Friendships are finally getting their due. Once relegated to a distant third position after life partners and children, a spate of new books are spotlighting the importance of friends. And research shows that people with close friends are healthier – both emotionally...
Purpose Prize
The Latest from CoGenerate
An Intergenerational Approach to Getting Families Housed in Santa Barbara
Lyiam Galo is the co-director of Generations United for Service, a program of the Northern Santa Barbara County United Way and one of 10 awardees of the CoGen Challenge to Advance Economic Opportunity. Watch for interviews with all 10 of these innovators bringing...
Utilizing Faith-Owned Land to Strengthen Intergenerational Community in Seattle
E.N. West is the co-founder and lead organizer of the Faith Land Initiative of the Church Council of Greater Seattle, one of 10 awardees of the CoGen Challenge to Advance Economic Opportunity. Watch for interviews with all 10 of these innovators bringing older and...
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Vera DuMont
Purpose Prize Fellow 2007
Building a self-sustaining foodshed based on the production and sale of local foods.
While growing up in New York City, working and raising a family in the suburbs, DuMont dreamed of living on a farm. Right after retiring 8 years ago, she headed into northwest New Jersey, still a land of woods and streams and family farms. There she attended an earth literacy program at Genesis Farm, where she became acutely aware of the intense development and market pressures threatening survival of the farms. Working with other concerned residents, she launched the Foodshed Alliance, a grassroots nonprofit devoted to fostering a profitable, self-sustaining “foodshed” based on the production and sale of local foods.The Alliance presents Farmers’ Forums demonstrating successful small farm strategies, Buy Fresh Buy Local campaigns to raise public appreciation of the many benefits of buying fresh, local foods and supporting neighbor farmers, a Farm-to-Chef program to bring local foods into local restaurants, and a Farm-to-School program to engage children early about good food. Generous support from Whole Foods and other local businesses and collaboration with such groups as FoodRoutes and the NJ Audubon Society have helped the Foodshed Alliance bring a new spirit of hope about the agricultural future of this area. DuMont still doesn’t live on a farm, but she does live near farms — and dreams of keeping them here.