By Shawn Dell Joyce

Bicycling is the lowest-carbon-producing form of transportation (along with walking) that gives you exercise and a great view at the same time. Many larger cities are actively encouraging cycling as it helps alleviate traffic congestion, and increase foot traffic in downtowns. Benefits of promoting cycling in cities include improving over health and well-being of residents, as well as the local economy.

This Thursday, the Orange County Transportation Council is hosting an “Open House” to discuss a bicycling “Master Plan” for our community. The open house is from 4:30-8:30 with presentations at 4:30, 5:30 and 7pm, at the Village of Montgomery Senior Center on Bridge Street. The Orange County Planning Department is updating the master plan is open to your input on ways to encourage non-motorized vehicle use. This is part of an effort to make our region more bicycle friendly.

What makes a community “bicycle friendly” according the League of American Bicyclists who rate bicycle friendly communities, aer what they call the “Five E’s.” These are Engineering, Education, Encouragement, Enforcement, and Evaluation & Planning. A community must demonstrate achievements in each of the five categories in order to be considered for an award. Communities with more significant achievements in these areas receive superior awards.

—– For Engineering, a community needs to design a “bicycle master plan” to a accommodate cyclists on public roads, using well-designed bike lanes and multi-use paths. The community has bike racks for secure bike parking .

—– Education includes teaching cyclists of all ages how to ride safely in any area for multi-use paths to congested city streets as well as teaching motorists how to share the road safely with cyclists.

—– Encouragement means a community promotes and encourages bicycling through events like “Bike Month” and “Bike to Work Week” events as well as producing community bike maps, route finding signage, community bike rides, commuter incentive programs, and having a “Safe Routes to School” program.

—– Enforcing laws that encourage safer cycling and road-sharing helps create a safer bicycling environment in the community.

—– Evaluation and planning is simply determining ways to make cycling safer, and setting benchmarks to gauge success. Here the community is judged on the systems that they have in place to evaluate current programs and plan for the future.

Many communities around the country have encouraged bicycling by creating bike lanes on existing roads, bicycle racks in village downtowns, and incorporated bicycle safety programs into driver’s ed classes and schools. Some have gone a little farther, and set up “safe routes” for children to ride bicycles to school, thus eliminating the need for school buses and lowering school taxes. Others have encouraged cycling with “Bike to Work” week, and printing maps showing safe bicycling routes on and off roads.

As more and more local residents are parking their cars and putting on their bike helmets, it’s time for munipalities to create safer shared roads and encourage bicycling.

Shawn Dell Joyce is the director of the Wallkill River School in Montgomery. shawn@zestoforange.com

By Shawn Dell Joyce

Crisp fall weather is bringing us an abundant harvest of sweet apples this year. In my opinion, the best apples in the world can be found in our region. Hundreds of varieties to please any palate! My personal favorite is Honeycrisp; the sweet, crisp crunch with juice that dribbles down your chin. You haven’t lived until you’ve eaten a Honeycrisp apple fresh from a farm stand.

One of the best places to buy apples this time of year is Soons Orchard in New Hampton. Soons has most every variety grown locally, with minimum spraying, as well as fresh apple cider, pies, donuts, and local foods like milk, cheeses, vegetables and meats. Soons is open year round so you kind buy tasty local apples in the middle of winter.

Soons was founded in 1910 by William Soons and his family, who started out as dairy farmers.  Soons’ son Sinclair begins to wholesale apples just after the Great Depression and has children who grow up to play integral parts in making Soons Orchards a success. Arthur, works with his wife Sandy to grow Soons.  Jeffrey, the attorney who’s office is across from the farmstand, takes over orchard and farm operations.  Laura, and her husband Scott found Scotty’s Country Kitchen in the back of the farmstand where all the pies and donuts are baked. Sharon brings home years of experience as an organizer to make the farm more efficient and profitable.

The Soons family are active in the local community and give back in service as well. Sandy is treasurer for Orange Environment, a nonprofit environmental education group.  “We are honest,” she says, “and we care!”

