Cultivating Farm Law Leaders in the Western Region

View the project report

Commodities

Practices

• Farm Business Management: business planning, financial management, labor/employment, risk management, Legal
• Sustainable Communities: quality of life

This project will result in the
development and support of 8 Farm Law Leaders who will deliver at
least 8 farm law workshops in the Western region on legal issues
of importance to sustainable producers. The Farm Law Leaders will
be equipped with additional resources that empower the Leader to
continue supporting producers who attend the workshops. As a
result, 240 farmers attending the 8 workshops (30 attendees each)
will have more resilient stable businesses and improved quality
of life. 

We will achieve these outcomes by
hosting a Farm Law Leadership Fellowship- a train-the-trainer
program for Extension educators, farm education nonprofit staff,
farm business service providers, and post-secondary instructors
to lead farm law workshops locally. The training curriculum
emphasizes risk-reducing action steps and accurate, clear legal
explanations. The program also trains (and requires) Leaders to
use peer-to-peer training techniques and incorporate local
producers in their presentations.

This program creates a next-step
leadership process for agriculture professionals who have been
through our 2018 Western SARE PD-funded Guiding Resilience
program (a 15-hour training in the basics of farm law for
professionals). Graduates asked us for this program so they can
deliver presentations. They also want support materials designed
just for them. As such, we will develop two handbooks in
collaboration with professionals and producers, to further
support the Leaders on leases and business structures. These
handbooks complement the extensive collection of resources Farm
Commons already provides to agriculture professionals on other
legal subjects.

As a nonprofit devoted
exclusively to teaching agricultural communities farm law, we are
deeply skilled in creating educational materials that accommodate
all state-specific nuances that are necessary to the curricular
goals. Through our NC SARE pilot, we proved that it is safe and
effective to train laypersons in legal matters without violating
any rules on practicing law.

For this proposal, objectives and
short term learning outcomes are the same.  Please reference
the attached Logic Model for additional detail.