Drew & Dan’s Story: We live and work in the San Francisco Bay Area. We have two kids, who are just about ready to go off to college.
We bought our 20 acres of unimproved grass and oak trees in 2005 with the plan to retreat to an off-grid homestead. Since then we have put in a well, a shed, gravity-based irrigation system, and started our straw bale field shed. Over this time we learned more about the issues surrounding our food production chain, particularly its ecological problems and vulnerabilities. The centralized structure needs to change, and the ones who own it are not incented to do so.

Plan for 2009 and beyond: We grew up with the message that there were “city” people and “farm” people and that one could not become the other without huge sacrifice and risk. We believe that this is not so. Our plan is to develop a profitable, sustainable organic farm that will feed our community while we still maintain a connection to our “city” roots. The people that have come before us developed growing techniques and telecommuting technologies. With creative thinking, hard work, and an active exchange of ideas with our fellow farmers, we think we can show that anyone can become part of a healthier food production system.