Soons is very child-friendly with hay mazes and a play area. Families can also pick their own apples on weekends should you want a family outing. This time of year, Soons is bustling with happy customers.

Gardiner boasts half a dozen wonderful orchards that offer fresh, crisp, local apples. Many are located off route 208 before New Paltz. My favorite is Dolan’s Farm where you can get not lonely delicious Honeycrisp apples, but if you’re lucky, a few tales and adventures from the farmer. The farmstand operates seasonally, then moves indoors for the winter and has an honor system store.

Towards Balmville and Newburgh there is Lawrence Farms on Colandrea Road in Newburgh. Lawrence is the perfect farm for children as it has “show chickens” and friendly goats, a “little village” reminiscent of a quaint, old-fashioned farm town, and a hay bale maze for children to run in. This farm also has holiday trees, gifts and wreaths.

There are many wonderful farmstands that sell apples directly in the Wallkill Region. It would be a crime this time of year to buy apples anywhere else. Sadly, most the apples available in grocers and down in New York City are “imported” from Washington State, with the world’s best apples in season just a few minutes away!

Shawn Dell Joyce is the director of the Wallkill River School in Montgomery. www.WallkillRIverSchool.com

Fresh Apple Tart

(Courtesy of Sandy Soons, Soons Orchard, reprinted from Orange County Bounty local foods cookbook available at the Wallkill River School)

8 c peeled, sliced cooking apples (Idareds, Winesaps)

1 c Sugar

1 tsp Cinnamon

2 tsp Lemon Juice

1 tsp zest of lemon

2 tsp cornstarch

3 T chopped nuts

3-4 T raisins

1 pie crust cut into strips

1 egg and 1 tsp. water

Sprinkle sliced apples with lemon juice and lemon zest. Mix sugar, cinnamon and corn starch in a jar, add nuts and raisins, along with contents of the jar to the apples. Mix well. Arrange in an 8” baking dish, layer pie crust strips across the top in a lattice, and brush with egg/water mixture. Bake at 400 degrees for 40-60 mins.

By Shawn Dell Joyce

“Think local for a stronger economy!”

Recently, we had a day where local merchants encouraged people to spend $25 at a local business. While that may seem like a small gesture, if we all do it, and make a habit of it, we could end the recession in the Wallkill Valley.

Economist Michael Shuman suggests that if every family spent just ten percent of its income at local businesses, it could add up to an infusion of millions of dollars into the local economy.  Where this happens, communities tend to have a higher quality of life, lower crime rates, and a friendlier, more neighborly attitude.

Local businesses are not shipping goods over thousands of miles and paying the higher fuel costs, also they tend to bank local, advertise in local papers, purchase local, use local contractors, and pay good wages and benefits to local people. That keeps money bouncing around longer in the local community. Each time that money passes through another pair of local hands, it improves the local economy a little more.

“About 42 percent of our economy is “place based” or created through small, locally-owned businesses,” notes Economist and author Michael Shuman. He estimates that we could expand this figure to 70 percent or more, by localizing some of our main expenditures. In the process, we would boost our local economy, and save money at the same time.

—–Local Food-Most of our urban areas are surrounded by farms that produce lots of local foods, that are shipped thousands of miles away. Ironically, 75 percent of fresh apples eaten in New York City come from Washington State, and foreign countries. Meanwhile, our farms grow 10 times more apples than the Big Apple consumes. If we all started eating closer to home; say within a 100 mile radius, eating in season, and lower on the food chain, we could localize our food system.

—–Local Electricity-The electricity for our houses and businesses most often flows through hundreds of miles of power lines from the source to our home. Imagine if cul-de-sac residents teamed up and purchased a communal wind turbine, or set up solar panels on all the southern-facing garage roofs. We could create a series of small-scale energy providers that could potentially meet their own power needs.

