Santa Fe City and County Advisory Council on Food Policy

Santa Fe City and County, Advisory Council on Food Policy Thursday, August 14, 2025, 9:00AM-11AM In-Person: Santa Fe Farmer’s Market Institute:1607 Paseo De Peralta, Santa Fe, NM 87501 and on Zoom A. CALL TO ORDER​ 9:04​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ B. ROLL CALL Nate Crail - Excused Maria Sanchez-Tucker - Excused Eric Renz-Whitmore - Present David Sundberg - Present Susan Perry - Present Emigdio Ballon - Present Tejinder Ciano - Present Said Assali - Present Jasmine Meyer - Present Peter Ives – Present Coy Maienza - Present Shana Woodworth - Not present We have a quorum. Staff: Pam Roy Helen Henry Guests: JoDee Powers Jill Dixon Marko Alarid Valerie Rangel, SF County James Martinez, SF County Joseph Scala, SF County Michelle Stizza, NMSU Cooperative Extension Office ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ C. APPROVAL OF AGENDA –August 14, 2025 [ACTION]​ ​ ​ ​ Prioritization and Agenda Order​ Decision to move item #J5 to the top Motion - David Second - Sue Approved Item # J5 - Motion to approve the October 9 meeting to the County Extension office with a hybrid option. Motion - Sue Second - David All approved ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ D. ACCEPTANCE OF MINUTES – July 10, 2025 [ACTION]​ ​ ​ ​ Motion - Said Second - Sue Approved ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ E. COMMUNICATIONS FROM THE FLOOR​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ None ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ F. INITIATIVES AND ACTIONS​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ 1. Federal Updates In the light of the federal reconciliation, we are scrambling to understand the implications of the changes. Pam introduced the new newsletter, Field Notes: AgriPolicy Brief which FTT is working on with Ivy Reynolds to put together. She walked through the newsletter and highlighted the changes and also went over an infographic which speaks to the changes. Federal funding cuts for food and nutrition programs will mean that the state needs to absorb at least $430M in lost funding, not including the losses to NM agriculture and programs. The SNAP Ed program is ending in October because the funding was cut and this will affect no only individuals, but organizations in NM. Some changes in conservation programs (like EQIP) which may result in increased funding, and many things that are being shuffled around. Larger farms and farming corporations have gained a benefit to include corporate investors in applying for money, which will make it more difficult for small farms to apply for funding, thus increasing disparities. Screwworm is a huge potential problem and we are keeping an eye on this. Because of the new reconciliation bill, the impact to rural areas will be deeper than in urban areas. Every month, Farm to Table will host a roundtable. Next roundtable Sept 24, 9-10 for stakeholders - conversation with federal delegation and their staff. Jill said that they are waiting to see how the reconciliation bill impacts SNAP which is what will affect the work of the foodbanks. The work requirements and eligibility requirements were set to go into effect as soon as the bill was signed (July 4, 2025), although they haven’t gone into effect, but may be applied retroactively. The current impact to New Mexico outlines a potential 60,000 people who would become ineligible or have their benefits reduced based on new exemptions. This is causing a lot of consternation because it is not clear how this will play out. Foodbanks provide 1 meal for every nine meals provided by SNAP. The foodbanks cannot make up the difference, so they will be working with the state to advocate for robust protections and reinforcements of the SNAP program within the state of New Mexico. There is a lot of anxiety right now among the people that they are serving. Herbert asked if SNAP benefits are being cut to veterans. Jill said that work requirements will apply to veterans for the first time. Peter asked about the timing of when the changes will happen? Jill said that Oct 1 is what they think, but it could happen any time. The New Mexico Association of Food Banks will hopefully be presenting to the state's Federal Budget Stabilization Committee. There was a request to Jill to share out what happens at that committee before our next meeting (send to Sue or Pam to share with the committee.) David asked if there is any printed information that describes what is happening? Jill doesn’t think that there is anything reliable out there right now, but would be happy to collaborate with anyone on this. Pam said that some organizations got a letter saying that they could apply for GUSNIP funding, but the government did not have an RFP. Pam went over some figures that the state might need to decide to absorb in the light of the federal cuts. Jill said that we still need to have hope in the ability of people who are coming together to find solutions to the problems we are facing. Pam reported that the USDA Secretary Rollins said that the federal government will be buying commodities (a list of about 8 items - beans, fish, cranberries, etc.) from “local farmers” and that this is how they see themselves as supporting local farmers. Jill said that we’ll see how that rolls out. Peter requested that Pam send out an email with the federal bill numbers and the resources that she shared in her presentation. Pam talked about the delicate balance that will need to be maintained in going forward with the farm bill reauthorization (via marker bills, etc.). Peter asked about what kinds of things we can do on a local level? Pam said that the Association of Counties might be a good partner in this. She asked the people who were on the call from the county, how we could support their work? David said that we can also leverage funding from the private sector to help support the work that the state can do. Tejinder asked Jill about how foodbanks can support local farmers over wholesale commodity