Billie•Sol Alexandria (they/them), President

Billie is an artist, farmer, herbalist & plant forward chef dedicated to connecting the collective to body and land sovereignty through self & community care practices. Billie’s work rises from meditations on ancestral traditions, community, earth, and body. As the co-creator of Indigo Rising, a Black & Indigenous trans earth work and plant medicine making collective, Billie centers their life’s purpose in carving spaces for BIPOC community to thrive while accessing ancestral healing rest practices to holistically tend to their body’s and spirit’s needs. Billie envisions a world in which indigenous sovereignty and black/trans liberation is possible and a world where we can all feel free to be ourselves, completely. 

Erica Merwin, Vice President

Erica is an avid dog walker, outdoor enthusiast, houseplant hobbyist, and geeked on apples. Mother to an amazing teenaged son, Miles, Erica wonders what will fill her time when she finds herself with an empty nest. She dreams of digging in the dirt, feeding her community and is examining how those ideas intersect w/ dismantling white supremacist patriarchal capitalism.  She was invited to join the board in the first half of 2021 and was voted vice president in September of the same year.

René Carver, Treasurer

René's passion to be a part of the solution for a better world is his motivation to serve as a Food Justice Projects board member. He deeply believes that helping others find their paths to healthier food and healthier environmental choices will lead to healthier lives and thus in turn to a better world. Further, René is committed to help address the many generations of oppression of the marginalized, and in our country that is especially BIPOC folks. Let's collaborate and create a better world!

Nicci Markland

Nicci is a master gardener and naturalist living in the Rocky Mountain state of Colorado. She is passionate about indoor and outdoor four-season gardening and grows a variety of vegetables, edible flowers, herbs, small fruits, and perennial vegetables throughout the year and makes the most of the short growing season with succession sowing and cold frames. She enjoys the challenge of gardening in a state with rocky clay soil, a dry climate, and an altitude of 6500 ft. It gives her a deep sense of satisfaction to provide fresh homegrown produce or preserved food for her family and friends. Nicci believes food security and access to nutrient rich produce are human rights that are largely denied to BIPOC communities. She believes that if we teach and help each other to grow in the soil and as a community we can provide our own nutrition and take our food security into our own hands. If she is not in her garden, you can find her with her husband and their two dogs on a hiking trail or camping.

Ellen Baer, Treasurer

Ellen is newly retired after being in the nonprofit world for 35 years. Before that, she was a cabinetmaker and carpenter. Ellen has a deep passion for food and racial justice and is pursuing those passions by serving on the Food Justice Projects and Unbroken Promise Initiative boards. Ellen enjoys her house and land where she and her partner raise chickens and sheep. They also have huge vegetable gardens and eat from it throughout the summer, fall, and winter. Ellen's favorite place to be is on a walk/hike, preferably in the woods. Best of all is their dog, Sunny Baer, who brings love every day.

Jay Smith

Jay is from New York City where he was a Brooklyn Botanic Gardens Urban Gardener, urban agriculturist, beekeeper, co-founder of a community garden, urban environmentalist, and writer. After relocating to Ithaca to live at the Eco Village in 2015, he has been involved with the Groundswell Center for Local Food & Farming (especially its Practicum to train Farmers of Color), CCE Composting as a Master Composter, and CCE Energy Navigators. His perpetual questions: in this time of ecological predicament, including an accelerating global food crisis, where are we going? What do we do? What do we prioritize?

Gary Fine

I was born into mid-20th century America, and have been witness to the unraveling of the American Empire. Having grown up food deprived and hungry, I cultivated an interest in food, particularly food that is produced and sourced locally, equitably and sustainably. My work with the Food Justice Project is a way to collaborate with others who share these interests. I direct the Durland Alternatives Library, a library whose mission is to collect and disburse information on alternative perspectives on current social issues including food justice. I also created and continue to direct Prisoner Express, a distance learning organization providing incarcerated men and women with information, education and opportunities for creative self-expression in a public forum.