Awards

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• Three community wellness projects receive MAPP Tier 2 grant funding from SEARHC

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Three Sitka community wellness projects will each receive $10,000 in funding through the MAPP (Mobilizing for Action through Planning and Partnerships) Tier 2 grants from the SouthEast Alaska Regional Health Consortium (SEARHC).

SEARHC-logo-rgb-150-web“Fostering health and wellness in a community is complex and multifaceted,” SEARHC Health Educator Lauren Hughey said. “We are pleased to support these three projects with MAPP Teir 2 funding because while each project has a different approach. All will make Sitka a healthier place to live.”

Earlier this year, the Sitka Health Summit collected MAPP data about community health issues in Sitka, identifying healthy weight as a key focus area. In order to help more Sitkans achieve a healthy weight, SEARHC and the Sitka Health Summit requested project proposals that addressed this key area using the identified strategies that also address the health status of Alaska Native people.

Projects must use one of these strategies and plan an intervention based on evidence-based policy, systems, and environmental (PSE) changes. PSE changes will increase access to and use of traditional and other healthy foods or increase health literacy by making them more readily available at home, work, and in the community. PSE changes are long term changes and reach a large proportion of the population. PSE changes can occur in the community, tribal organizations, schools, healthcare systems, childcare facilities, worksites, or in families.

Here are brief descriptions about the three projects to receive MAPP Tier 2 grant funding:

  • Sitka Seedling Farms (project info provided by Matthew Jackson) — Sitka Seedling Farms is an initiative to meet Sitka’s food system needs in a thought-out, comprehensive way. Many food-related initiatives have been proposed over the last several years, but most have stalled for lack of space. Sitka Seedling Farms, which is a finalist in the Paths to Prosperity economic development contest for Southeast Alaska, will solve this problem by exploring innovative land relationships with major landowners in our community to develop the resources Sitka’s food system needs to thrive, such as production space for food entrepreneurs, community greenhouses, food storage and processing facilities and more. Sitka Seedling Farms is currently in the land exploration phase. Please contact Matthew Jackson with questions or comments at 907-821-1412.
  • Sitka Community Playground (project info provided by Lynne Brandon) — The grant award is to assist with the Sitka Community Playground Project Phase II, the design process. The design will help with the subsequent fundraising effort. The Phase III goal is to construct the new playground during the summer of 2017. Phase I was establishing a steering committee with volunteers, getting Assembly approval for the playground location at Crescent Harbor Park playground incorporating one of the three tennis courts, creating a funding plan and a timeline with tasks. The Sitka Community Playground project also is a 2015 Sitka Health Summit community wellness project.
  • Hames Center Elder Connect project (project info provided by Caitlin Blaisdell) — The Hames Center‘s Tier 2 grant will be used to create delegated senior hours for everyone older than age 65 and their caregivers to use our gym floor free of cost. These hours will incorporate group fitness activities, serve as an indoor walking space, create senior service information dissemination, and spark active, social groups for our growing senior demographic. Through bringing seniors together at the Hames Center with transportation assistance, we aim to remove many of the obstacles, such as social isolation, transportation limitations, and fixed income restrictions, that seniors may face in maintaining their physical and mental well-being all year round. The Hames Center Elder Connect project also is a 2015 Sitka Health Summit community wellness project.

Selected projects are awarded up to $10,000 for the project period of Nov. 1, 2015, through Oct. 31, 2016. For more information about the MAPP Tier 2 grant program, please contact Lauren Hughey at 966-8797 or lauren.hughey@searhc.org.

 

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• Sitka Farmers Market earns top ranking from Alaska in American Farmland Trust’s Farmers Market Celebration

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FARMMARKETCELEB_LOGO_DThank you to everybody who supported the Sitka Farmers Market in the seventh annual American Farmland Trust‘s Farmers Market Celebration, which ended on Wednesday, Sept. 23.

