Our Team
Farm and Ranch Freedom Alliance maintains a fairly small staff, rallying its members, supporters, and board members to amplify the voice of our lean but impactful organization. People like you are how we pack a strong punch!
Executive Director
Judith McGeary
Judith McGeary is an attorney, activist, and sustainable farmer. After earning her Bachelors of Science from Stanford University and her law degree with high honors from the University of Texas at Austin, she clerked for a Federal Appeals Court and went on to private law practice. During that time, she became a passionate advocate of sustainable agriculture, and she and her husband established their own livestock farm. After seeing how government regulations benefit industrial agriculture at the expense of family farms, she founded the Farm and Ranch Freedom Alliance to promote common-sense policies for local, diversified agricultural systems. Judith has been profiled in the Texas Observer and Edible Austin, appears in the documentary Farmageddon, and has been interviewed on numerous radio shows across the country. Judith has served as the Vice Chair of the U.S. Secretary's Advisory Committee on Animal Health and is also active with Texas Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association, the Weston A. Price Foundation, and the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund.
Deputy Director
Lindsay Gonzales
A lifelong real food activist and now ag-tivist, Lindsay brings 20 years' experience in nonprofit fundraising and leadership to advocate for independent farmers and ranchers across the country. Born and raised in Houston, Lindsay pursued a bachelor's in ethics and public policy at Hampshire College, a master's in ethics at Vanderbilt University and then took her passion to work for the common good to Washington DC where she worked in the legislature and politics and for multiple national-level nonprofits. Returning to Texas to be with family, she now lives in a small town south of Houston, with a small banana orchard, "just enough" chickens, three dogs, two sons, and her husband. Though she always cared about sustainable agriculture and healthy food systems, her work founding and organizing a local farmers' market made the barriers in the current systems for producers and consumers more apparent than ever. She is passionate about bringing people together so we can create new food systems that will improve the health of individuals, communities, economies, and the environment.
Director of Communications & Engagement
Maria Whitworth
Maria comes to FARFA with a 38+ year creative background in marketing, brand management, community engagement, event coordination, and digital media strategy, and holds a special love for local, sustainable initiatives that support small growers, ranchers, and food producers. Her background includes marketing, writing and editing for Edible Dallas Fort Worth magazine, with a focus on highlighting the stories of local small farms. Prior to EDFW, Maria was responsible for Regional Marketing & Community Engagement for Whole Foods Market in the Dallas/Fort Worth region. She is serving her third term in public service on the City Council of Weston, Texas, where she promotes and supports soil and water conservation. You’ll find her fostering collaborations and advocating for sustainable local food systems at many Texas events, and can also find her cooking up local goodness in her own family's kitchen.
Senior Policy Associate
Paul Figueroa
Paul comes from an eight-generation farm family and has been active for years in community organizing around food sovereignty, strengthening local food systems, organic farming and the environment. He brings a varied experience having worked in political marketing and communications, as a strategist for local and state-level campaigns, and as a policy consultant where he worked to write the roadmap for federal food sovereignty policy for Puerto Rico. Additionally, he has presented on climate policy for Puerto Rico in international forums including the United Nations COP26 People’s Summit, the Transform Europe Conference (European Parliament), as a guest lecturer at the University of Copenhagen’s Department of Latin American Studies; speaker at the University of the Virgin Islands at Saint Croix, and at the Caribbean Studies Association in Santa Marta, Colombia. When he’s not advocating for small-scale food producers at FARFA, you can find him at home in San Juan with his hands in the soil at his local community garden.
FARFA is Hiring!
Part-Time Policy Advocacy Intern
The Farm and Ranch Freedom Alliance seeks a policy intern for the Winter/Spring 2025 session. The intern will have the opportunity to gain valuable experience by assisting in all aspects of FARFA’s policy advocacy on behalf of small farmers, regenerative ranchers, and local food producers, at the state and federal level.
Questions?
If you have a general question, please email info@farmandranchfreedom.org or call 254-697-2661.