NEW(S) from SSRF

Regeneration—Latina Alliance for Agroecology and Food Systems/Regeneración – Alianza Latine en Agroecología y el Sistema Alimentari is a startup fiscally sponsored by SSRF that serves both rural and urban Latine farmers and Latine agricultural professionals in California providing technical assistance (business, financial, food safety, pest management, crop planning, soil health improvement, irrigation, etc.) and service providers (advocates, educators, on-farm staff, cooperative extension specialists and small farm advisors, federal or state government agencies that work with small farmers, and any other professionals throughout the supply chain.)  You can learn more about RegenerationLA here.

Regenerative Farming Workshops: From 2021-24, SSRF and RegenerationLA conducted three years of regenerative agriculture and technical assistance workshops for about 50 Latine operators of small farms across the California Central Coast.  SSRF conducted a third round of Regenerative Agriculture workshops for 2023-24. With the support of USDA and the California Department of Food and Agriculture, these Spanish and English hands-on workshops on management skills, regenerative agriculture, and agricultural technologies and practices for small farm operators in Santa Cruz, Santa Clara, Monterey and San Benito Counties ran from October 2023 to June 2024 at sites around the Central Coast.  SSRF & Regeneration LA have received funding from USDA to conduct another round of workshops in 2026-29.  The workshops are being held, in part, on Rancho Coyote Viejo, a RegenerationLA pilot land access and demonstration farm near Hollister.

A Movement to Create a Solar Utility in Santa Cruz:  SSRF is launching a campaign to create a municipal solar utility in the City of Santa Cruz with the authority to build community energy systems and distribute power to interested customers.  The obstacles to creating such a utility are significant but the potential savings are, too.  A draft description can be found here.

Older Projects & Other news

Protecting Soil and Water Quality with Compost Applications on Small Latine-operated farms on the California Central Coast   Our latest project, funded by the Central California Coast Water Quality Control Board and the Rose Foundation, seeks to measure and monitor nitrate leaching into groundwater after the application of compost.  Read the project proposal here  and the final report here.

Marigold Collective: Cultivating Tradition, Community, and the Land/ Colectivo Cempoalxochitl: Cultivando Tradición, Comunidad y la Tierra supports small-scale, organic Latine marigold growers in San Benito Monterey and Santa Cruz counties. 

Resources on the “Solar Cost-Shift” Debate

Resources on Community Solar & Renewable Energy Strategies

Housing: Maybe It’s Time to Revisit ADUs

Community Solar Strategies is an on-line discussion and action group seeking to “move the noodle forward” on community and distributed energy resources in California.  The California Public Utilities Commission and the state’s investor owned utilities are making the deployment of independent microgrids and community energy systems difficult, if not impossible.  This group is developing strategies and tactics for getting around those obstacles.  Calls take place every 2-3 weeks.  If you’d like to join, please email to sustainablesystemsresearch@gmail.com.  Resources and records can be found at  https://drive.google.com/drive/u/3/folders/1TcajVYupAP88MSWbmBRC6IUjGqJo4M6C (the page is open access)

Solar Dividends: Solar energy can convert a temporary guaranteed income pilot program into a permanent program. Tune into this webinar to hear more from Robert Stayton and the Sustainable Systems Research Foundation. Video here: https://youtu.be/4KaoFCN6u0c; Audio here: https://tinyurl.com/bdhrf3ua; Transcript here: https://tinyurl.com/m886jhcw