In Montgomery, a Taylor Biomass has found a way to generate electricity from bagged household garbage.  This would fill a huge leak in our local economy replacing fossil fuels with locally-generated electricity.

—–Suburban Renewal-If we relocalized our towns so that residents could walk to the farmer’s market, hardware store, library, and post office all in the same area, we wouldn’t have to drive so much. Driving is expensive, and environmentally devastating. When you walk or bicycle, you go slower, appreciate the architecture and history, wave to the neighbors, and possibly engage in conversation. This kind of walkable downtown encourages local spending and reinforces community bonds.

—–Business to Business-Part of what my business; The Wallkill River School does, is encourage our clientele to frequent other businesses. An example: We partner with Wildfire Grill to provide appetizers at our monthly receptions in exchange for advertising on our class brochures, and encouraging our reception guests to go for dinner at this fine local restaurant. This keeps the 50-75 people who come to our receptions in Montgomery spending money at more local places. When the tide comes in, all boats float!

Shawn Dell Joyce is an award-winning columnist and founder of the Wallkill River School in Montgomery.

By Shawn Dell Joyce

“Omnivore, Vegetarian or Vegan? Which is more sustainable?”

Picture in your mind the food ladder. Starting at the bottom rung, we have the most abundant and free source of energy on the planet: solar, which is consumed by plants (next rung) to make food energy, which is consumed by animals (next rung) to make protein, which is consumed by man. Except in a few rare cases involving bears, sharks, wild dingoes or cannibals, the food ladder ends with us humans.

Each rung on the ladder represents about a 10 percent loss of resources. The plants waste 10 percent of the sun growing things the animals won’t eat. The animals waste 10 percent of the plant by growing things like feathers, fur and bones that we won’t eat. You get the picture. What does that innocuous 10 percent really look like?

To produce a pound of wheat takes about 25 gallons of water, a lot of sun, and less than an acre of land. Yet it takes 16 pounds of that wheat (plus soy), and 2,500 gallons of water fed to a cow to make one pound of beef.  More than half our farmland and half our water consumption is currently devoted to the meat industry. A 10-acre farm could feed 60 people growing soybeans, 24 people growing wheat, 10 people growing corn but only two producing cattle, according to the British group Vegfam. We eat most of our grain in the form of meat, 90 percent actually, which translates into 2,000 pounds of grain a year. In poorer countries, grain is consumed directly, skipping a rung in the ladder.

“Imagine sitting down to an eight-ounce steak dinner,” writes author Frances Moore Lappé in “Diet for a Small Planet,” “then imagine the room filled with 45 to 50 people with empty bowls in front of them. For the ‘feed cost’ of your steak, each of their bowls could be filled with a full cup of cooked cereal grains.” We Americans don’t often see the unappetizing effects of eating 260 pounds of meat per person, per year. We waste 90 percent of the carbs, fiber, and plant protein by cycling grain through animals for meat. Harvard nutritionist Jean Mayer estimates that reducing meat consumption by just 10 percent in the U.S. would free enough grain to feed 60 million people. This year, about 20 million people, mostly children, will starve to death.

We don’t often see the hungry and malnourished in our culture, so it’s difficult to make that connection when standing by the grill waiting for your hamburger. Consider ways to replace meat for two or three main meals a week. Marge Corriere, a Blooming Hill Farm customer, said recently, “Treat meat like a condiment. Use just a small amount for a meal, much like they do in other countries.” By eating lower on the food chain, even just a few meals a week, we reduce our risk for heart disease, obesity, hypertension, and colon (and other) cancers, and save valuable resources that could be put to better uses elsewhere.

“It boils down to a simple equation,” says Alan Durning, head of the Northwest Environment Watch. “We currently consume close to our own body weight in natural resources every day. These resources are extracted from farms, forests, fisheries, mines and grasslands, all of which are essential to the health of the planet – and to the health of human beings.”

Adding more vegan meals to your diet, and treating animal products (meat, dairy, eggs) as condiments and using very little, as Corriere says, improves your health and the health of the planet.

