Interview with Michelle Howell, March 29, 2023

BRINTON: All right, this is Alaina Brinton with the Kentucky COVID Storytelling Oral History Project. It is March twenty-ninth at about 2:30 p.m., and I'm here with Michelle Howell. All right, so we're gonna talk a lot about COVID today, um, but before we do that, can we get to know you a little bit better? Can you tell me a little bit about yourself?

HOWELL: Yes, um, I am a full-time farmer in Scottsville, Kentucky. My business partner is also my husband, Nathan Howell. We have five children and eleven employees, and we raise fruits and vegetables and then beef, pork, and chicken.

BRINTON: And then do you have family elsewhere in the state or elsewhere?

HOWELL: My mom is in Bowling Green, um, and then her extended family is also in Bowling Green.

BRINTON: Can you tell me a little bit about your farm?

HOWELL: Yeah, so it's a twenty-acre farm. Um, it's--sits on a 00:01:00historical landmark. The home is--was built in 1829, and it was built by a Harvard graduate who is a--was a Union--uh, supported the Union during the Civil War. And it was a Union hospital for a while, so that's pretty cool, um, lot of history there. So, there's a cemetery in the front yard with the Union soldier buried there. And we bought that house because we needed land, and we couldn't afford land in Warren County, and so that's how we ended up there, but it's been neat to have the history as well. And, um, we raise about a hundred different fruits and vegetables year-round and really try to grow as many different types of fruits and vegetables to have more diversity in the crops and 00:02:00really prioritize food access.

BRINTON: That's--are you subsi--subsistence farmers or are you, um, farming to sell?

HOWELL: We farm to sell, yeah. Everything we sell is direct to consumer, but it's in a different--it's a lot of different varieties. So, we sell at farmers markets, we have a CSA program, Community Supported Agriculture. We also sell to schools, um, and then we have partnerships with Kentucky Medicaid companies where we deliver to the home of Medicaid, um, clients who are experiencing some kind of chronic disease that fresh food would help.

BRINTON: Have you always been in farming?

HOWELL: I have not, I was raised by a single mom with disabilities, we were low income. Grew up actually in San Diego, California, so a very urban area, um, had limited access to food myself but I had a coup--several coincidences that happened that led me towards agriculture. One was I was offered fresh 00:03:00food as a child while I was experiencing hunger and told that I deserved access and was worthy of that fresh food. In eighth grade, I accidentally took an agriculture class, didn't know what it--that word meant but--(Brinton laughs)--ended up loving it. And then, um, was really able to become a leader for the first time through the FFA program [editor's note: Future Farmers of America] and pursued a degree in agriculture and then in the year two thousand was hired by the University of Kentucky to assist tobaccos as they--or tobacco farmers as they were transitioning to fruit and vegetable crops.

BRINTON: And so, it's really come full circle?

HOWELL: Yes.

BRINTON: That's, that's lovely. Um, are you, are you doing a lot for your local community? It sounds like you're very interested in that food, food access.

HOWELL: Yes, so all of our food is distributed within twenty miles of our home--of our farm, um, so in Allen County and Warren County.

BRINTON: Okay.

HOWELL: Yeah.

BRINTON: So, I'm gonna switch gears here a little bit and start talking about COVID. If you could describe your life during COVID in one word, what would that be?

HOWELL: I have to think about that.

BRINTON: Yeah, take your time.

HOWELL: Yeah, one word, hmm, I think responsive.

BRINTON: Can you expand on that a little bit for me?

HOWELL: Um, from the moment we--right before we knew things were gonna shut down--so I work with public health a lot--the director of the health department contacted me and said, "I think this is getting ready to happen, and we're going to have to get into action," and so. I can share more about that, but we had been talking about pandemics and natural disasters for about ten years, so we had some plans in place. And so from then--the next day, I was on a 00:05:00school bus helping distribute food, so I--we were responding to the needs as they were needed, um, and that went on for about eighteen months or so. --(both laugh)--

BRINTON: Sure.

HOWELL: Yeah.

BRINTON: Did, did you feel like you were in a really good place given what you do to help your community when that was first starting?

HOWELL: Yes, and that was--that was the intention. So, in 2013, we became full-time farmers. Nathan was working for the University of Kentucky at the time, and we did that to be able to be responsive when the need was there. Yeah, we were pre--we had been preparing ourselves for a while.

BRINTON: That's perfect. I'm going to ask you about, uh, the object that you brought with you--

HOWELL: --yes, these carrots.

BRINTON: --if you can hold up it up a little bit?

HOWELL: Yes.

BRINTON: Yeah, there we go. --(Howell laughs)-- Um, tell me why you brough those with you today?

