NARROWSBURG, NY — Slow Money is a global movement that connects investors with farms and food entrepreneurs. Started in 2008 by economist Woody Tasch, the organization has grown to include local and regional chapters. One such chapter is starting here: Slow Money Delaware River. One of the organizers, energy activist Jack Barnett, explained it is a spin-off of the slow food movement.

“It’s counter to the McDonald’s model of food,” Barnett said. “We care about our food—how it’s made, how it’s served.” He and a group of about 12 to 15 people have been working on creating a local chapter of Slow Money. Two years ago, Barnett and lawyer Tony Waldron attended the Slow Money gathering in Louisville, KY. This past summer, a group formed to organize and figure out where they wanted to take the Slow Money concept in our area.

Barnett said they are just getting started, but they want the group to be “educational peer-to-peer networking.” The group will hold its first event on Tuesday, February 7 at The Narrowsburg Union from 6 to 8 p.m. The meeting will start with a potluck, because “sharing a meal is a wonderful thing,” Barnett said. A community discussion will follow with guest speakers Greg Swartz (Willow Wisp Organic Farm, Abrahamsville, PA) and Grant Genzlinger (Settlers Hospitality Group, Hawley, PA, which includes The Settler’s Inn, The Mill Market, Cocoon Coffee House and Silver Birches). Barnett will be the facilitator.

The meeting will focus on what investors typically need from local farmers and food entrepreneurs before they sign on to help capitalize their businesses. The group, for now, is for Sullivan County, NY and Wayne and Pike counties in PA. Barnett said it “emphasizes the connection we all have to the river.”

According to the press release, “Slow Money is a new way for local participants, who care about eating healthy food from local farms, to invest in meaningful economic development where they live.” As explained on its website (www.slowmoney.org), the mission of Slow Money is “to catalyze the flow of capital to local food systems, connecting investors to the places where they live and promoting new principles of fiduciary responsibility that bring money back down to earth.” The idea of “bringing it back to earth” is something that resonated with Barnett and the group. “We’re investing locally to make the earth better,” he said.

To date, Slow Money groups across 46 states and seven countries already have invested local capital totaling over $50 million in 519-plus local and organic food enterprises. Here in the Upper Delaware River Region, local farmers, small-business and artisan food entrepreneurs, restaurateurs and retail and wholesale purveyors of local and sustainable food can benefit from this organization. “Food is what unites us,” Barnett said.