Your votes helped the Sitka Farmers Market rank as the top farmers market in Alaska in all five categories — People’s Choice, Focus on Farmers, Healthy Food For All, Pillar of the Community, and Champion for the Environment. We ranked 49th nationally in Champion of the Environment, 55th in People’s Choice, 57th in Healthy Food For All, 57th in Pillar of the Community, and 58th in the Focus on Farmers categories.

SitkaFarmersMarketSignIf you’re not familiar with the American Farmland Trust’s Farmers Market Celebration, you can learn more here. The Sitka Local Foods Network hosted six Sitka Farmers Markets this summer — on Saturdays, July 4, July 18, Aug. 1, Aug. 15, Aug. 29, and Sept. 12, at the Alaska Native Brotherhood Founders Hall.

While our markets are over for the summer, the Sitka Local Foods Network will host a fresh produce booth from 10 a.m. to noon this Saturday, Sept. 26, downtown near St. Michael’s Russian Orthodox Cathedral at our 21st annual Running of the Boots fundraiser.

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• Sitka Local Foods Network receives Strengthening Organizations grant from the Alaska Community Foundation

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Alaska CF headerThe Sitka Local Foods Network is one of 15 nonprofits in Alaska — two from Sitka — to earn a “Strengthening Organizations Program” grant from the Alaska Community Foundation.

The 15 grants totaled $75,353, with both Sitka organizations winning $4,600. The Island Institute, which partnered with the Sitka Local Foods Network to produce the Sitka Community Food Assessment Indicators Report in 2014, is the other Sitka organization to be awarded a grant.

The grant-winners “were recognized for their initiative in building internal structures to enhance capacity. Grant proposals ranged from requests for leadership development support, funding for staff to attend conferences, financial management training, digitizing collections for website purposes, and much more,” according to an Alaska Community Foundation press release.

The Sitka Local Foods Network applied for the grant to take a step toward the next level as a growing organization. It plans to use the grant to create a formal fundraising and business plan, with the intent to start putting money aside to hire a part-time staff person to take over some of the group’s day-to-day duties from the volunteer board of directors. Other than a few select positions which are contracted out, such as the Sitka Farmers Market manager and St. Peter’s Fellowship Farm lead gardener, the organization is entirely operated by volunteers.

“That is not sustainable in the long run,” Sitka Local Foods Network Board President Lisa Sadleir-Hart told the Daily Sitka Sentinel. “We have to start thinking about staffing in the long run, and that requires capital. We’re moving in that direction.” She also said the grant will help the network become “more strategic in how we use precious volunteer energy.”

The Sitka Local Foods Network will work with consultants from the Foraker Group, an organization that provides support and training to Alaska nonprofit organizations, to develop the fundraising and business plan. The grant was written by Matthew Jackson, the board vice-president.

The Alaska Community Foundation’s Strengthening Organizations Program is unique in the funding it makes available to nonprofits, as it focuses on internal capacity building, rather than programs or outreach. This program awards capacity building grants up to $10,000, with typical awards ranging from $3,000-$5,000, to 501(c)(3) nonprofits or equivalent organizations, which may include tribes, schools, churches and local government agencies and programs.

Applications are accepted on an ongoing basis and the next deadline is Sept. 1. The Alaska Community Foundation program staff strongly encourages interested applicants to submit drafts for review a minimum of two weeks before the deadline. For more information or to apply, visit The Alaska Community Foundation at http://alaskacf.org/grants or call (907) 274-6705.

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• Seventh annual Sitka Health Summit helps celebrate a culture of wellness in Sitka

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The seventh annual Sitka Health Summit is coming up, and this year’s event features health fair, lunch-and-learn, community planning day and community wellness awards.

This annual event got its start in 2007, when leaders from Sitka Community Hospital and the SouthEast Alaska Regional Health Consortium (SEARHC) got together to try and build bridges between their health organizations. Working with other partners, they created the Sitka Health Summit as a way to help improve the health culture in Sitka.

Summit_LogoThis year’s summit opens with the Sitka Community Health Fair, which takes place from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 21, at Sweetland Hall on the Sheldon Jackson Campus. This event features workers from the Alaska Health Fair Inc., who will provide a variety of medical tests such as cholesterol checks, glucose tests, vision screenings, flu shots, and more. It also includes informational booths from a variety of health-related programs in Sitka.

