Four of 11 people named to a state Senate agricultural advisory panel are from St. Lawrence County.

The panel, established by 48th District state Senator Patty Ritchie, who is also Senate Agriculture Committee chair, is attending a series of regional agricultural forums to give New Yorkers from across the state an opportunity to offer their suggestions as Ritchie develops her agenda for the upcoming legislative session.

The St. Lawrence County members of the panel are Mark Akins, a dairy farmer and Republican St. Lawrence County Legislator from District 2, representing the town of Lisbon and part of Ogdensburg; dairy farmer and St. Lawrence Farm Bureau President Jon Greenwood; Rensselaer Falls dairy farmers Allan and Mary Kelly; and Ogdensburg-area dairy farmer Keith Pierce.

The remaining members of the panel are from the other two counties in Ritchie’s district, Jefferson and Oswego.

The first forum was held in Jefferson County. Upcoming sessions are in Geneseo, in Livingston County, and Riverhead, in Long Island’s Suffolk County.

“My advisory panel will help the Senate Agriculture Committee identify issues by bringing some of our region's best and brightest leaders from a variety of agricultural backgrounds together to offer their insight and real world experience,” Ritchie said.

“I am hoping that people who own large, as well as small farms, and those who work full and part-time in the agribusiness industry will offer their suggestions to the members of my advisory council.

“By capitalizing on the use of our abundant natural resources—sun, rain and open space—Central and Northern New York can produce the raw materials to help the Empire State reawaken its manufacturing base and produce the kind of high paying jobs we need.”

“Our cheese, yogurt, ice cream, wineries, meat packing and other food processing plants have traditionally played a vital role in creating industrial jobs,” Senator Ritchie said. “And we can grow our manufacturing base by focusing more attention on family farms.”