HOWELL: Yeah, so we are really passionate about food access, and so we would love to see as many local farmers growing as much fruits and 00:06:00vegetables and getting them to people who wouldn't normally have access to fresh fruits and vegetables. And that's something we've been working for and we had been working towards for a long time before COVID. And we had a neighbor farmer that had about thirty thousand carrots in the ground, and they were for a, um, for restaurants in Nashville, so they were going to be, you know, driving an hour to distribute these carrots. And, um, when COVID happened, the restaurants closed down, and the school systems started doing home delivery of fresh food to, um, families. And they weren't able to, from their normal suppliers, get many fruits and vegetables because the bigger cities were getting most of that, and so they were specifically wanting carrots, that's because kids like carrots. And so we were able to help that farmer sell that crop, get a good 00:07:00price for that crop, sell it to the schools who needed the, the carrots, and kids were able to get access to fresh food. So, it was a very powerful moment where what we knew was possible actually happened because of COVID unfortunately.

BRINTON: That's--yeah, and all that, that preparation that you were talking about before--

HOWELL: --yes.

BRINTON: --it, kind of, came to fruition.

HOWELL: Yes.

BRINTON: Oh, pardon the pun, I'm very sorry.

HOWELL: Yeah. (laughs)

BRINTON: Um, are there any other memories like that, that are particularly salient to you from that time?

HOWELL: Yeah, um, --(clears throat)--the health department director in Allen County, um, showed up on our doorstep, and it was in the very beginning. So, it was when people were starting to get diagnosed with COVID, and, and it was, kind of, this--this really kind of scary time because people felt like they had to, you know, just stay in their home. And obviously, they wanted to be social distancing, but this was very new for everyone, and we didn't want 00:08:00people who were being diagnosed with COVID to feel like they were being separated from their community. What we wanted there to be a sense of connection, and we wanted them to know, especially for people that were doing the right thing, which was taking their diagnosis seriously, being willing to stay home. And so, um, this wasn't a sustainable thing, but in the first few weeks, we were delivering baskets of fresh, locally grown food to anyone who had been diagnosed in Allen County with COVID. And it was a really powerful time where we were able to work with the health department director, gave all of us--we were working with other farmers, aggregating product, making baskets, um, and then delivering them. And it just--it felt like a time when we were taking care of people, um, instead of making people feel like that they were separate because they had, they had been one of the first to get to get COVID.

BRINTON: And see, that's not something I had actually heard about happening. Did--was that something that people in your community were aware of? 00:09:00They were able to reach out to you all when they needed help?

HOWELL: Yes, so what we did in the beginning was we posted on the health department's page and on our social media pages that if anybody was diagnosed, they were welcome to contact us for a delivery. And then the health department also knew who was being diagnosed because it was being reported to them, and so they were contacting people and asking if they were interested in a delivery.

BRINTON: Did that carry on, um, as more and more--as large numbers of people were being diagnosed?

HOWELL: We weren't able to do that. So, we were able to--I think we were doing about--the first week, it was like six people, and then it was twelve, and then it was twenty, and then it was thirty, and then it just--we started growing really quickly. Um, so, we weren't able to continue doing that, but it did definitely, definitely open up this conversation that people do want access to fresh food, and it does make them feel special, and it makes them feel really taken care of. And we're really thankful for that because tornadoes 00:10:00came through the Bowling Green area not long after, so--or in December of 2021, is that right? Twenty twenty-one or twenty-- yeah, twenty--

BRINTON: --it all, it all--

HOWELL: --yeah, twenty--

BRINTON: --bleeds together.

HOWELL: --twenty-one. --(both laugh)-- And we were able to use a similar response to care for people. And you'd think that when people are in a disaster or they've been diagnosed with, with something that they were hoping not to get, um, that fresh food might drop to the bottom. But when people have, um, have time and want to feel that sense of connection or normalcy, fresh food can really make a difference--impact on people.

BRINTON: Oh, so now, that's something you've done with COVID and then again with the tornadoes, you feel really well set up to do that again in the future for, for the next thing?

HOWELL: Yes, we actually were able to do that in Eastern Kentucky. What we did learn is that perishable product works good close to home, but when we're traveling a couple of hours away, it needs to be a little more shelf stable. What we've done is we've made bean soup mixes with dehydrated summer 00:11:00vegetables and then beans and then sweet potatoes and onions and apples and winter squashes. They're not completely shelf stable, but they would keep for about two to three months, and it allows us--it allowed us--we distributed about, um, five hundred fresh food bags to Eastern Kentucky, and then they were able to stay in places and then get distributed when people needed them.

BRINTON: Wow, that's perfect, that's--just even you talking about going to Eastern Kentucky makes me think about how much the state has been through in these last couple of years.

HOWELL: Yes.

BRINTON: So other than--so you were taking on, sort of, these big projects of--that were helping your community, did the pandemic impact your work at all on the farm itself?

HOWELL: We were already growing a wide variety of fresh food, which helps. And when you have a diversity of product, you always have thing--you always have a lot of different types of things, and you can be responsive with them. Um, we had about --starting in 2014, we had started doing a lot more like 00:12:00fresh food boxes, working with the Kentucky Medicaid companies, working with food pantries within school systems, and so we were already starting to do that. It--what I think it did is it made us realize how important the need is. And that our farm has really focused more on not necessarily growing more but how we distribute our food and then purchasing food from other farmers so that we can, like, sup-- like supplement what we grow with other farmers' product.

BRINTON: I got you, it must be a pretty strong community--

HOWELL: --yes,--

BRINTON: --as at least local--

HOWELL: --yes.

