By Nina Livingstone
Photos courtesy of Michael Piazza
In October 2020, then–City Councilor Michelle Wu laid out an ambitious 66-page plan she titled “Food Justice Agenda for a Resilient Boston.” In part, it was in response to the broken food supply the pandemic had exposed.
Wu released her plan just a month after announcing her candidacy in Boston’s mayoral race. It was clear food justice would remain pivotal in her campaign strategy, later earning her the moniker Food Justice Mayor.
Soon after Wu won the race, she began to assemble key people to set her plan in motion. She revamped two departments to create the Office of Food Justice (OFJ), formerly the Office of Food Access, and Grow- Boston: Office of Urban Agriculture, which had been under the Department of Neighborhood Development. Wu mandated that the departments work together at a “systems level.”
Edible Boston spoke with Hae-In Kim, the deputy director with the Office of Food Justice; Shani Fletcher, director of GrowBoston; and the Rev. Mariama White-Hammond, chief of Environment, Energy and Open Space cabinet, which oversees the OFJ, to better understand how they will “build a food system that is equitable, resilient, sustainable and just.”
“GrowBoston will focus on increasing food production while OFJ will focus on food distribution and connecting producers to low-income food-insecure communities,” said Kim in summarizing the roles.
Fletcher pointed out that GrowBoston is essentially an expanded version of the Grassroots Program, which for 25-plus years was in the Mayor’s Office of Housing. GrowBoston provides support to farmers, urban gardeners and other food producers “to make it easier to grow food,” she said.
Yet getting the word out has been their biggest challenge, which is why putting together a communications campaign is at the top of the list. White-Hammond said it was also untangling the web of information to connect people to the right agency—an objective of the OFJ. “We work with a wide range of groups across the board, so we are listening and trying to at least consolidate where people can get information about what’s out there,” she explained.
The breadth of the newly revised departments is daunting. For example, one of the more sizable undertakings has been Wu’s inventory of all City-owned properties “from the smallest to the biggest,” said White-Hammond. The available property will allow GrowBoston to consider suitable land for urban farms. Gardens are already popping up across the city—on private land and in City parks.
“We are making more of our land available,” said White-Hammond, whose office also oversees the City’s Parks Department.
Together GrowBoston and OFJ cover a lot of ground— from helping people put a single raised bed in their backyard to operating urban farms and developing both rooftop gardens and farms. (Fletcher said the distinction between the two is this: Rooftop gardens are for individuals, whereas rooftop farms would be overseen by professionals and provide food for low-income households.)
“We’re trying to think holistically through all of those interventions to make sure that people have access,” said White-Hammond.
Urban gardens address several needs, including providing the city’s immigrant population the ability to grow foods they are familiar with. “We want to give people that opportunity, from both a financial perspective and a cultural perspective,” said White-Hammond, adding that other bonuses include “bringing positive energy to the parks; providing an opportunity for them to meet their neighbors and work on something together.”
GrowBoston is not just growing for and feeding Bostonians, but has recently added climate resiliency and educating residents to its agenda, along with a list of possibilities, which includes supporting the planting of fruit trees, providing technical support for innovative production (including rooftop growing), partnering with the Boston Public Library, funding school gardens, providing educational programming and garden spaces at senior centers and the list goes on, with Fletcher quick to note that GrowBoston is still in its planning stages and hopes to have specifics locked in by fall.
There were a lot of downsides to COVID, White-Hammond admitted, but developing relationships and partnerships with local farms landed on the upside. “The OFJ was able to give money to local farms to provide food for people. That was exciting, to have people go pick up a farm share grown right in their own backyard.”
With 22 farms to access, it’s a win-win. “To support our urban agriculture and support our food insecure families, that’s the sweet spot of exactly what we want to be able to do more of,” she said.
In looking at specific programs that serve the city, Kim lists Boston Summer Eats, which this year has more than 100 community partners providing free meals for kids 18 years and under throughout the summer. Double Up Food Bucks is a SNAP incentive program that encourages people to buy fresh produce with participation from seven corner stores and three Daily Table nonprofit grocery stores. The Farmers Market Coupons program provides households experiencing food insecurity with coupons to buy fresh produce, dairy products, eggs, meats and baked goods. It also gives vendors mini-grants to participate in small farmers markets. Food Sovereignty Grants provided $300,000 to build about 500 raised beds and 1,800 community- supported agriculture (CSA) deliveries.
But it is City Fresh Foods, a Roxbury-based, minority- owned business that was making headlines this summer. The City signed a $17 million contract with City Fresh Foods to provide meals to Boston Public Schools starting July 1. It is the largest non-construction contract the City has ever issued to a certified Black-owned business, said Kim.
The City Fresh contract also marks a major milestone under the Good Food Purchasing Standards. On the City’s books since 2019, Wu has made it the backbone of food procurement and pushed its overarching reach even further.
“The ordinance really helps us rethink how we procure food in the city,” said Kim, who listed its five pillars: local economies, environmental sustainability, valued workforce, animal welfare and nutrition.
Both White-Hammond and Kim acknowledged the impact inflation has had on families across the city, even addressing those households whose income puts them above government assistance but below their ability to keep the kitchen cupboards full.
“There are resources in the city that don’t require income qualifications,” Kim said, citing food pantries as a primary one. Unfortunately, a perceived stigma keeps many away from its doors. “They are there for everyone to use and they do have fresh fruits and vegetables sourced from local farms,” she said.
Kim outlines Mayor Wu’s plan as simply helping the city to grow and distribute food, and its residents to consume healthy food, with the end result supporting the local economy as much as it does Boston’s food-insecure population—regardless of where they stand on the income scale.
“My hope is that we find multiple ways to encourage food production in the city and that we help individuals grow food,” said Fletcher.
Getting food to households and institutions, as well as increasing the city’s resilience in times of crisis, provides “food security across the city,” she added.
“We know that we won’t be able to grow all of the food that the city needs but we can make a pretty big difference,” said White-Hammond.
For more information, visit boston.gov/departments/food-justice.
Just before press time, Aliza Wasserman was brought on as the Director of the OFJ; Edible Boston was able to catch up with her…
After a seven-year stint as head of Washington D.C.’s Produce Plus program, Aliza Wasserman can easily draw parallels between the two cities, transferring her successes along the way. Key among those is her political acuity, something she honed while developing and advocating for federal policies around food equity in cities across the country.
“Working with passionate city leaders who were committed to tackling resistance to change … and [doing so] in a way that brings everyone along with them, taught me how to lead through disruption in local government,” she said. “I also gained quite a bit of experience leading others through uncomfortable conversations about race—and doing so as a white woman,” she added.
In stepping into her new role, Wasserman outlined a few of her priorities:
- Full implementation of the Good Food Purchasing Program ordinance, which invests city dollars in a way that “represents our values.”
- Encourage OFJ and GrowBoston to deepen relationships between food justice leaders and food producers to jointly craft a new food system that has justice and resilience at its foundation.
- Acknowledge inequities in the locations of farmers markets and grocery stores. “While we build and improve programs…we have to ask the question ‘why are things the way they are?’ And by that I mean, what is the relationship between the widening racial wealth gap in the city of Boston and access to healthy food or access to land to grow food or capital to start a business?” she asked.
Wasserman sees her strengths coming into play as change rounds the corner. “The hallmark of my career and how I lead my life is that I am an extremely collaborative person,” she said. “We have an incredible opportunity with the creation of OFJ and GB and Mayor Wu’s commitment to moving a bold food justice agenda, and at the end of the day, I believe this is at its core about building relationships and collaboration.”
This story appeared in the Fall 2022 issue of Edible Boston Magazine.
