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Marin Agricultural Land Trust
When Ellen Straus, a dairywoman from Marshall, California, gazed out from her family’s farm in the early 1970s, she saw practically the same sight those who raised livestock there 150 years before would have seen. And it was practically the same view a coastal traveler on this section of Highway One located about 50 miles north of San Francisco would see today: rolling hills, ranches, and the sparkling estuarine waters of Tomales Bay. But Ellen knew all of this was threatened. Marin County had devised a plan that envisioned a city of 150,000 people on the shores of Tomales Bay. Highways, shopping centers, and car dealerships would have replaced the bucolic scene, ending a way of life for her and other farming families who had made a living from the land since the time of the Gold Rush. (In those days, local butter was known as “the other gold.”) So no one who knew Ellen was surprised when she and friend botanist Phyllis Faber came up with the idea of a land trust to permanently protect the land from development and provide some sense of certainty for farmers and ranchers that there would be a future for agriculture. At the time, no one had ever used the concept of a land trust to protect farmland. Marin Agricultural Land Trust (MALT), the nonprofit organization they started in 1980, was the first land trust in the nation to focus on agriculture. So far, it’s protected 41,000 acres of farmland on 63 family farms and ranches. MALT isn’t resting on its laurels, though. One million acres of American farmland were paved over last year and, in Marin, 60,000 acres are still at risk. To learn more about Marin Agricultural Land Trust and Marin’s family farms and the food they produce, visit www.malt.org. "If we can make the right choices about where our food comes from, we can change the world. Protecting farmland is the first vital step. " —Alice Waters Click here to donate to the Marin Agricultural Land Trust. |
