Ron Weins the CEO at the Big Sandy Medical Center has noticed a few problems in his recent time in rural Montana.
“I have been in medical, mostly hospital services for over 30 years and this is a new position for me, CEO up here at Big Sandy. I’ve been here for only seven months, and I’ve already noticed some issues with rural communities. The struggle for small farmers but also for small rural hospitals, and I was looking at the issues with food distribution and getting healthy food to local communities, and I realized actually how vulnerable our systems are.” -Ron Weins
Following his observations Ron devised a plan to bring fresh food to rural communities, starting with Big Sandy.
“Maybe create a pilot or prototype greenhouse project that could provide nutrient dense fruits and vegetables to our community. Big Sandy is only population 600 and take the surrounding areas we might get up to 1000. It’s an excellent population size to try one of these prototypes of a greenhouse that could actually support the community.” -Ron Weins
As of right now Ron says he’s at the very beginning stage of implementing his idea.
“Very early stage, first thing in order to be able to accept grants or any kind of funding we need to set up a 501-C3 organization. So that’s been put on my plate to get that done and so we’re working through the articles of incorporation and all those kinds of things to get our organization set up. It would be called Big Sandy Sustainability Project.”-Ron Weins