BRINTON: --local farmers. Other than your work, was there, was there any other major impacts to your life during the pandemic?

HOWELL: Um, I--so one thing that was a--was different for me is so I'm, you know, very busy on the farm, I have five kids, we homeschool, um, we're--I don't get off the farm a whole lot, um, I attend meetings. I don't 00:13:00attend--I don't sit on boards of directors, I don't attend meetings real regularly. I used to come to, like, state conferences here in Lexington or in Louisville, and I would, like, meet with people then. What happened, kind of, overnight was this demand for my time to be on Zoom, which was not something I had done before that moment. And at first when everything was completely shut down, I was able to spend some time doing that, but I quickly realized that I wasn't gonna be able to do my work feeding people and spending that much time on, like, Zoom calls. So I definitely--that was a--kind of a learning lesson for me.

BRINTON: Hmm, draw some boundaries?

HOWELL: Yes.

BRINTON: That's--that Zoom definitely--it opened up some channels, but also has changed the way our time is expected to be.

HOWELL: Yes, yes.

BRINTON: You talk about your husband and your five kids and then, 00:14:00your farm. Did you all experience that same sort of isolation that people talk about during COVID?

HOWELL: We were really fortunate. So, we're--I haven't talked about this yet, but we're founding vendors of Community Farmers Market that's in Bowling Green, and so we are a farmers market that started in 2011. Our goal was--we were the first in the state to accept WIC [editor's note: Women, Infants, Children], Senior, and SNAP [editor's note: Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program] benefits. We have a strong Double Dollar program, and we have a Fresh Rx for Moms Program for pregnant women who participate in Medicaid. And when the pandemic happened, we felt really strongly that we needed to stay open for participants in those programs because they--because those were farmers market programs, they had to come to the farmers market to get their food. So, what we had to do is we set up outside, we're an indoor market year-round--

BRINTON: --sure.

HOWELL: --so we had to set up outside, we had to practice social distancing, we had to wear masks obviously, we were wearing gloves at the time, um, so we were doing all of those things. I think it did help create a 00:15:00little bit of, like, community by doing that and then we were still getting to, sort of, see people. So, we were frontline workers, we were just like your grocery--

BRINTON: --right.

HOWELL: --store workers. Another thing that happened is on the farm, we worked with Allen County High School, and we were able to accept high school co-op students because they were working outside on the farm. We could definitely social distance way beyond six feet, and for some of the students, it was really great. They needed a place to be like that, and so we were able to expand our high school co-op program to include more students. Um, and then I think because of Zoom, I didn't feel--I felt less isolated than ever because now I was having all this communication with people all the time, so.

BRINTON: You mentioned masking and distancing, um, did you feel like those things were able to keep you safe? It sounds like there was plenty of room.

HOWELL: Uh, we didn't have to--so interestingly, we didn't have to 00:16:00wear masks a lot because we--I--we weren't leaving--I wasn't leaving the farm a lot. My husband, my son started selling at the farmers market as well during that time. They had to wear masks when they were at the market, but when we were at home, it was just our family. We have a couple employees--full-time employees that, um, weren't going anywhere, so we kind of--we were able to create, kind of, like a bubble where it was just us and we were spending, you know, three or four days a week together. They weren't around anyone else, and so we were testing and we were--we all got vaccinated when we were able to, so we, kind of, were able to create a little bit more of a safe space for all, like, kind of an extended family--

BRINTON: --right.

HOWELL: --that lasted for a while anyway. The hardest part was we didn't get to see my mom or Nathan's dad for at least two months or so, except for maybe driving by and waving and, you know, like standing six feet away from the front door, that sort of thing. That--that part was really hard.

BRINTON: And, and what about the kids? You said they're homeschool, so I assume they usually have a lot of activities--

HOWELL: --yes.

BRINTON: --out with their friends? Did they--did that--were they able to maintain that or was there some difficulties there?

HOWELL: I would say my oldest two children had the hardest time. My oldest son was seventeen, and my daughter was--turned fourteen. She was thirteen going on fourteen. Um, they missed summer camp, they missed, like, like you said, different activities. They're very social with different friends. The few friends though that were part of our bubble because we did have some high schoolers that worked for us that got to keep coming to the farm, um, they got really close with them so that was good. And I think they got really close with one another during that time too.

BRINTON: Sure, a little, little family-building time.

HOWELL: Yeah, yeah.

BRINTON: Can you tell me about what you think your biggest challenge was during the pandemic time?

HOWELL: Um-hm. We had to say--so we, we all--we have an 00:18:00all-you-can-eat, full diet CSA program at our farm. It's a farm store, every Thursday people come, they can get milk, they can get eggs, they can get beef, pork, chicken, they can get fruits and vegetables, they can get grains and beans and rice. Um, we had a large number of people who knew about that who, all of a sudden, wanted to join, and so we had to say no to a lot of people. And then in addition to that or the reason for that was to make--keep making our food accessible through the schools, through food pantries, through the farmers market. And so, we had to say no to maybe a hi-- higher dollar amount that we would've got or through consumers who were pretty demanding and really wanted the food to make sure we kept it accessible to Kentuckians that wouldn't have access to that food otherwise.

