Prissy, who works in the St. Johns County Office of Intergovernmental Affairs, said the county is moving toward creating a new agricultural advisory committee after local farmers sought a formal channel to make their concerns heard.

"So this started all with conversations from our St. Johns County farmers wanting their voices to be heard," Prissy said. "It's been a genuine grassroots effort to ensure that of the many advisory committees that the county offers that we now have 1 that is specific to agriculture."

Prissy described what the county plans for the committee's membership: it will include farmers "whose livelihood is financially dependent upon creating these and growing these crops," and said, "They have to be residents of St. Johns County, and they have to have farming experience." The requirement is intended to ensure members can provide information about current issues facing local producers.

County staff, she added, want committee members who are already part of the farming community and who can "give us information that is relevant to issues they're dealing with now and to enlighten us on things that those of us that didn't grow up on a farm would otherwise not be familiar with."

There was no formal timetable, vote, ordinance number, or funding detail discussed in the interview; Prissy framed the effort as a grassroots request that county leaders and staff are working to structure. The host asked about next steps and what the board would do, prompting the overview of purpose and membership criteria. The county did not present a draft ordinance or a scheduled meeting to adopt the committee during this segment.

Next steps, according to the exchange recorded here, are organizational: establishing the committee structure and eligibility rules so the county can begin recruiting local farmers to serve. No formal action or vote was reported in the transcript.