HEAL Food Alliance

07/08/2026

Liberated food and farm systems are possible 🌱💫

Marlene Manzo, HEAL Political Leadership Manager, shares their personal background as a farmworker and the ways SoPL leaders inspire them to keep dreaming of liberated food and farm systems
HEAL’s School of Political leadership (SoPL) is made up of teams of farmers, community activists, organizers, educators, and advocates working in grassroots communities across the United States.

campaigns range from policy advocacy to land sovereignty and aim to create pathways for reimagined food and farm systems in which every community has the right and the means to produce, procure, prepare, share, and eat nutritionally and culturally appropriate food free from exploitation of people, land and the natural world.

06/05/2026

05/31/2026

Shifting power for food equity 🌟

HEAL’s 2026 School of Political Leadership blog series continues with a piece from advisor, researcher and advocate Derrick Robinson on how the SoPL program helps shape the Reconnecting Foodways team’s campaign to shift power for food justice for communities impacted by division and corporate control in the San Diego region.

https://healfoodalliance.org/sopl-reflections-shifting-power-in-san-diego-for-food-equity/

05/29/2026

Our community’s heartbeat is more important than a data center’s hum. As many of us find ourselves in difficult times, remember: The Future is Ours to Build.

For the sake of our children, our neighbors, our communities, we need investments in health and well-being, money for schools, community-controlled clean energy projects, and jobs that support us all, not data centers that drive crisis and chaos.



Artwork by .art

Check out the link to CJA’s data center webpage in the bio of and follow the amazing work that groups around the country are doing to push back.

05/26/2026

Work with us!
HEAL seeks a principled and practiced Managing Director to steward our five year strategic plan.

Responsibilities will include operationalizing HEAL’s strategic plan, charting the organization’s path to meet HEAL members’ objectives, ensuring internal team alignment to support our long-term organizational strategy, and overseeing internal leadership and implementation.

If you love organizational strategy, project and team management, have a knack for fostering collaborative connections and relationships and have a deep commitment to movement building, this could be the role for you!

This is a remote, full time, salaried exempt position with annual gross pay of $120-130K.

https://healfoodalliance.org/work-with-us/

05/24/2026

Power rooted in community 🌱

Launching HEAL’s 2026 School of Political Leadership blog series with a piece from beginning farmer Sun Smith of Solar Community Farm on how QTBIPOC folks in Greenville, South Carolina are finding community and connection through food and the land.

https://healfoodalliance.org/reflections-from-heals-2026-sopl/


cover photo by

04/16/2026

“The USDA’s decision to end the contracts hits me twice: as an advocate and as a farmer.”

Increasing Land, Capital, and Market Access Program (ILCMA) provided grants and low-interest loans for farmland down payments, on-farm infrastructure, and agricultural equipment; farm business management training and technical assistance; programming to build relationships between retiring landowners and new farmers seeking access to land; and more.

The program served farmers and ranchers facing the steepest barriers: Black, brown, Indigenous, immigrant, refugee, LGBTQ+, limited-resource, women, and veteran producers. People without inheritable land or generational wealth.

“Terminating it now, in the midst of record farmland costs, a gutted USDA workforce, and an extremely fragile farm economy without a single meaningful alternative plan isn’t fiscal responsibility. It is abandonment.”

The USDA has canceled $300 Million in contracts to support first-generation farmers, abandoning farmers like me.

03/26/2026

WWJ Statement on the recent allegations against Cesar Chavez

As an organization rooted in the labor movement, we are deeply troubled by the recent reports involving Cesar Chavez and the survivors who are speaking out. In particular, Dolores Huerta, an incredible labor leader herself who stood alongside workers demanding fairness and justice, all while facing so much pain and silence at his hands.

Sexual harassment and assault are realities that far too many workers face every day, including in the very workplaces and movements meant to uplift and protect them. At Warehouse Workers for Justice, we hear directly from workers - women, men, LGBTQ+ workers - who experience abuse, coercion, and retaliation on the job. This is not abstract for us but rather it is part of the daily fight for dignity and safety.

We believe it is also important to acknowledge the culture that exists within the labor movement - and many other movements - that asks women and others facing abuse to sacrifice themselves with their silence for “the greater good.” To sacrifice themselves as they face abuse, retaliation, and so much more, while their abusers face no accountability.

We believe it is essential to confront this issue with honesty and care for those who may have been harmed. Supporting survivors, acknowledging harm, and demanding accountability are not in conflict with the fight for workers’ rights but are central to it.

We remain committed to building a movement that reflects these values: one that listens to workers, protects the most vulnerable, and refuses to ignore harm no matter where it comes from.

Our solidarity is, and must always be, with those leading our movement: working people.

03/26/2026

While we are rocked by the news that has been shared about long-time farmworker advocate Cesar Chavez, we nevertheless will always stand with those who suffer injustice.