BRINTON: Have you, since that time, been able to expanded at all, so you can maybe take advantage of some of that consumer willingness while still providing for the community?

HOWELL: We haven't done that for ourselves, but we helped encourage and mentor other farmers to be able to help meet that need. And so, it's allowed some other farmers to expand their businesses a little bit more than they had planned a little sooner and start CSAs or start delivery programs or start coming to the farmers market. So while we didn't meet the need, we were able to help bridge the gap between those farmers and consumers.

BRINTON: Were there any particular resources that you found useful while you were trying to help maintain all of those things?

HOWELL: Yeah, so our referring partners are, like, crucial. So, we worked a lot with the family resource center directors, we worked with frontline workers in the health department, so HANDS [editor's note: Kentucky Health Access Nurturing Development Services] coordinators, WIC staff, um, nurses in the health department, food service directors and their, their staff. They were one--they were the ones that were really able to make sure that we were connecting our food to the right people, making sure that --because what we saw, 00:20:00there was a lot of food distribution happening--

BRINTON: Um-hm--

Howell: --but you didn't necessarily know that it was going to people that really wanted the access to that food. And so, they were able to help us make sure that our food was going to the right people.

BRINTON: Oh, that's, that's really good.

HOWELL: Um-hm.

BRINTON: So, I know you talked about--you said your mom and Nathan's dad, was that right--

HOWELL: --yes.

BRINTON: --that you weren't able to go meet. Were you able to connect with them at all or was it--did it, did it remain that wave through the window for, for too long?

HOWELL: We--we called and talked to them every day on the phone, which is not a habit we had before, so that was pretty--that, kind of, made it fun. Nathan's dad drove down a couple times and, like, sat in a rocking chair at the end of the drive, you know, and, like, we would sit and talk. Um, and so, you know, it was, it was--it did feel a little bit distanced and hard, but then once we were able to spend time together again, like, we really valued that time. And Nathan's dad was actually diagnosed with cancer last September and 00:21:00passed away in November. And we actually think about during COVID after that initial, like, where we were really social distancing, we really took advantage of spending more intentional time with him, and we're thankful for that.

BRINTON: That's a little bit of a silver lining--

HOWELL: --yeah.

BRINTON: --and a little--that intentionality.

HOWELL: --um-hm, yeah.

BRINTON: Um, so that, that obviously, is just one, sort of, difficult thing. Did you feel like the pandemic--and it, it sounds like you were incredibly busy, um, and then there is the pandemic going on, did that have an impact on your mental health or your stress levels at all?

HOWELL: Um, I think I was--I had already been, sort of, a pretty busy person before. I think I was definitely running on, like, adrenaline and e--not excitement in a positive way but just feeling useful and feeling helpful at a time when people really needed the knowledge and the connections that 00:22:00we had, the food we had, seeing the impact we were making on other people. All of those things carried us for certain period of time and then I definitely did have, like, um, needs--get to a point where I needed some rest, and so, and we--and we were luckily, as a family, able to do that. We didn't have what everybody else had as far as that, like, lockdown, stay at home, play games, be in your pajamas, like that wasn't our reality of COVID. And so it was probably eighteen months or longer before we finally realized, okay, we were gonna have to take some time like that too --(both laugh)-- just so we can catch back up to what this new normal everyone was trying to live was.

BRINTON: That--yes, the new normal. Were there, were there any, um, sort of, routi-- routine kind of daily changes you made in your daily life other than the work that you were doing?

HOWELL: Um. That's a good question. Um, I mean the main, main 00:23:00routines really were just being on Zoom calls or phone calls, oh, keeping my phone on me.

BRINTON: Um-hm.

HOWELL: I--so I only bought a phone the--a few months before COVID happened, the fall before. I had never had a phone--um, cellphone ever before that, and I wasn't used to carrying a phone with me, and so that was probably a big one. Um, we're not big news watchers, so watching the news every day to find out what the updates were, what was going on, was, kind of, a new routine for us. A lot of other things that changed for other people, sort of, stayed the same because we were--we had already been homeschooling, we had already been cooking three meals a day for our entire family, we had already been, you know, living at home together all day, so that didn't really change. It was, kind of fun and interesting because other people were living like we, we always 00:24:00lived, --(both laugh)-- and we felt a little more understood all of a sudden. So, we were able to, kind of, give people--other people advice on like, this is how you homeschool five different-aged children at the same time, and this is how you, you know, prepare this many meals for yourselves and--

BRINTON: --yeah, I bet, I bet. Did you guys become a hub of information--

HOWELL: --yeah, we had a lot of people--

BRINTON: --for your friends and family?

HOWELL: --texting us saying like, you know, "How am I going to do this homeschool thing?" so, um, yeah, that was good. And I think people may be understood. I think when you don't live a certain way, you can't even comprehend what it's like, and now, I think it is a little bit nice that people realize that they may not want to homeschool long term, but they realized at least a little bit of what that that might look like, so.

BRINTON: Sure, a little more understanding.

HOWELL: Yeah.

