Q: What kind of work are you doing?
This summer, I spent eight weeks in Louisville, Kentucky working with New Roots: Fresh Stop Market, a nonprofit that focuses on food justice. This small organization reaches about 700 families, which equates to 2,200 community members. Their mission is to increase fresh food access and ensure that affordable fresh food is available year-round in all neighborhoods. The markets function similarly to a crop share. My responsibilities included office work in the morning and tending markets in the afternoon. In the office, I completed paperwork, edited spreadsheets, sent reminders for people to pick up their shares, published blog posts, handled phone calls and organized deliveries to bring shares of produce to those unable to access the markets themselves. In the afternoons, we went to the markets to organize, pack and distribute fresh produce to community members. The produce came from local organic farms, and there was a total of nine locations, where each market operated every other week. Families and individuals signed up and paid for this crop share on a sliding-scale system based on their income. Each bag has eight to 10 food items, which change weekly.
