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Grow Ohio Valley cultivating new talent

WHEELING — Grow Ohio Valley, a nonprofit advocate for health and local food, has secured new talent.

Two associates will direct day-to-day program operations, as well as launch the Wheeling Public Market project at the Robert C. Byrd Intermodal Transportation Center. The company also filled eight, year-long AmeriCorps service positions.

Samantha Amberg has joined the organization in a full-time capacity as director of sales and operations. Eleanor Marshall, an AmeriCorps VISTA sponsored by the West Virginia Economic and Community Development HUB, will spend one year coordinating logistical matters related to launching Grow Ohio Valley’s Public Market project.

“This again demonstrates how AmeriCorps programs have consistently brought high-quality, motivated young talent into Wheeling,” said Danny Swan, Grow Ohio Valley co-founder.

He said the organization has been particularly adept at attracting new talent, adding, “Young people are interested to reshape our food systems through localized food economies. They are concerned about what we’re eating, and believe in the opportunities available through reconsidering how we meet our most basic need.”

Amberg started with Grow Ohio Valley as a VISTA service member in late 2016. In joining the company’s executive management team, she will lead Grow Ohio Valley’s food sales and aggregation operations, develop and oversee ongoing and new programs, and help manage the organization’s 17-member AmeriCorps program and three VISTA resources.

“After completing my service year, I was ready to step into a leadership role. I’ll be working closely with our wonderful AmeriCorps service members while overseeing daily operations and program development,” Amberg said. “2018 is going to be a big year for the local food movement in Wheeling.”

Marshall arrived at Grow Ohio Valley as a recent graduate of Yale University. She holds direct experience tied to the organization’s mission, including coordinating sales efforts at large-scale farmers markets in the Atlanta metropolitan area and working on food sovereignty issues in America and abroad.

She said the Public Market project, a year-round consignment farmers market destined for downtown Wheeling, is an opportunity to strengthen the Ohio Valley’s food economy. The project will boost regional farmers’ revenue streams by returning a majority of market profits to local food producers.

“It’s a chance to prove local foods as an economic driver,” Marshall said. “As an outsider, Wheeling seems a place of absolute potential, and this market will be one of the ways the city can enact that.”

Grow Ohio Valley has four returning AmeriCorps service members assuming full-year positions: John Gasiorowski and Isa Campbell on the farming team and Hannah Hedrick and Sarah Stec advancing education initiatives.

Also entering full-year positions are four new members: Sarah Morgan recently returned to McMechen from Tennessee, Kala Babu from northern California, Lorenzo Arce from Michigan and Annina Wells from Maryland.

Also, a new AmeriCorps VISTA service member will serve as a full-time program impact reporter and grant writer, tracking the benefits of and securing funding for the organization’s various programs in the Ohio Valley. There are five additional AmeriCorps opportunities for summer 2018. For more information, contact Grow Ohio Valley at (304) 233-4769 or by email at info@growov.org.

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