At noon on Monday, Sept. 23, at Kettleson Memorial Library will be a lunch-and-learn with Dr. Don Lehmann, a local physician and sports medicine specialist. He will give a brief talk called “Whistle While You Walk,” which will feature highlights about Sitka’s trail system. Participants can enter for a chance to win a set of walking sticks.

The “Community Planning Day: Selecting Sitka’s Wellness Goals” is from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. on Friday, Sept. 27, at Sweetland Hall. This all-day event is when members of the community get together and select two community wellness projects to work on this year. The two projects will receive $1,500 in seed money, plus facilitation to help get the project going. Last year’s three winning projects included the Sitka Downtown Revitalization project, Walk Sitka‘s work in applying for a Walk Friendly Communities award, and the Sitka Community Food Assessment. Some of the top projects from previous years include the Sitka Bicycle Friendly Community award applications in 2008 and 2012, the Choose Respect mural at Blatchley Middle School to raise awareness about sexual and domestic violence, the Sitka Outdoor Recreation Coalition’s Get Out, Sitka! project to get more families and kids outdoors, supporting the Hames Athletic and Wellness Center as a community resource, etc. There also have been several projects related to local foods, such as creating a Sitka Farmers Market, expanding community gardens and building a community greenhouse, planting dozens of fruit trees around town, promoting more local fish in school lunches, community composting,, and more. The first 65 people to RSVP will receive a free lunch (contact Clara Gray at clara.gray@searhc.org).

Finally, this year’s Sitka Community Wellness Champion Awards will be presented as part of the Monthly Grind at 7 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 5, at the Sheet’ká Kwáan Naa Kahídi on Katlian Street. The awards are made in a variety of categories, such as physical fitness, nutrition, tobacco control and policy, holistic health, injury prevention, and general wellness.

For more information, call Doug Osborne at 966-8734 or go to the Sitka Health Summit’s website at http://www.sitkahealthsummitak.org/.

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• Sitka Local Foods Network named Alaska’s lone finalist in 50 States for Good contest

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The Sitka Local Foods Network has been selected as the Alaska representative in the fifth annual 50 States for Good contest, where one representative nonprofit organization from each state and the District of Columbia compete for a chance to win $10,000 from Tom’s of Maine.

Supporters of the Sitka Local Foods Network can take part in a public vote to help the organization share in $150,000 total grants from Tom’s of Maine (15 awards of $10,000 each). Voting is simple, just go to http://www.50statesforgood.com/, and follow the instructions. People can vote once per day for one nonprofit finalist during the period from 8 a.m. Alaska time (noon Eastern) on Monday, Sept. 16, through 4 p.m. Alaska time (8 p.m. Eastern) on Tuesday, Oct. 15. A free Facebook account is required for voting, and people who do not already have an account can go to https://www.facebook.com/ to create one.

The 50 States for Good program was created to help uncover local nonprofit groups that address a variety of community needs and engage volunteers to get the work done. This year’s finalists offer a diverse range of community services, such as improving access to local foods, working with people who have autism, helping street teens, supporting the needs of low-income residents, providing food and hygiene products to the homeless, building playgrounds, and more.

The Sitka Local Foods Network works on a variety of food-oriented projects in Sitka, a community of 9,000 people on Baranof Island in Southeast Alaska. Even though there is no commercial agriculture on the island, the Sitka Local Foods Network created the Sitka Farmers Market, which sells produce grown at the organization’s St. Peter’s Fellowship Farm communal garden and from family backyard gardens. The Sitka Local Foods Network also is trying to build the Sitka Community Greenhouse and Education Center, which will be a commercial greenhouse providing local produce and bedding plants for residents, and an education center teaching local students about gardening. Education is another focus of the network, which hosts the annual Let’s Grow Sitka garden exhibition in March and brings nationally known speakers to town to teach about gardening, seeds and greenhouses.