purchasing? Jill said that she appreciates the complexity of this question and wants to continue this conversation. She said that just at The Food Depot, for the entire fiscal year, the purchasing budget is $2 million and with that, they have to feed approximately 40,000 people a month. Emidio asked about getting data and understanding what the needs of the food assistance organizations are. Joseph said that the county is working on Aggregate to create a digital marketing platform. They are also working on a digital marketing plan to work with restaurants and institutions. They also are starting a working group for LaBajda Ranch. Pam asked to be included in this. Eric mentioned a project called Fund It that could help aggregate funding from multiple sources. He would like support in making this work for people that we are involved with. Pam said that we are learning how to communicate with our federal colleagues in this new environment of high scrutiny. Spyware is currently being used for federal employees. Hvtce emphasized that communication with people who are being affected is very important right now. There may be county or city programs that people don’t know about that are available, and we can share information. Jill - the foodbanks have been having conversations about including minors in the meals that they are serving. This could be a simple change in the rules to allow this. Action: Peter asked Jill to send the Council more information about this. Peter asked if anyone would like to serve on particular committees - send an email to Peter, Sue and Pam. Said is happy to continue to help with updating the Food Plan. Sue said that we can summarize the comments and report back at our next meeting. Action: Helen will send out the request for Food Plan updates after the meeting. 2. Critical Timeline of the impacts of Federal funding cuts in the state. [Action] 3. Update to the Food Plan [Action] 4. County Transfer Development Rights-Update​ on County map. Herbert gave an overview of a recent meeting and described the Transfer Development Rights (TDR), program of the county basically born out of the county's zoning ordinance which allows landowners who have certain qualities of their property, like ag land, or open space, or riparian habitat with those characteristics and values we want to conserve. It allows them to voluntarily agree to sever their remaining development rights. What they do with this program is they voluntarily, through the program that he manages, agree with the Board of County Commissioners to to basically put a TDR on the property, which is like a conservation easement. They're basically voluntarily volunteering to never develop their property again. For each of those houses that they agree not to build, they get a TDR certificate, andnd what they do with that certificate is really their own business. The intent is that they would sell these certificates to developers, and for the price of one certificate the developer can build 5 houses. So the farmer agrees not to build one house and they get four certificates. A builder could buy those certificates and build 20 more houses on their property in other areas of the county that are designated for future development and placemaking and community development, where we want to focus, development, and infrastructure investments. It's a land conservation tool to preserve valuable, sensitive irrigation, agriculture, environmental historic property and transfer that development right to other areas of the county. The county now has 43 certificates in the “bank” Peter asked if the maps that Herbert showed could be shared? Action: Herbert said yes, also please see if there is anything that they can provide feedback on where they can help preserve agricultural land. David asked if the data could be filtered to show ownership. Valerie said yes. David is willing to support information gathering about this. Tejinder mentioned a cooperative process that happens in other states that can help broker the TDR process. Discussion around this work. ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ G. PRESENTATIONS: ​​ ​ ​ ​ ​ Senator Trujillo (invited) Postponed​ ​ H. STAFF COMMUNICATIONS Website re-build and transfer- Deadline for bios and head shot from Council members August 14, 2025 Sue would like to be involved in website redesign.​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ I. ITEMS FROM THE COUNCIL​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ Member check-in Tejinder apologized for his recent absences, but still values his involvement with the Council and is very happy to be back here. Peter noted that this is the busy season for Tejinder’s work. Discussion about community gardens. ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ J. ITEMS FROM THE CHAIR​​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ●​ 1. SFFPC progress Reports to City Council and County BCC Peter talked about doing a two-page update to each of the governing bodies. on food issues. He’ll put together a draft and send that out for comment. ●​ 2. Discussion of Public Education meeting​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ●​ 3 New member update​ Sue reported that Jill Dixon is working on having someone from Food Depot on the council​​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ●​ 4. Next Meeting: September 11, 2025: Hybrid ●​ 5. Vote to meet in-person at SF County Extension office October 9, 2025 [Action]​ ●​ 6.Topics for future presentations Peter: We would still like to have Sen Trujillo speak. Sue: We love to have Tejinder talk about healthy soil and related work. Emigdio is also interested in doing a presentation. K. ADJOURNMENT 10:55am These notes were taken contemporaneously and may contain errors and omissions. Signed by ___________________________ Helen Henry. I verify that these notes have been approved by a quorum of members of the Santa Fe Food Policy Council. Signed by Susan Perry, Co-chair or, Peter Ives, Co-chair _____________________________________________________