Our project goal is to establish a community food processing facility in order to foster the development of an agriculturally based, value added local economy. This facility will provide a state inspected, regulation compliant environment, furnished with commercial equipment and staffed by a professional food processing consultant, who will deliver training and on-site supervision, thereby allowing micro business owners to produce retail and wholesale value-added products. Our role in this process is to organize the creation of this facility to best serve the needs of our community. We will provide the expertise in standards of food safety and facility inspection that are challenging for individual food businesses to achieve. Particularly in the design phase of this project, research in food safety regulations, as well as coordination with state health inspectors will take time and resources. Increasing the accessibility and diversity of high-quality local foods in our retail markets, school kitchens and senior centers strengthens the connections between agricultural producers and the community at large, rebuilding the broken food system. At this time, we cannot feed ourselves in this region. Markets for local food are predominantly in-season for fresh produce. However, the demand for processed and out-of-season foods is currently dominated by producers outside the region. Consumers have demonstrated an increasing preference for local products, but are frustrated by the lack of locally processed food available throughout the year. A local food processing facility will meet that demand, expanding the opportunities for food entrepreneurs. Such a facility will also increase the demand for local farm products and create many new opportunities for existing producers and new farmers. Over the course of the past two years, through discussions and workshops within the Pompanoosuc Agricultural Society network (which includes many other Upper Valley organizations) as well as through regional and statewide food summit participation, we have repeatedly encountered the lack of infrastructure as a crucial missing link in the production, availability and affordability of quality local food. A recent email posted to the VT Vegetable Growers listserv, Sept. 12th 2010, gives a perfect example of why we need this facility. Jake and Liz Guest, proprietors of Kildeer Farm in Norwich, VT, posted the following request: “We're looking for a canning facility with steam jacketed kettles and an electric strainer and capacity to hot water bath a number of jars at once in which to process all our tomatoes...we have way too many tomatoes now to sell retail and wholesale at our usual venues.” The nearest facilities are currently The Franklin County Community Development Center, in Greenfield, MA, as the Food Venture Center facility in Fairfax, VT closed due to building expansion limitations associated with historic preservation. Two years from now, the FVC is slated to open another location in Morrisville. We are currently evaluating the suitability of a centrally located building in Post Mills to house a commercially certifiable processing facility, including a commercial kitchen with a stove, multiple ovens, a bread oven, pressure canner, deep fryer, commercial mixer, steam kettle, walk-in freezer space and refrigerated space as well as long term cool storage space with different regulated humidity levels. An adjoining space for processing foods containing local meats is also part of this design. In the shorter term, we are seeking funding for the preliminary meetings with other community groups, area groups organized around food and sustainability issues and to engage professionals either paid or volunteer contributors to help evaluate locations/facilities/buildings we have researched as well as to help us conceptualize a more comprehensive business and funding plan for the implementation of the entire project. Uses of this facility will be diverse: value-added product businesses will play a crucial role, bringing local, prepared foods into the market year-round. Processing and storage of surplus crops in-season for off-season consumption is particularly important for schools and senior centers, often struggling with processing and storage capacity. Farmers running year-round CSA share programs also gain the possibility of offering value-added goods. Home-scale processing training and space will be available.