“We are honored to be chosen to represent Alaska in the 50 States for Good competition,” said Lisa Sadleir-Hart, president of the Sitka Local Foods Network board of directors. “If we are successful, we hope to further food production in Sitka using a host of strategies, such as creating an additional community garden, offering seed money to the community greenhouse and education center working group, or helping the school district jump start a school-based garden program. An award of $10,000 from Tom’s of Maine can really help Sitka make strides in improving its local food system.”

The 51 finalists (one from each state plus the District of Columbia) were selected from a pool of about 1,100 nominated nonprofit organizations by an independent panel of judges that included Huffington Post columnist Lisa M. Dietlin, Cool People Care president Sam Davidson, assistant features editor covering social good for Mashable.com Matt Petronzio, and The Vampire Diaries star and nonprofit founder Ian Somerhalder.

“A desire to do more for a favorite can often be hindered by a lack of time to volunteer or the financial means to make a donation,” said Susan Dewhirst, goodness programs manager at Tom’s of Maine. “The 50 States for Good program makes it easy for anyone to have an impact and directly help organizations that are bringing goodness to communities in a variety of creative and inspiring ways.”

For several decades, Tom’s of Maine, a natural products company focused on oral and personal care products, has donated 10 percent of its profits back to the community and encourages its employees to use 5 percent (12 days) of their paid time off to volunteer every year. For more information, visit http://www.tomsofmaine.com/ or like the Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/TomsofMaine. Voting information will be at both links.

To learn more about the Sitka Local Foods Network and some of its community projects, go to http://www.sitkalocalfoodsnetwork.org/ or like the organization’s new Facebook page at  https://www.facebook.com/SitkaLocalFoodsNetwork.

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• Daily Sitka Sentinel features Keith Nyitray with his winning cabbage from the Sitka ‘state’ Fair

BIG PRODUCE – Sitka gardener Keith Nyitray arranges the leaves on his 17-pound cabbage Sunday during the second annual Sitka “State” Fair at Harrigan Centennial Hall. The cabbage earned a blue ribbon at the fair, which had categories for vegetables, jams, hobbies, crafts, photography and spam hors d’oeuvres, among others. The event included music by the SitNiks and performances by Celtic dancers. (Daily Sitka Sentinel Photo by James Poulson)

BIG PRODUCE – Sitka gardener Keith Nyitray arranges the leaves on his 17-pound cabbage Sunday during the second annual Sitka “State” Fair at Harrigan Centennial Hall. The cabbage earned a blue ribbon at the fair, which had categories for vegetables, jams, hobbies, crafts, photography and Spam hors d’oeuvres, among others. The event included music by the SitNiks and performances by Celtic dancers. (Daily Sitka Sentinel Photo by James Poulson)

The Monday, Aug. 12, 2013, edition of the Daily Sitka Sentinel included a photo of local gardener Keith Nyitray with his winning cabbage from the Sitka “state” Fair held Sunday, Aug. 11, at Harrigan Centennial Hall.

The second annual Sitka “state” Fair was hosted by the Greater Sitka Arts Council. More details about the event and some of its contests can be found here.

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• Christi Henthorn wins Table of the Day at sixth Sitka Farmers Market

Sitka Farmers Market assistant market manager Jasmine Shaw, left, and Sitka Farmers Market market manager Johanna Willingham, right, present the Table of the Day Award to Christi Henthorn for the sixth and final Sitka Farmers Market of the season, on Sept. 15, 2012, at ANB Hall. Christi sold homemade baked goods, jams, veggies from her garden, jewelry and other artworks she’d made. The Sitka Local Foods Network board selects a Table of the Day winner from the vendors at each Sitka Farmers Market of the season, and the winners receive prizes such as a fifth-anniversary market tote bag, produce and a check.