BRINTON: You mentioned that, sort of, being intentional in your relationships and, like, being really aware of how meaningful what you're doing is, and has that carried over? Have you been able to, sort of, keep that as a, as a way to approach things?

HOWELL: Yeah, so interestingly this morning at the local food summit, 00:25:00I got to talk about an experience I had. So, I left local food for a while, I had four children under the age of six, so during that --(Brinton laughs)-- period of time, I was not too, too active in agriculture, but I came back through public health. I was assisting with some policy change and mother-baby friendly care in the hospital and breastfeeding support, things like that. And, um, was asked to sit on the community health planning council, and in 2010, we had a meeting with the FDA to discuss what might happen if we ever have a pandemic or a natural disaster in the future. And so those things were on my mind, and they were really one of the reasons I became passionate about becoming a farmer--

BRINTON: Hmm.

HOWELL: --becoming full t--we--my husband was assisting farmers, um, and working through University of Kentucky on research with farmers, but we weren't farming at the time for our income. And I just realized the importance of not 00:26:00trying to be idealistic about it, but that if we ever got to a point where our food chain was to be really disrupted, it's going to be important that we at least have models of what's possible. Um, and that's really what we wanted to be. And then to get to live it out, like in a reality even though it was short-lived, and we were really, we were really thankful things were getting back to normal. You know, we didn't want it to get worse than it did.

BRINTON: --right.

HOWELL: --but at the same time, it was good to see that what we're doing matters and, um, and to know that we're there to keep moving the needle in case something like that was to happen again.

BRINTON: Oh, that's perfect. Um, so, in addition to just the pandemic and then we were talking about some other natural disasters that happened during that time, 2020 was a time of really some intense political and social, clim-- climate things that were going on. Um, I know you mentioned that you 00:27:00were, you were watching the news maybe more than you had been. Did you feel like you were impacted at all by that, that racial tension that we were, we were sort of, talking about as a country at that time?

HOWELL: Yes, absolutely, and really just from a place of--so I for one, I went to Warren Central High School in Bowling Green, so it is the most diverse high school. Was in the FFA program in an urban high school, and really grew up with diversity around me and so that was--that is my normal. A lot of my closest friends are black women in the agriculture community--

BRINTON: Um-hm.

HOWELL: --so people like Cassia Herron in Louisville, Ashley Smith in Lexington, Tiffany Bellfield. You know, they were reaching out to me at the beginning of the pandemic but also, um, as we started seeing some of the social unrest. And so, one of the things we were able to do as a farm is to bring, um, 00:28:00fresh food to the, to the front lines of the Breonna Taylor protests. We were able to partner with black farmers in Louisville and help buy food from them for our food boxes as well as distribute fresh food to them and help them meet some of the needs that they had. And that actually ended up being a great catalyst for helping some, um, some black farmers who really wanted to take farming more seriously, scale their business, weren't really sure, but they were able to really start doing that, um, an--to a greater scale. And, and many of those farmers are either farming full-time, some of them have been hired by Kentucky State, some of them, you know. It's, it's been a really great time to see urban farming in particular take off, but also rural farming. Um, Travis Cleaver is a black farmer from Central Kentucky, and we're buying about three 00:29:00hundred pounds of ground beef from him a month to put in our food boxes, and that would not have happened had it not been for the pandemic.

BRINTON: Is there a large black farming community in Kentucky?

HOWELL: So, there is Black Soils, which is a, um, a for-profit organization run by Ashley Smith. She's here in Lexington, she does a really great job organizing and buying from black farmers, creating CSA boxes, we work together a lot. We're actually doing a, um, series through the University of Kentucky with Nicole Breazeale on lifting up the voices of black farmers, and it's going to be, uh, aired on KET, we hope, and also used for middle schools on the diversity of agriculture. And then there is a very strong network of black farmers from across the state. They, they host a black farmer conference every year, and then they really work together. Tiffany Bellfield is a really amazing 00:30:00leader. She--I was actually talking to her right before I came here, --(Brinton laughs)-- and, yeah, they have a lot of--this is organizing that's been happening. I think that the social unrest and the pandemic allowed some of this to be talked about more out in the open and allow for some expansiveness within it.

BRINTON: Did you find yourself talking more about these things with your family, with your husband and your kids?

HOWELL: Yeah, so we, um--this is something--when we decided to become full-time farmers, we wanted diversity not to be something we added on to what we do. We wanted diversity be the core of what we do, not that we're the experts, we're always learning, but just because we've experienced oppression. I have as a woman in the agriculture community, my husband has now that he's become a full-time farmer, he doesn't have that label of professional or practitioner. And so, we also--we also want to see agriculture expand, and we want 00:31:00to see it grow, and it's going to take anybody who wants to farm being a part of that. And so, um, it's important to my children, and I have four high schoolers now--

BRINTON: Um-hm.

