Conference Schedule

About the Speakers

• Micha Ide

  WSDA Regional Markets Program

  Micha Ide is the small farm direct marketing specialist in the Regional Markets Program at the Washington State Department of Agriculture. She has over a decade of experience working in agriculture and supporting producers in Washington. In her role, Micha assists farmers and ranchers with access to resources, business development, regulatory guidance, facilitating market connections and more.

• Cara McNab

  Ranch Park Consulting

  Cara is the founder and CEO of Ranch Park Consulting and an attorney who has spent her career working on agricultural programs and policies that affect farmers and ranchers. She recently authored the Washington Direct Farm Business Guide for the National Agricultural Law Center, a practical resource designed to help Washington farmers understand and navigate the legal issues involved in selling directly to consumers.

  Before starting Ranch Park Consulting, Cara spent more than 16 years with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, where much of her work focused on beginning farmers and ranchers, local and regional food systems, and improving access to USDA programs. She has worked with farmers, agricultural organizations, Extension professionals, and government agencies across the country and is passionate about making complicated laws and regulations more understandable and useful for producers.

  Cara holds a J.D. and an LL.M. in Agricultural and Food Law and is licensed to practice law in the District of Columbia.

• Rusty Rumley

  National Agricultural Law Center

  Rusty was born and raised on a family farm in Cogar, Oklahoma. He graduated magna cum laude from Oklahoma State University in 2004 with a B.S. in AgriBusiness and in 2007 earned his juris doctor from the University of Oklahoma. After law school, Rusty earned his LL.M in Agricultural Law at the University of Arkansas. He is licensed to practice law in the states of Oklahoma and Michigan. Rusty has published law review articles discussing the future application of special use valuation for inherited farmland, “right to farm” statutes, and the enforcement of animal cruelty statutes by private organizations. He has also written on landowner liability, agritourism, food labeling, local food production, business

  organizations, crop insurance, estate planning, leasing, and other land use topics in his work at the Center. Further, Rusty presents around the country to producer, consumer, extension, industry and legal groups on an array of topics. Additionally, he has co-taught a course titled “Animals and Agricultural Production, Law and Policy” several times at the University of Oklahoma College of Law and most recently at the University of Nebraska College of Law and teaches an introduction to agricultural law course through the Dale Bumpers College of Agricultural, Food, & Life Sciences at the University of Arkansas. He is also an adjunct faculty member in the University of Arkansas’ Animal Science Department and the Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness Department. His primary areas of interest are in estate planning, taxation, business organizations, landowner liability, leasing and agritourism.