The original Depression-era Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), part of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal, was a public work relief program developed in response to high unemployment and the ravages of poor soil health management that created the Dust Bowl. It was a far-sighted program that built trails, lean-tos, and cabins on state and national parks, and expanded forest management, flood control, and many other conservation-focused projects on public lands across the country. Slangily known as “three hots and a cot,” the program provided a lifeline for unemployed young men—offering not only accessible work opportunities but also training in new skills and a path toward stable, long-term employment.

Today, with multiple stresses from a changing climate, extensive soil loss, continued unemployment from a global pandemic, and the erosion of confidence in a prosperous and sustainable future, Pasa has been advocating to bring back this multifaceted program, and make it available to everyone while prioritizing younger and older people, people from rural and underserved communities, and formerly incarcerated people.

No less than six versions of a new CCC have been introduced to Congress over the past few years, and all share a kinship with the original program. Some are most focused on training fire crews to battle the increasing number of forest fires in the West. Others focus on restoring abandoned industrial landscapes with streams and green spaces. 

In Pennsylvania, Senator Bob Casey Jr. has created a version of the CCC called the Revive the CCC Act, introduced in July. It will be one of the bills “reconciled” as each CCC version jockeys for funding and position in what could ultimately become CCC 2.0. We support the Revive the CCC Act because Senator Casey agreed with Pasa that while public lands need reinvestment and restoration help, so do private forests and farms.

How a new CCC could work for farms

Including support for farmland conservation projects as part of a revitalized CCC would protect the health of our communities and natural landscapes.

Farmers in Pennsylvania alone are responsible for managing over 7 million acres of land, which accounts for nearly a quarter of the state’s 29 million acres. Implementing conservation measures on private agricultural lands offers cost-effective, invaluable public benefits—from vastly improving water quality and mitigating flooding, to building healthy soils and ensuring the long-term security of our food system. Including support for farmland conservation projects as part of a revitalized CCC would protect the health of our communities and natural landscapes.

Here, in brief, is how a new CCC could work: Federal dollars would be awarded to assemble work crews and train them in different skill sets, such as reclaiming mines, restoring streams, planting trees, fighting forest fires and reducing woodland fuels, restoring industrial sites, and revitalizing neighborhoods. These skills would be put to use on projects needed most by the community or region, including work on farms to install conservation practices, such as planting and maintaining trees and shrubs for riparian buffers. Crew members would get on-the-job skill training, and move on prepared for future jobs with better stability and better pay. Young crew members might get to stay in the communities they grew up in. Some might even want to become farmers—a career path facing a looming labor gap as most U.S. farmers approach retirement.

Similar to maintaining infrastructure like roads, highways, and bridges, it’s vital we restore and maintain our natural resources. Reviving the CCC would let us accomplish this while offering meaningful employment and potentially a pipeline for future farmers. A new CCC could translate into thousands of small projects—maybe one in your community, or one on your farm.  

Funding for a new Civilian Climate Corps that builds on existing service programs like Americorps, and employs over 300,000 Americans, is part of the Build Back Better Act currently under consideration in the U.S. House. In 2020, Pasa and ReImagine Appalachia partnered to advocate for including support for private farmland into Senator Casey’s bill and now the Build Back Better Act.

• How could a modern CCC help your farm improve conservation practices, and mitigate and adapt to climate change? Let us know so we can share your story. Email us at policy@pasafarming.org.

• Learn more about the Revive the CCC Act.

The post We need a new Civilian Conservation Corps that works for farms appeared first on Pasa Sustainable Agriculture.

Spicebush berries. Credit: Tracey Coulter

By Tracey Coulter, Agroforestry Coordinator, Pennsylvania Bureau of Forestry, trcoulter@pa.gov

Over an inch of rain fell on our one-acre homestead in this past weekend. That’s the equivalent of over 27,000 gallons and nearly 113 tons of water! 

We are at the bottom of a drainage, and we are the stewards of a culvert—essentially a funnel—that collects runoff from a state highway and our neighboring lots. This culvert empties directly to a tributary of Spring Creek, a wild trout stream that contains some of the highest-quality naturally reproducing trout populations in Pennsylvania.

