New Chapter Application

Welcome to starting a new chapter!

Completing this document is the first formal step in the process of establishing a new Slow Food USA local chapter in your community.

Before filling out this form, you should check in with the National Office to see if there is a chapter that already exists in your area or if one is already in the process of forming. To do this, email chapters@slowfoodusa.org or call 718-260-8000 to get the green light.

This first phase of applying to start a chapter is primarily a self-evaluation process to help your leadership team establish a shared vision for the proposed chapter.

Getting Started

The process for setting up a local chapter can take some time and effort, but it should be fun too! The best way to ensure that it is both productive and fun is to work with a team of people who share your passion for spreading the Slow Food message. We'd love for you to focus on

You’ll need a minimum of three (five is recommended) people committed to serving on your chapter’s leadership team in order to get started. Once you’ve found your teammates, get together (in person and over food is best, of course!) to work through answering this form as a group. The primary purpose of completing this form is to get your ideas down on paper.

Proposed Chapter Name

This application's point person's email address:

Location

One of Slow Food USA's greatest strengths is that we are a true grassroots network. Chapters are rooted in a specific community and geography. We act locally and collaborate nationally for the most effective change toward good, clean, and fair food for all.

Please provide the mailing address you will use as a chapter- this address will be used to locate your chapter, receive Slow Food mail, and be used as the IRS address for the chapter.

Street Address

City

State

Zip Code

Please briefly describe the geographic area your chapter will focus. For instance, many chapters focus on a town or city, others focus on a natural region, and some focus on an entire state (140 characters or less).

Are you applying as a campus chapter?

YesNo

If you answered yes above, what is the name of your school?

Founding Leadership Team

A Chapter’s Leadership Team is the most critical key to a successful chapter. A founding team is required to have at least three people filling the roles of Chairperson, Vice-Chair, Treasurer, or Secretary. We require a minimum of 3 founding leaders because you must start a chapter with a board of directors of 3. Other leader roles include:

Membership Chair: focus on engaging donors and members. Also can be called fundraising chair
Social Justice/Equity Chair: focus on ensuring chapter operation and activities are just, equitable, and anit-oppressive
Events Chair: Focus on creating and coordinating chapter events
Marketing Chair: Focus on outreach, especially email lists, social media, and media partners
Co-Chairperson: active chapters can be quite busy. Having a co-chairperson is a great way to share the responsibility

All three leaders can concurrently be board members and hold another leader role. But no leader can concurrently hold two or more of any of these roles: chairperson, treasurer and secretary.

Chairperson

The chairperson is the main active leader of the chapter. This position is best related to an executive director. This person is mainly responsible for a chapter's activities.

Chairperson First Name

Chairperson Last Name

Chairperson Email Address

Chairperson Phone Number

Vice-Chair

The Vice-Chair is the main leader of the board of directors. This person is mainly responsible for ensuring the bylaws and charter for chapter is being followed. This includes ensuring good governance, mission adherence, and proper financial records.

Board Chair First Name

Board Chair Last Name

Board Chair Email Address

Board Chair Phone Number

Treasurer

The treasurer is primarily responsible for the financial health, filings, and bookkeeping for the chapter. This includes ensuring that chapter decisions are financially sound, maintaining proper financial books, and reporting annually to the IRS.

Treasurer First Name

Treasurer Last Name

Treasurer Email Address

Treasurer Phone Number

Secretary

The Secretary is quite an important role as they will keep the official minutes for chapter meetings and decisions. This is very important so that all chapter leaders and members consistently have common understanding and expectations. The Secretary is also responsible to ensure that decisions that require voting actually have a recorded vote- and is not just a the decision of one leader.

Secretary First Name

Secretary Last Name

Secretary Email Address

Secretary Phone Number

Fifth Leader

Additional Leader if applicable. The more the merrier! A vibrant chapter with strong leadership is the key to success!

Leadership Role

First Name

Last Name

Email Address

Phone Number

Additional Leader

Additional Leader if applicable. The more the merrier! A vibrant chapter with strong leadership is the key to success!

Leadership Role

First Name

Last Name

Email Address

Phone Number

Additional Leader

Additional Leader if applicable. The more the merrier! A vibrant chapter with strong leadership is the key to success!

Leadership Role

First Name

Last Name

Email Address

Phone Number

Additional Leader

Additional Leader if applicable. The more the merrier! A vibrant chapter with strong leadership is the key to success!

Leadership Role

First Name

Last Name

Email Address

Phone Number

Additional Leader

Additional Leader if applicable. The more the merrier! A vibrant chapter with strong leadership is the key to success!

Leadership Role

First Name

Last Name

Email Address

Phone Number

Additional Leader

Additional Leader if applicable. The more the merrier! A vibrant chapter with strong leadership is the key to success!

Leadership Role

First Name

Last Name

Email Address

Phone Number

Extra Credit: Selfies!! Bonus points if you snap a group photo of your team and send it in with this application - we love to be able to put faces to names :)

Joy + Justice

The fight for good, clean, and fair food for all is fundamentally a justice fight. Access to quality food is a human right. We call our focus on justice and anti-oppression "joy + justice". Through seeking just food systems, we will also achieve real joy-- in our journey, our actions, our events, our food, and our relationships.

For more information and perspective, please refer to the Slow Food Equity, Inclusion, and Justice Manifesto.

How will your chapter center your actions on joy + justice? How will your chapter's actions and internal operations remain consistently dedicated to good, clean, and fair food for all? For example, can you point to one of your focal strategies and to a goal?

Is your leadership team representative of your communities demographics-- this includes gender, race, socio-economic status, and more?

YesNo

Please describe how your leadership team is appropriately representative of the community you seek to serve. And please describe how you will seek to maintain this.

How will you seek to diversify your leadership team so that you can authentically be representative of the community you seek to serve? What are your strategies to diversify your leadership team and membership?

How will you work together to establish a chapter culture of consensus/consent, gratitude, and fun?

Is there anything else you want to include here for consideration during the review of this phase of your chapter application?

You did it! Please review this application and click submit when ready!