The next Sitka Local Foods Network event is the annual Running of the Boots fundraiser this Saturday, Sept. 29, at Crescent Harbor Shelter. Registration opens at 10 a.m., costume judging is about 10:30 a.m. and the race starts at 11 a.m. A Sitka Farmers Market booth will be selling veggies and other items at the race. For more information about the Sitka Local Foods Network and the Sitka Farmers Market, go to http://www.sitkalocalfoodsnetwork.org/

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• Meggan Turner and Kathy Branch win Table of the Day at fifth Sitka Farmers Market

Sitka Local Foods Network Quest Card coordinator Muriel Sadleir-Hart, far left, Sitka Farmers Market assistant market manager Jasmine Shaw, second from left, and Sitka Local Foods Network board member Robin Grewe, right, present the Table of the Day Award to Meggan Turner, center, and Kathy Branch for the fifth Sitka Farmers Market of the season, on Sept. 1, 2012, at ANB Hall. Meggan and Kathy sold organic bread, pasta in gift jars, jams, jellies, pie fillings, and dehydrated fruit. The Sitka Local Foods Network board selects a Table of the Day winner from the vendors at each Sitka Farmers Market of the season, and the winners receive prizes such as a fifth-anniversary market tote bag, produce and a check.

The final Sitka Farmers Market of the summer is scheduled for 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 15, at ANB Hall (235 Katlian St.). The Sitka Local Foods Network is seeking volunteers to help set up tables and tents before the market starts, and to tear down and pack up the market after it ends. We need volunteers for this last market. If you have a strong back and helping hands, please contact Johanna Willingham at 738-8336 for more details. Also, if you are a vendor who wants to accept Quest and debit card tokens, please contact Johanna. For more information about the Sitka Local Foods Network and the Sitka Farmers Market, go to http://www.sitkalocalfoodsnetwork.org/

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• Carrie Hisaoka and Ben Warren win Table of the Day at fourth Sitka Farmers Market of 2012

TABLE OF THE DAY: Sitka Local Foods Network intern Courtney Bobsin, far left, volunteer Mark Partido, second from right, and volunteer Marjo Vidad, right, present the Table of the Day Award to Carrie Hisaoka (with baby Joshua Warren) and Ben Warren for the fourth Sitka Farmers Market of the season, on Aug. 18, 2012, at the Alaska Native Brotherhood Hall. Carrie and Ben sold handmade jewelry, fireweed bread cookies and homemade granola. The Sitka Local Foods Network board selects a Table of the Day winner from the vendors at each Sitka Farmers Market of the season, and the winners receive prizes such as a fifth-anniversary market tote bag and check.

The next Sitka Farmers Market is scheduled for 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 1, at ANB Hall (235 Katlian St.). The Sitka Local Foods Network is seeking volunteers to help set up tables and tents before the market starts, and to tear down and pack up the market after it ends. We need volunteers for the two remaining markets (Sept. 1 and 15). If you have a strong back and helping hands, please contact Johanna Willingham at 738-8336 for more details. Also, if you are a vendor who wants to accept Quest and debit card tokens, please contact Johanna. For more information about the Sitka Local Foods Network and the Sitka Farmers Market, go to http://www.sitkalocalfoodsnetwork.org/

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• Pauline Duncan wins Table of the Day at third Sitka Farmers Market of 2012

TABLE OF THE DAY: Sitka Local Foods Network volunteer Mandy Griffith, far left, volunteer Jonathan Ocampo, second from right, and Sitka Local Foods Network board member Maybelle Filler, right, present the Table of the Day Award to Pauline Duncan for the third Sitka Farmers Market of the season, on Aug. 4, 2012, at ANB Hall. Pauline sold packaged seaweed and her Tlingít recipe cookbooks at the market. The Sitka Local Foods Network board selects a Table of the Day winner from the vendors at each Sitka Farmers Market of the season, and the winners receive prizes such as a fifth-anniversary market tote bag and check.

The next Sitka Farmers Market is scheduled for 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 18, at ANB Hall. The Sitka Local Foods Network is seeking volunteers to help set up tables and tents before the market starts, and to tear down and pack up the market after it ends. We need volunteers for all of the remaining markets (Aug. 18, Sept. 1 and 15). If you have a strong back and helping hands, please contact Johanna Willingham at 738-8336 for more details. For more information about the Sitka Local Foods Network and the Sitka Farmers Market, go to http://www.sitkalocalfoodsnetwork.org/