Thankfully, about half of our lot is wooded and the runoff from the highway is filtered through a rain garden before it reaches the stream. This perennial vegetation slows the stormflow that would carry sediment and attached pollutants from the road into the stream. Our woodlot, albeit small, intercepts and infiltrates water that could otherwise flood our home.

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Permanent vegetation, such as trees, shrubs and grasses, helps to slow runoff from surrounding land uses, provide habitat for beneficial insects, grow food and florals for your table or farm stand, slow erosion, and enhance water quality for your downstream neighbors and anglers. Perennial vegetation is the cornerstone of agroforestry—the intentional integration of trees into agricultural systems—or productive conservation.

Agroforestry practices can benefit farmers by mitigating heat stress to livestock (silvopasturing), reducing wind erosion and snowdrift (windbreaks), enhancing crop diversity (alley cropping), deriving crops from woodlots (forest farming) and reducing streamside erosion and contamination (riparian buffers).

Each of these practices can reduce flooding and flood damage by reducing and slowing the movement of rainwater, but streamside plantings of trees, shrubs, and grasses provide the last chance to slow and filter runoff before it reaches your stream. Apart from the ecological benefits, choosing edible native species such as elderberry, serviceberry, black chokeberry, pawpaw, persimmon, black walnut and American hazelnut can add diversity to your table and to your customers’ baskets. Silver maple and black walnut are adapted to grow along our streams and rivers and can be tapped for syrup. Even spicebush berries can be added to jams and jellies—and when dried can be used as “Appalachian allspice” to flavor soups and stews.

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The Pennsylvania DCNR Bureau of Forestry and PASA are collaborating on a cookbook to celebrate our diversity of native foods. The cookbook will share information on native trees and shrubs that enhance our landscapes, as well as recipes that use the fruits and nuts produced! We invite you to submit your favorite recipes that include our native fruits and nuts. Our hope is that by sharing these foods with farmers and consumers through this cookbook, we can encourage productive conservation and reconnect to our native bounty.

To learn more about agroforestry in Pennsylvania, contact Tracey Coulter, Agroforestry Coordinator, Pennsylvania DCNR Bureau of Forestry, at trcoulter@pa.gov.

The post Streams. Trees. Food. Agroforestry Improves Water & Farms appeared first on Pasa Sustainable Agriculture.

We’re partnering with the PA Department of Conservation and Natural Resources Bureau of Forestry to produce a conservation cookbook!

The cookbook will include recipes featuring berries, fruits, and nuts that are native to Pennsylvania and the mid-Atlantic region. By sharing these foods with farmers and consumers through this cookbook, we hope to encourage productive conservation and reconnect to our native bounty.

We invite you to submit your favorite recipes that include one or more of the ingredients listed below. The native species we’re featuring are particularly suitable to integrating into riparian buffers (protective vegetative areas near streams), wildlife plantings, or hedges. If your recipe is selected, you’ll be acknowledged in the cookbook.

Fruits

• Juneberry / Serviceberry (Amelanchier spp.)
• Black currant (Ribes americanum)
• Golden currant (Ribes aureum)
• Elderberry (Sambucus canadensis) and (Sambucus nigra)
• Nannyberry (Viburnum lentago)
• Highbush cranberry (Viburnum trilobum)
• Black chokeberry (Aronia melanocarpa)
• Common chokecherry (Prunus virginiana)
• American plum (Prunus americana)
• Black raspberry (Rubus occidentalis)
• Highbush blueberry (Vaccinium corymbosum)
• Persimmon (Diospyros virginiana)
• Pawpaw (Asimina triloba)
• Northern spicebush (Lindera benzoin)

Nuts

• Chestnut (Castanea spp.)
• Hazelnuts (Corylus spp.)
• Black walnut (Juglans nigra)
• Hickory & pecans (Carya spp.)

Syrups

• Boxelder syrup (Acer negundo)
• Black walnut (Juglans nigra)
• Silver maple (Acer saccharinum)
• Sugar maple (Acer saccharum)

Submit a recipe

You can submit a recipe using this form.

Entries must be submitted before midnight on Friday, September 7, 2018.

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