 – $15,000 loans. This included a few banks in VT NH Mass and Maine. It raised a lot of money and we realized it is a good investment, made for a lot of success and many programs are still running. This became a way farmers could show a history of good borrowing success. – Sustainable. Once we could catapult that, we moved to the next program which we are on now. We are still now in the process of our Farm Business Plan Competition for our 4th year. Mostly younger folks start businesses that would support farmers. Big Picture Farmers for example was one of the winners and they worked with goat milk and are now national. Many success stories! Also in the developing stage a farm food incubator accelerated program which is for those who would like to start a agriculture business. They can come to us for consultation, mentoring and connect them to appropriate funding to help get it off the ground.
Very dedicated people working on this organization which is why it is successful, 90% of funding is through sponsorship for the event and parade. Takes place the first weekend in June and beginning of dairy month, all about sustainable culture.
Our Locavore Index is done each year to help states to bring their rating up so they are supporting local agriculture in their state community. It’s a conversation tool and a way to get people to stop and think about what they are doing in personal community.
What is sustainability and sustainable living in
your own words?
- Reason why you want it to be sustainable is because the world at large right now wherever you are is very shaky, every country state and place has this issue. This issue of having control is there. None of us have control of our climate. Every person on this planet can take a stand now and start one step at a time no matter how big or small and take control. They start with the first in industry on this earth which is agriculture. If they start investing in their community, it will have control of what they are doing at the moment, local control is sustainability. Personal sustainability is what I put into myself and the choices I make. It’s a complicated situation but to me it is having control of choices and those I make in my personal lifestyle and community.
What do you think Vermont would be like without
this focus on sustainability?
- Like Vermont, its every state. It is such an important issue that it is a world issue. VT is clearly a leader in our country but when you step out of the continent there are the same issues. We all have to as citizens of this earth take action in our local community. Its important issue for VT but also other states.
- For a small state and a small population, we accomplish and prosper a lot and successfully. That is why people choose it because of the land and quality of life. But go to other states and talk to these issues they might just talk about dollars and cents.
- People are realizing more about the food that is going into their body and of their health. By the way statistically, Vermont has more farms now than it ever did before. But the farms have changed. There are more boutique type farms such as a 4 to 5 acre farm selling herbs. Large farms not so much as opposed to smaller second income farms. Close to 3000 farmers but not as large. There are not many dairy farms left; you probably can just count them on two hands. Lots of dairy producers having tough times getting milk from VT because VT can’t produce dairy that they used to.
Stacey-
What I have seen and heard from some people we
get tremendous feedback from work we do. Also run programs around The River Garden
where they can promote businesses they can come in and talk about an area of
interest they have. A free event for participants which creates a community forum
kind of place and a springboard for businesses. We are connecting also a lot of
local artists to the public that comes to visit us. It starts a great
conversation! It is preserving the community here in town and drawing attention
to great efforts put on by other organizations, helps connect community members
to each other. “Support local economy and local farms – mission of Strolling of
Heifers.” People are paying attention to what is going on here and there has
never been anything like it.
The River garden is new and brand new building, we
have become the ambassadors for sustainable agriculture we invite people and it
is really good community values here. What it is about, slowing down and supporting
business- Orly
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