DR. KIMBERLY STONER JOINS CT NOFA AS NEW DIRECTOR OF ADVOCACY

CT NOFA is excited to announce that Dr. Kimberly Stoner will be joining our team as our new Director of Advocacy.

Dr. Stoner recently retired as an Agricultural Scientist from the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station, after 34 years as a vegetable entomologist and researcher on bees, including the effect of their exposure to pesticides. She is also a longstanding associate of CT NOFA, having served on the board for 20 years and chaired the Organic Land Care Committee during the development of the Organic Land Care Standards that would be used to inform the program’s courses.

In her new role with CT NOFA, Dr. Stoner will be advocating for organic agriculture, organic land care, resources to assist new farmers, environmental regulation, and food equity. She provides the following assessment of the advocacy mission ahead, including steps any Connecticut resident can take to advance environmental policy in our state:

No matter what news sources you favor, probably 95% of what you hear and read is about the partisan political game — politicians making themselves look good and their opponents look bad. But what really matters in our lives is policy — how our governments make laws and regulations and spend our tax money to provide the services and the structures we need to thrive as a community.

Right now, the Connecticut General Assembly is in session, and issues critical to our future as a state are on the table: how will we change from a fossil-fuel based economy to one that runs on renewable energy? How will we transition from producing mountains of solid waste that we either incinerate or truck to landfills to a state that says goodbye to plastics and composts our organic materials?

Here’s how to find out and get involved in deciding the answers:

1. Go to the Connecticut General Assembly website
2. Many of the issues of interest to CT NOFA members are handled in the Environment Committee. On the Environment Committee page, you can find a list of bills under consideration and where they are in the legislative process. You can do the same with other committees of interest.
3. If you don’t know who your state legislators are, you can find them by putting your town and street address into the Find Your Legislators page.
4. Look them up, see what they are doing, and tell them what you think. Their job is to work for you!

I look forward to being in touch with you again on a regular basis, and I will be presenting a CT NOFA workshop (at the 2023 Winter Conference, this March) on a bill close to my own heart — the CT Environmental Rights Amendment, a Green Amendment for the Connecticut state constitution. I hope that you’ll join me at the conference for that discussion, and that you will be a part of and contributor to policy action in the future.