Reach Shawn at shawn@zestoforange.com

Kezia Lain Farm in Westtown is one of the oldest family farms in the county. This is the view of the cows grazing in the distance with rolling Black Dirt hills and the barn from last week on the edge. If you want to try your hand at painting this scene; come paint with the Wallkill River School next Sunday from 9-noon. It’s free to try it, and I’ll show you how I did this painting. www.WallkillRiverSchool.com

By Shawn Dell Joyce

Very few developers have a vision for their hometown like F. Edward Devitt. “Ed” as we all call him, is a third-generation Montgomeryite  with his local children, Marc, Edward, and Meghan being the fourth generation, and his local grandchildren Maia and Hudson being the fifth in the Devitt line.

Ed’s grandparents came to Montgomery in 1909, from Paterson, N.J. They were bakers, and owned a bake shop in the building currently housing Eddy’s Deli (no relation), on Clinton Street in the village. Ed’s father, William J. Devitt Sr. was born there, and lived upstairs.  William became postmaster for Montgomery, and married a fine Irish lass named Frances Flannery.

Ed’s parents purchased a house on Boyd and Wallkill Streets where Ed’s wife Mary currently resides. Ed and his siblings were born in that house. He was brought up in Montgomery, and went to Montgomery High School, where his mother once taught home economics, and was known for having the first “boys Home Ec class.”

Part of Ed’s passion for preserving Montgomery’s heritage lies in his childhood memories. His bedroom in the Boyd Street house was in the corner next to St. Andrew’s Church. Through his window came the sounds of the blacksmith shop down the street; the smell of the smithy’s fire, and the clank of metal-on-metal.  He could also hear the mill saw at Brescia Lumber ripping wood into building materials.

These early memories sparked Ed to purchase and restore the old blacksmith shop into a two family home. Actually, Ed owns a good many of the historic landmarks in Montgomery including the Patchett House which holds my nonprofit Wallkill River School, and its carriage house where I live. Ed’s love of the town, and desire to preserve it, has led him to purchase and restore many buildings that are integral to our town and may have been lost otherwise.

One may question investing in real estate in a market with such wild fluctuations, but Ed says; “Why invest in bonds, and CD’s with such a low rate of return when you can own real estate and have something to show for it?” Never underestimate Ed’s business acumen. He is a self-made man, and started his entrepreneurial career by delivering groceries in his wagon from the A&P for 10 cents.

Ed landed his real estate broker’s license in 1966, and began selling real estate locally from the garage of his Boyd Street house. His cottage business grew, and his reputation as a fair and honest businessman helped him prosper. Ed made much of his money by building the Super 8 hotel in Montgomery. He then built 42 more across the country, hiring more than 500 employees to run his small empire.

He decided that owning a hotel chain was far from the local focus he wanted, so he sold off much of his holdings. He now runs a real estate office in the building that was once Stratton Mill at the intersection of Routes 17K and 211. He owns the Winding Hills Golf Course with his son Marc, along with several historic buildings, and a few new buildings that pass for historic.

Ed and Marc have a vision for Montgomery that combines preserving our cultural heritage, with bringing in rateables, affordable housing,  and new cottage industry. They have incubated several small businesses like the Wallkill River School, Montgomery Sporting Goods, Yoga on the Wallkill, Ms. Claire’s Musical Cupboard, the Village Pharmacy, and most recently, Montgomery Montessori School. These businesses all add to the historic charm of our quaint village, and attract tourism and visitors to other local businesses. Not many developers have such a deep love for their community and tie their family’s fate to our town the way the Devitt family has. We are fortunate to have them in our midst.

Ed’s current passion is the Firefighter’s Museum which he founded. Ed was a volunteer firefighter for 50 years and is a past captain of the Wallkill Hose Company. He fought to bring the historic pumpers to Montgomery, and create an educational center where children can get a hands-on experience in learning how to protect themselves from fires. Right now, Ed is fundraising $70K to add tech equipment to the museum so children can learn about fire safety and prevention 365 days a year.