HOWELL: --or teenagers, and they want to see that this work is not idealistic and for higher income individuals or people of privilege, they want to see that this is for everyone. And I'm very grateful that that's a priority for us because it's helped them keep interest in what we do longer. And a lot of their friends were a part of a community--in Scottsville, there's a camp called Barefoot Republic, and it is a diversity camp, and my kids are very involved there, and my daughter works there as a, a camp counselor. And we were able to keep connecting with them during the pandemic as well, and that encourages that within our family. So then in addition to that, my son is nineteen, 00:32:00he has a girlfriend who's from South Sudan--

BRINTON: Oh.

HOWELL: --and so he--you know, we're in rural Kentucky, and he has a black girlfriend. And, um, he says quite often like that wouldn't have been possible if we had not raised him in a culture where you're--you are open to connecting with anyone that you meet.

BRINTON: And being from South Sudan, she would have, she would have her own perspective on this sort of--

HOWELL: --yes, absolutely.

BRINTON: --constant political strife that's going on.

HOWELL: Yes.

BRINTON: That's--you mentioned wanting to make sure that, that the farming isn't just idealistic. Are there, are there resources out there for people who maybe aren't, like, higher income, aren't--where it would be difficult for them, where they can go ahead and get in--involved in--with agriculture?

HOWELL: So as--for farmers or consumers or both?

BRINTON: As farmers.

HOWELL: So, there are, I mean there's a lot of funding sources out there. I would say some of the best organizations that farmers could get 00:33:00involved in with--would be Community Farm Alliance. It's a really great organization that does a lot of policy work. They also provide the Kentucky Double Dollar program, so they match for SNAP, WIC, and Senior. It's a great way as a farmer if you want to sell to people who might be lower income. It helps supplement those dollars so that people can get twice the food, but the farmer gets to sell twice the product as well. Um, The Kentucky Department of Agriculture has several programs, the Kentucky Proud program, they have several grant programs, match programs. Um, the Farm Service Agency has the high tunnel program where you can get a free high tunnel to grow crops during the winter months. There's a lot of programs like that out there that really help, um, farmers who may not be farming with, you know, their parents' tractors and--

BRINTON: --right.

HOWELL: --already have a barn and already have land, um to help them 00:34:00with some of those costs that they might have.

BRINTON: I feel like I've led us astray because I find you're talking about the, the farming so interesting, so--(Howell laughs)--I'm going to bring us back to COVID a little bit. That's my fault. Um, do you remember where you were when you first heard about the coronavirus?

HOWELL: Yes, actually, yes, I do, this was really funny. --(Brinton laughs)-- So I think my father-in-law--so my father-in-law i-- was, um--he's very--was very conservative politically and so I'm really surprised by this. But he was really concerned about COVID--about a potential pandemic before we even knew the word COVID.

BRINTON: Um-hm.

HOWELL: He raised animals, and he'd say, "I just sense when, when beef, ca-- be--when the cows are gonna get sick, I just know it," you know, and he just had this, this mentality about it. And I can't remember if he told me about COVID, but I do know that I was in IGA which is--do you know what that is?

BRINTON: --I do not.

HOWELL: It's a gas--it's like, um --they're, like, really popular gas 00:35:00stations that have like little groceries in, in the South Central Kentucky.

BRINTON: Okay.

HOWELL: And so, I was in an IGA and on the end of the aisles, they had Corona beer stacked up, --(Brinton laughs)-- and there was something about--like a sign about Corona. And they were making fun of this pandemic that was happening in China but they--like people were starting to talk about it because it was starting to come here. Um, and so that--I remember coming home and being like, "They had--" telling my husband about this, "--they had Corona stacked up in the, in the--and like is--like what's going on, you know, like why--"

BRINTON: --right.

HOWELL: "--what's, what's happening here?" And then, um, I was also on Instagram, and I received a private message from someone from the health department that said--I'll have to remember what--who was the, uh, univer--the teaching hospital university that was keeping up with the stats, do 00:36:00you remember that?

BRINTON: Gosh, I don't know.

HOWELL: You could go on there in the beginning every day and they would show you how many people in--it was like a map of the United--a map of the world, but you could focus on the United States and every d--I can't remember if it was Harvard or it was--

BRINTON: I do, I can picture it but I don't think I--

HOWELL: But, yeah, anyways--

BRINTON: --would come up with it.

HOWELL: --they had sent a screenshot of that, and I was like, okay. So, this was all before it got shut down though, but this was in just a few days of that. Um, so that--I just remember being in that kind of moment of time of just being like, something's happening here. And then we were planning to have thirty-five hundred students from the Bowling Green city schools visit the farm, um, and--in April of 2020. And I was on the phone with the food service director, and we were planning it, and she said, "I have to let you go, I'm--got to be in a meeting." She calls me back, and she said, "We're closing school."

BRINTON: Yeah.

HOWELL: And we couldn't e--we couldn't believe it. Like we had just been talking about the school tours, we were still gonna have them, that it was 00:37:00gonna be fine, we would just have to--if anybody was sick, they weren't gonna come to school, and then the opposite, um, yeah.

BRINTON: Did you have any idea, like, early on, how big it was gonna get? I know you said you worked in public health so maybe you did?

