Judith McGeary, the founder and Executive Director of FARFA, is an attorney and sustainable farmer. She has a B.S. in Biology from Stanford University and her J.D. from the University of Texas at Austin. After a clerkship with the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, she practiced as an attorney in the areas of administrative law, litigation, and appeals. She and her husband have a farm in Central Texas with sheep, cattle, horses, chickens,a nd turkeys. After seeing how government regulations benefit industrial agriculture at the expense of family farms, she founded FARFA in 2006 to provide a voice for independent agriculture. She and her husband are also active with Holistic Resource Management of Texas, the Texas Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association, and the Weston A. Price Foundation.
Deborah Davis has been a Texas Longhorn rancher since 1990, and manages a grassfed Texas Longhorn beef marketing company in Bandera, Texas. She is a past President and current Registrar of the Cattlemen’s Texas Longhorn Registry and has served as Secretary and Newsletter Editor for that organization. Mrs. Davis also served on the Board of the South Texas Longhorn Association and was its Newsletter Editor. She was Chairman of Artist Reservations with the Women’s Art Guild of Laguna Gloria Museum in Austin, Texas, and served on the Board of Holistic Management International–Texas. She received museum docent training from the Elisabeth Ney Museum, Laguna Gloria Art Museum and the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas in Austin, and Texas Forums moderator training at the LBJ Presidential Library and Museum.
Steve Diver established an independent consulting firm, Agri-Horticultural Consulting, in 2010. He earned B.S. and M.S. degrees from Oklahoma State University and has worked in horticulture and sustainable agriculture since the early 1980s. He was the Extension Horticulturist in Muskogee County, Oklahoma prior to managing an organic farm in Missouri. He worked with the ATTRA – National Sustainable Agriculture Information Service program as an Agriculture Specialist for 18 years in Arkansas, then relocated to Texas where he was R&D Scientist with Sustainable Growth Texas, LLC. He served on the NOSB Compost Tea Task Force and is a current member of the Science and Technical Advisory Committee for The Organic Center.
Dr. Glen Dupree has been a licensed veterinarian since 1982. After running a conventional veterinary practice for a number of years, Dr. Dupree studied homeopathy and is now a Certified Veterinary Homeopath through the Academy of Veterinary Homeopathy. Dr. Dupree is licensed in the states of Louisiana, New York, and Pennsylvania, and his practice currently consists of consultations in these states, in addition to telephone consultations to offer advice to care givers living outside those states. In addition, Dr. Dupree maintains an active teaching, writing, and speaking schedule and serves as a mentor on Dr. Pitcairn’s Professional Veterinary Homeopathy web list. His writings have been published in the Journal of the American Institute of Homeopathy, Homeopathy Today, The Natural Horseman, The Louisiana Horsemans Guide, and IRiS Magazine.
Ron Freeman is a 53 year old fifth generation cattleman who has run a grass-based intensive grazing ranch in west central Illinois for over 30 years. He is a past director of a breed association and past president of a regional satellite. He has a B.A. in Psychology and Social Theory. He believes in the fundamental laws of Nature and models his ranch accordingly. He and his wife Jeanne have three children.
Brad Stufflebeam: “A pioneer of the local food movement in the Lone Star State” (Texas Agriculture Magazine), Brad Stufflebeam has been a professional organic horticulturist since 1991, the past President of the Texas Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association (TOFGA), current USDA Administration Council Member Southern SARE, the Brazos Valley chapter leader for the Weston A. Price Foundation and a full-time farmer in Washington County, Texas. Brad has been an educator and organizer for many of the largest organic farming events in Texas. His small family farm serves his local community and the Houston area through a unique Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program along with a Monthly Market Day hosted on his farm.
Howard Vlieger is the president and co-founder of Verity Farms. He began the journey of a lifetime in 1989 when he started using alternative farming practices on the family farm. Howard considers it an amazing privilege to be a care taker of the soil: “The Good Lord made an awesome creation when He created the soil. It is a true joy to continue the never-ending learning experience of working with all of the biological and elemental components of the soil to produce clean, high quality, nutritious food for all deserving consumers to eat.” Verity Farms has the privilege of working with crop and livestock producers in 7 states. Verity Farms has a successful biological crop production division, a grain division, a feed division focusing on natural livestock production, and a natural meat division. The mission of Verity Farms is the reestablishment of the “family farmer.”