Let’s help this community-builder achieve a lasting legacy. Visit the museum in person, or online at www.OCFM.us, or make a donation at 457-9654.

Shawn Dell Joyce is an award-winning, syndicated newspaper columnist and director of the Wallkill River School in Montgomery. Shawn@zestoforange.com

By Shawn Dell Joyce

Some farms grow more than just fresh food, some grow the future of the foodshed in our region and Phillies Bridge Farm is one. It’s a farm, run by a nonprofit corporation with the mission of educating people about the importance of sustainable agriculture, and training new farmers in organic and biodynamic practices.  It the kind of farm you can bring your kids to and have them directly experience what it means to grow food, and be connected with the earth and it’s seasons.

Phillies Bridge Farm is located in Gardiner, about five miles from New Paltz and sits on 65 acres of local history. The farm is the ancestral home of the Ottaway family that built the newspaper empire that once owned the Times Herald Record and Wall Street Journal. The farm is a wildlife sanctuary, and one of the few places that is habitat for the rare Bog Turtle.

The farm started in 1995 as a C.S.A. (Community Supported Agriculture) meaning you pay for a portion of the harvest up front, and pick up a weekly share of whatever comes out of the fields. Its one of the largest and most successful C.S.A. projects in our region, and has expanded over the years to serve many other communities including Rosendale, Kingston, and many foodbanks.

My studio was once the drop off for Orange County shareholders, and I have had a long and fruitful relationship with this farm. The nonprofit Wallkill River School worked with Phillies Bridge more than six years ago to start a benefit art auction. Many of us artists have painted on the farm through the years, and offer our artworks at auction. This year the auction is Sat. Sept. 25 at 1pm.

In addition to growing fresh, organic vegetables, selling directly to the public and donating to local food banks, the farm also has extensive children’s programs. I’ve been on the farm when busloads of inner-city school children have arrived and experienced a farm for the first time. One child was astonished that green beans grew on a bush, having never experienced anything that wasn’t canned. The farm welcomes children through the school system as well as at the “Farm Camp” in the summer.

My son was lucky enough to go to farm camp several times and came home singing songs like; “Dirt, you made my lunch! Thank you dirt! Thanks a bunch!” As a mom who’s had to listen to a thousand advertising  jingles, that was music to my ears! Where else will our children learn how important top soil is to our health and the planet?

I will never forget the experience of picking cherry tomatoes with my son one bright summer day on the farm. The tomatoes were golden and orange, a special heirloom variety, and were barely warm in the sun. We would pop one in our mouths as we picked and the juicy globes would explode tasting like pure sunshine. My son relished fresh tomatoes, and would eat many things on the farm that he scorns today.

Farms like Phillies Bridge make a huge difference in our community, connecting people with no access, to the land that sustains us. Bringing eaters in direct contact with the people who grow their food, putting a human face on the local food system. Please join me in supporting this farm by becoming a member, and attending the annual art auction. Get more info at www.pbfp.org

Linguini Gremolata-Courtesy of Phillies Bridge Farm (reprinted from Orange County Bounty local foods cookbook available through Wallkill River School)

½ pound zucchini (about one large, or two small squash)

1 ½ c. cherry tomatoes

3 cloves of garlic (pressed or finely chopped)

2 tsp. lemon zest

2 T. parsley

3T olive oil

1 ½ tsp salt

1/8 tsp pepper

½ lb linguine

2 T pine nuts

Fresh basil leaves

Grated parmesan

To make the gremolata (a sauce to coat the pasta); combine the garlic, lemon zest, and parsley; set aside. Cook pasta per directions. In a saute’ pan, heat olive oil and sauté squash with garlic, salt and pepper. Add ½ c. boiling pasta water to the squash with cherry tomatoes. Cook for a few minutes, then toss with gremolata. Spoon onto plates, and grate a bit of parmesan and a few sliced basil leaves and pine nuts.