HOWELL: The people that I knew public health and people I knew at--that worked at the hospital were telling me this is not just go away quickly and so I think that was a little bit helpful. Um, I don't know that I knew it was gonna get a point where almost everybody I knew would eventually get it or that it would last as long as it did. I really--I mean I, I knew what everybody else knew, which was we're going to shut down for two weeks--

BRINTON: Um-hm.

HOWELL: --that will help and then we'll open back up and see what--how things go. And so then when that didn't happen --(laughs)--, that was--when that didn't happen, that was when I realized, okay, this may be a long--a longtime thing, so.

BRINTON: Um-hm, a long haul situation. So other than 00:38:00the--those--the--what we through we're going to be the short-term shutdowns, uh, do you remember how you felt about those systems that were designed in those early days to help keep us safe whether it was the mandates or the, the pop-up testing locations and the vaccines?

HOWELL: Yeah, so, um, what--I was--I was really--I felt differently than my husband because I was in a really safe environment. And my--nobody came into my home except my own family and two employees that we had made an agreement with that they would not be with anyone else. And if people did come to the farm, they stood outside, quite a ways away, and so I didn't feel, like, this urgency to like, I have to get vaccinated immedi-- I wasn't waiting, like, impatiently for the vaccines.

BRINTON: Um-hm.

HOWELL: My life hadn't changed much really except for me being a little bit busier with some of my work. You know, l--my other work not having thirty-five hundred kids had, like, just been crossed off my list, so it, sort 00:39:00of, felt like at first like a--I'm not doing this because I'm doing this now. I--there was some intensity, I feel like, with people around me about, you know, some people didn't believe there was a pandemic, they didn't think people should have to wear masks, they didn't think people should have to get vaccinated, and there was other people that were very angry about that. I do remember being, sort of, in the middle of that a little bit, um, but as far as like the core group of people around me, it wasn't that way, so I was very thankful for that.

BRINTON: Did, did you get involved with any, uh, any strife about your, your being very pro-vaccine fairly in a rural area? Did you find that you were like a--one voice among many?

HOWELL: I think--what I think has happened for us, and I was thinking about this earlier today, we were talking about being pro-public health , 00:40:00pro-diversity and inclusiveness, pro-access to everyone before anybody knew Need More Acres as a succ--as a successful farm or as me as like a community organizer and leader. And because of that, nobody's surprised by my beliefs, and it--that's kind of nice. What I think happened during the pandemic is people who never talked about their beliefs before felt pressure to share how they believed and then make a decision about whether somebody else is right or wrong really quickly.

BRINTON: Sure.

HOWELL: There were some of that going on. Where I don't think anybody--since I had been working with Kentucky Medicaid and public health for all these years, I don't think there was any surprise that I was siding with public health.

BRINTON: Right.

HOWELL: And it, kind of, was a relief a little bit. And I think in general, people know that our heart is in service, and, um, they-- I don't 00:41:00know, I feel, I feel a little bit grateful that because it's part of our core values, we're allowed to say and do things without as much criticism as some people might get.

BRINTON: Sure, people already know that that's who you are?

HOWELL: Yeah, they're not surprised, yeah, they've gotten time to get used to it. Where some people, I think they were like, oh, my cousin feels that way, I didn't know that, or, you know, this person feels that way, or my kid's teacher feels this way. Like they were seeing all this stuff that they didn't, they didn't know those people were that way before. And I feel like I kind of spared myself from that a little bit. --(laughs)--

BRINTON: Since people knew that you were in public health and you had this background, did they go to you as a source of information, maybe about the vaccines and--?

HOWELL: Um, a little bit about vaccines, more about--what I think people did was people felt differently if they had caught COVID in the 00:42:00beginning, not thinking they would and then they did. Or if they had somebody in their family pass away from COVID, they really--like their, their mindset changed, and I think I could be a source of helpfulness in those situations.

BRINTON: And then as far as you went, what were your primary sources? I know you mentioned you listened to the governor in the evenings. Were there other sources that you were using other than your public health connections?

HOWELL: Yeah, so the health department was sending out--I'm part of the community health planning council. It--well it's called the BRIGHT [editor's note: Barren River Initiative to

Get Healthy Together] Coalition. So, they were sending out almost daily emails that were pretty specific. The superintendent of the schools were sending out--like a lot of this was happening on social media at the time, um, so this was mostly public. There were a few, kind of, like, private things, mostly public information. I was just keeping up on that, just so that I can know, kind of, what was happening, what to expect, um, figuring out how to, kind 00:43:00of, shift and change who we were serving when and that sort of thing. That way I wasn't having to call people who were already really busy and overworked and ask questions. I was trying to figure out--stay on top of the information myself.

BRINTON: Did you feel like you trusted the information that you were getting?

HOWELL: I, I felt like the governor and public health did a really great job being completely transparent from the very beginning. In retrospect, I probably didn't have to listen to every single governor re--like update.

BRINTON: Yeah. --(both laugh)--

HOWELL: I finally had to be like, okay, I can do this maybe every three or four days instead every day. Um, but I feel like, um, I feel like the information was coming out and to the best of the ability of--what I know about public health, just like anybody out there, is they were just were everyday people, and they're doing the best they can with the information that they have.

BRINTON: With the benefit of hindsight, is there anything that you wish had been done differently with the information rollout?

