During Hazel’s six-week internship, she was a fantastic asset to our preserve team! Here, she poses with European holly trees that were removed to make room for native trees and plants to grow at Snow Creek Forest Preserve.
I’ve lived in Port Townsend for 19 years — my entire life. Throughout that time, I’ve been told, over and over again, that PT is a special place. Though I may grow weary of hearing it, I also believe in the truth of it: this place, these people, are unlike any other. It’s a fact that’s been thrown into sharper relief in the past year, as I set out for a college on the opposite coast, nearly 3,000 miles away.
Hazel Windstorm
The thing I missed, more than anything else, was the sense of interconnectedness, the rich tapestry of this place. I missed walking into the Co-op and recognizing every third person. I missed opening my door and finding, not a brightly lit dorm corridor, but a network of trails that I could navigate to North Beach, Fort Worden, or the Quimper Wildlife Corridor. It’s this quality — this connection between open space and love of place and community — that is encompassed so perfectly by Jefferson Land Trust’s observation that here, “our livelihoods, cultures, and ways of life depend on our water, forests, farmland, open spaces, and sacred places.”
It’s that thirteenth word, “farmland,” that I find particularly intriguing. I’d always thought of the Land Trust as an organization that preserved habitat, first and foremost, and to me that term conjures images of dense forests, meandering creeks, and sprawling wetlands, rather than neat rows of crops. And for a while, agricultural preservation wasn’t included in the Land Trust’s work. In 2002, though, this changed, with the addition of two words — working lands — into its mission.
Agriculture is a defining feature of this place, and has been for many decades. Farmland is everywhere, stretching from the very heart of town to the outskirts of the county. As of the 2022 census, there were 188 working farms in Jefferson County, representing nearly 9,000 acres of land. They contribute to the local culture in myriad ways, providing everything from organic produce to thriving social hubs.
“Agriculture is a defining feature of this place, and has been for many decades… As of the 2022 census, there were 188 working farms in Jefferson County, representing nearly 9,000 acres of land. They contribute to the local culture in myriad ways, providing everything from organic produce to thriving social hubs.”
Beyond that, local farms play a critical role in the economic functions of this community, with benefits both numerous and significant. At their most basic level, farms produce food — a critical task, in a world facing the twin pressures of a rapidly growing population and a changing climate. Agriculture generates revenue, creates jobs, and supports an interconnected web of businesses that rely on its products.
Farmland plays an essential role in preserving a healthy environment, too, emitting roughly 60 percent fewer greenhouse gasses than developed land. Agricultural lands can also serve as natural firebreaks, while providing essential habitat for native and endangered species. The environmental impact of agriculture varies depending on the type of use, but agricultural land of any sort is less ecologically damaging than developed land. Likewise, land that is protected as farmland provides vastly more opportunity to implement sustainable farming techniques in the future than urban sprawl. This future potential is one thing that the Land Trust seeks to protect, using voluntary legal agreements, called conservation easements, that limit development.
This role is growing increasingly vital, because our local farmland — and farmland across the country — is under threat. Every day, we lose 2,000 acres of agricultural land to high density growth and urban sprawl. Nationwide, 11 million acres were converted to developed land from 2001 to 2016, per a recent study by the American Farmland Trust. Should this trend continue into 2040, we will lose another 18 million acres. Should it accelerate, pushed by housing prices and remote employment, the number could be closer to 24 million acres.
Chimacum farmworker on agricultural land protected by the Land Trust. Photo by Mae Wolfe.
Worse still, this sweeping degradation will not affect all farms equally. Those most at risk are small farms, those located near or in urban areas where the conversion pressures are strongest. These farms play a valuable role in our food system, providing 15-20 percent of food globally. Traveling shorter distances, their products have a lower carbon footprint, and this proximity to urban centers also provides resilience, in a world where natural disasters are only growing in strength and frequency.
It’s these farms that my peers and I grew up surrounded by. Raised with local farmers markets, school gardens, and farm tours, we learned from a young age where our food came from, tracing the ways in which agriculture influences everything from soil health to water quality to climate resilience. I’ve seen the ways a childhood like this influences a person — the many benefits, incalculable though they are. In protecting these farms, this community has built a generation of future advocates and land stewards that will be critical on the path to a better future.
“In protecting these farms, this community has built a generation of future advocates and land stewards that will be critical on the path to a better future.”
Midori Farm in Quilcene. Photo by John Gussman
It’s this vision, this future, that guides Jefferson Land Trust. They have worked to protect more than 1,500 acres of farmland locally, ensuring this land will remain intact for generations to come. In protecting farms such as Midori, SpringRain, and Finnriver, they have enshrined both a way of life and great swathes of unfragmented, undeveloped land. In recent years, the Land Trust has even begun to explore more innovative ways of promoting agriculture in the area, partnering with the Olympic Housing Trust on a project that will create housing that is both affordable and sustainable — for food system workers.
While interning with the Land Trust over the past six weeks, I’ve gained a deeper understanding of the breadth of their work — both its vast scope, and the century-long timeline that guides it. The work they do rests at an unusual convergence point between ecological preservation, community building, and innovation, and it’s for these reasons that I urge you to support the Land Trust, in whatever way you can. There are so many ways to do this: monetarily, through land or vehicle donations, or by volunteering your time. In supporting them, you support an organization backed by science, by a deep commitment to this community, and by hope for our collective future. More than that, you ensure this land — the land that feeds us, nourishes us, and sustains us — will continue to give back for years and years to come.
