** Our Spring 2008 Newsletter is now online - please visit the "Newsletter" tab! **
** Please visit the "Event" tab for our wine tasting fundraiser on April 22, 2008! "

Dear Friends:

We are fortunate to live in a place were local farmers provide our communities with fresh, healthy food. The rich delta soils, ample water and year-round growing season make Contra Costa County one of the world’s most productive farming regions.  Contra Costa farmers have grown food for the Bay Area since the Gold Rush: from wheat in the 1850’s to the famous Brentwood sweet corn, peaches and cherries that we enjoy today.  For generations, Bay Area families have traveled to Brentwood each summer to pick fruit at the u-pick farms.

The Brentwood Agricultural Land Trust is proud to be working to ensure that future generations will continue to enjoy a local source of  food.  We work with local farmers on agricultural conservation easements that will keep our precious, prime farmland  available for farming forever.  We build connections between local farmers and our Bay Area neighbors that support local farmers who provide fresh, healthy food to the Bay Area and keep our food dollars in our communities.

Until this June, the Brentwood Agricultural Land Trust was fortunate to receive funding from the City of Brentwood.  This past spring, Brentwood ended city funding of our effort to preserve the prime farmland and promote local agriculture.  However, we are determined to continue working to preserve our local source of food.  We are building a new future for the Brentwood Agricultural Land Trust.

I urge you to join us by making a generous donation to the Brentwood Agricultural Land Trust this year.  Because of the loss of City funding, your contribution to the Brentwood Agricultural Land Trust will have an important impact on the work that we will be able to do during the upcoming year. 

My family has grown food for the Bay Area for generations.  I continue to farm the rich, productive land that my father and grandfather farmed before me.  I hope that you will join me in supporting the Brentwood Agricultural Land Trust’s efforts to ensure that my sons will also have the opportunity to farm the land and grow food for our urban neighbors.

Best wishes for the New Year. 

Tom Bloomfield, 
Chairman of the Board