HomeMy WebLinkAbout2019-03-13Agricultural Advisory Committee
March 13, 2019
Page 1 of 2
Agricultural Advisory Committee
March 13, 2019
Members Present: Evan Carpenter (Chair), Kim LaMotte, Marie McRae, Brian Magee, Erin Bieber
Absent: Steve Foote
Liaisons: Craig Anderson, Planning Board
Jason Leifer, Town Board
Guests: None
The meeting was called to order at 7:34 pm.
Review and approval of minutes dated February 13, 2019
K. LaMotte made a motion to approve the minutes as written, seconded by E. Bieber, minutes
unanimously approved.
Old business
Virtual Farmer’s Market/Website
Discussion ensued regarding Virtual Farmer’s Market. Two options presented were localharvest.org and
buylocalfoodny.org. We would be linking from the Dryden website to whichever site is decided on.
• Local Harvest website was easy to use, one drawback was that there is a minimum $30/year
charge to have an ad free listing (per farm).
• The buylocalfoodny.org that Cornell Cooperative Extension of Tompkins County uses is free of
charge and is managed by Cornell Cooperative Extension in each county.
• Discussed what information could be put on the page for various farms. Each farm would be
responsible to make sure their information is up to date.
• C. Anderson suggested a member or two of the committee experiment by putting their farm on
the websites to see how it works for the next 30 days. E. Bieber and K. LaMotte will each give
the bylocalfoodny.org (Extension) site a try and report back at our next meeting.
• If everything goes well, we will send a bulk email to farms with the link letting them know the
Town website is linking to the Extension website, and if the farm wishes to be included, how to
go about adding their farm.
Comprehensive Plan Guidance Document
Discussed buffers and placement of residential wells with respect to neighboring farms. Committee
members have not finished reviewing for input, this will be tabled until the next meeting.
E. Bieber – Has been debating since going to the meeting regarding proposed changes to the
comprehensive plan. What potential issues there may be for farming? Has not been able to come up
with any obvious negatives to the introduction of restricting or regulating the greenhouse gas emissions
within the Town of Dryden and reducing the use of fossil fuels. The presentation did stress that it has
nothing to do with agriculture and will not affect agriculture.
Agricultural Advisory Committee
March 13, 2019
Page 2 of 2
The changes that make it into the Comprehensive Plan tend to inform and direct the laws and
regulations that eventually get on the books in Dryden. The comprehensive plan meeting was mainly
focusing on new building and making sure they are more energy efficient.
One of the recommendations that was highlighted as being important (in the chart that was worked on
quite some time ago) was farm energy conservation and renewable energy development. Believe that
was aimed at avoiding installation on prime soils. C. Anderson – The County says Dryden should have
1300 acres of solar panels to be self-sufficient. We currently have about 150 acres of solar panels.
There being no further business, E. Bieber made a motion to adjourn, seconded by K. LaMotte and
unanimously approved. The meeting was adjourned at 8:28 pm.
Respectfully submitted,
Chrystle Terwilliger
Deputy Town Clerk