Reprint Puget Sound Business Journal (Seattle)
February 29, 2008
by Joan Crooks and Abbi Little

There was a time in the mid-1990s when most people saw environmental protection as being at odds with economic development and job creation. Now, a decade later, there is a different understanding of both -- especially in the Puget Sound region. Investments in clean energy, green buildings, and consumption of organic foods are now mainstream. Increasingly, moving forward as a region is about finding the ways to build sustainable economic development and improve the quality of our land, air and water.

One proposal that will achieve these mutual goals is currently being debated in the state capital. "Local Farms - Healthy Kids" (sponsored by Rep. Eric Pettigrew) is a bill that would help develop significant markets for locally grown food while at the same time improving the eating habits of the next generation. This initiative addresses a broad range of problems -- from the loss of farms due to increased cost pressures to higher rates of obesity and diabetes in younger children.

And "Local Farms - Healthy Kids" has caught the imagination of lawmakers, newsmakers and a diverse collection of farmers, parents, students, child advocates, businesses and environmental groups. This broad coalition, led by Washington Environmental Council, has made some significant headway already down in Olympia with the bill passing out of the House with a nearly unanimous bipartisan vote.

The biggest challenge this year is to get the state to invest enough in the new program to make it as effective as it can be and result in the most significant economic development and children's health benefits as possible.