HOWELL: --(pause)--I think that COVID was in Kentucky much earlier than April. My mom had an issue, which was very similar to what they're now calling COVID toe where I took her to the hospital. They put her in a separate room, they were all wearing masks, they put masks on us, they--the hospital was overrun, this was like in February. Um, and the only question we got asked when we, we came in was have you been to China in the last--

BRINTON: --oh wow.

HOWELL: --period of time, you know? I feel like there were signs that the pandemic was here sooner, and that maybe that information could've been shared if they, if did know, I don't know that they did, so I mean that, that piece in the beginning where it was, kind of, getting obvious. That's what I say, I just had this feeling something was happening. My father-in-law had the 00:45:00same feeling. Um, but at the same time, I think they were trying not to create urgency or, like, distress or concern because it could've been like some of the other viruses and gone away, so I can, kind of, see--I can see that. I think had it been maybe a little--the information had been rolled out slower soon--like sooner rather than so--

BRINTON: Um-hm.

HOWELL: --like so much information urgent and just shut down, people might have taken it better, but maybe not, it may have been the same way. People may have felt that--felt however they were going to feel about it.

BRINTON: That's--yeah, I guess we--we can never know.

HOWELL: Yes.

BRINTON: Do you--I know you talked about the farming community having learned a lot from this, do you think the public health community has learned what they needed to learn from, from that initial sort of pandemic crisis?

HOWELL: Um. --(pause)-- I think so. Um, I'm concerned for public 00:46:00health, just like I am all frontline workers, of the expectations that we put on a small group of people and just how overworked they are and how tired they are in, in a very unsustainable way. I think that we need to be prioritizing mental health and people being able to take breaks when they need them. And people being compensated for, like, the emotional labor that they are contributing to these things. That's, that's the lesson I would like to think that we have learned, I don't know that we necessarily have. --(laughs)--But I would love to see us learn that, like, food service staff and teachers and nurses and the people that are in the service industry, grocery store workers, and farmers that they need to be valued for the role that they play and taken 00:47:00care of and feeling like they can take care of their self too.

BRINTON: Do you have confidence that we will do it better next time?

HOWELL: Um, I think the farming community is set up to work towards that. I think it's gonna depend on how quickly the next pandemic comes. If the pandemic doesn't come for another ten, fifteen, twenty years, maybe not. If it comes in the next couple years, I think that we will--it'll be more fresh on our mind, and we'll be better at responding, I'm hoping that that doesn't happen. But I do think a lot of it will depend on, you know, if it takes twenty years, we will have forgotten a lot of what we've learned, and it'll probably happen similarly to how this one did, so.

BRINTON: Sure, that urgency will wane in the, in the interim?

HOWELL: Yes, and you will forget the wisdom of the people before you, which is exactly what we're doing with the local food system. We had this diverse--everybody grew their own food, all the food came--most of food came from close to home, and then we went to commodity agriculture, and hardly any food was grown close to home. And now we're trying to get back to that, we're trying to relearn, um, and I think that, well, that's similar to, to public health too.

BRINTON: Sounds like you, sort of, approached this whole thing, you, kind of knew what you were about, and you knew what you were getting into. But is there anything personally that you would handle differently were this to happen again?

HOWELL: --(pause)--In the very, very beginning, I feel like a lot of feelings about my experiences of hunger and some childhood trauma came up. And 00:49:00I'm glad that it did, and I got to work through that. But I think that energy was fueling my work, and I was working from this place of, like, desperately wanting things to be better rather than from like a sustainable pace of something that I can do long term and so I learned that lesson. I wouldn't want to learn that lesson again --(both laugh)-- if we were to have another pandemic.

BRINTON: That--it--it, it sounds like you were putting yourself in the, sort of, take care of this the same way the healthcare workers were, jus--just in a different stream?

HOWELL: Yes.

BRINTON: So, I'm just going to ask you one last thing before we go, can you tell if there's any one major thing that you feel you've learned because of the pandemic experience, one major takeaway?

HOWELL: Um, let me think. One major takeaway from the pandemic. The 00:50:00major thing that I saw across the board, whether it was public health or agriculture or school systems or grocery stores, was we were able to get back to, like, just country common sense. This is what will work, it's this the simplest way, this is the most efficient way, this is--let's get rid of some of the paperwork, let's get rid of some of the, like, strings attached, like, let's get some of the, like, red tape and just make this happen. And all this common sense, like, solution came about, um, and then that, like, quickly waned as we got back to the new normal.

BRINTON: Right.

HOWELL: But I would love, I would love for us to take that and build on that. You know, so many people who had been the frontline workers were able to say, "I've always wished we could do it this way because it would be so much easier, so much quicker, so much cheaper, we'd be helping more people," and they were able to do that. They--they were the experts, and I think the people 00:51:00at the higher level were quick to let people on the frontline be the experts, and I think that's the way that it should be.

BRINTON: All right, and thank you so much for coming to talk with us. I know I'm so happy to have been able to talk with you today, this is all so, so interesting and so important, so just thank you so much.

HOWELL: Yeah, thank you.