Shay Frank is WYSO’s food insecurity and agriculture reporter. She’s been on the job full time since March, but actually began as an intern while in college, in 2021.
She spoke with All Things Considered Host Jerry Kenney about being a Dayton native and what she’s learning through her reporting efforts.
This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.
Shay Frank: I grew up in Dayton, right by the Air Force base, actually. I moved away for a few years, but couldn’t get away long enough, had to come back. I went to University of Dayton, too, so also went to college here. I studied journalism with a minor in music.
Jerry Kenney: Okay, so journalism with a minor in music. Tell us about your experience so far with YSO. You have a pretty interesting beat with food insecurity and agriculture. Talk a little bit about how those two meet.
Frank: So it actually was started by Alejandro [Figueroa], who many of you who are listening probably have heard before on the radio, super grateful for the platform he left here for me. Basically, I write about food insecurity in agriculture, as the title suggests, but food insecurity and agriculture are tied together in a lot of ways people don’t really realize. So agriculture and food systems are all tied together through the Farm Bill.
When it comes to food and food security, you don’t always think about farms. You think more about food banks, people with SNAP benefits, EBT, things like that. But in reality, it’s all tied because farmers do provide us with the food that we need to be nutritious, to survive, to grow.
And so all of that comes together because farmers really are the catalysts of what we’re able to eat and how we’re able to survive here in the United States.
Shay Frank at the 2024 Ohio State Fair
Kenney: So you mentioned Alejandro, and we lost him to Oregon Public Radio. So I know he’s doing a great job out there. And we’re real pleased to have you and the work that you’re providing for WYSO. So are there any surprises that you’ve learned since you started on this beat?
Shay Frank: Surprising for me. I came from writing about the arts before this and then doing general news coverage. The biggest surprise for me is learning so much about the food systems, agriculture, especially here in Ohio.
I just very recently learned that we have a massive wine industry in Ohio. And, my family’s full of winos, so they’re very excited about that. And I’m excited to bring that information to the public to be able to teach more about that. As someone who’s from Dayton and didn’t even know that we are so close to such a booming industry. I’ve learned a lot about the different agriculture groups that are here in Ohio. There’s a lot of corn, soybean, things like that. A lot of production that I had no idea was so big here in the state.
Kenney: Great. So any other favorite stories that you’ve worked on?
Frank: My gosh, there’s so many. Like I said, learning about a lot of different groups, you know, the different agriculture groups here in Ohio. Learning about how climate impacts soybean farmers is a huge thing. I also had no idea about. I mean, the way they plant, how they [plant], when they plant, how they cultivate, you know, bring all of this to our markets to be able to eat or to be used in other capacities. It’s really impacted by climate because everything farmers do is pretty much outdoors and working with and around the climate, which has changed so much over the years.
Kenney: That’s interesting too, because I know soybeans are like the crop that a lot of food producers and farmers alternate their crops with to save the nutrients in their fields and to not overproduce some of the land that they’re farming. So if that’s threatened, that’s a pretty big story.
Frank: Certainly. And also learning on that same note about cover crops and about regenerative farming has been so educational for me and hopefully the listeners as well. You know, as someone who never was around farms as much — I grew up so close to the Air Force base, there’s not much farmland right there — I learned a lot recently just interviewing local farmers, statewide farmers as well about their struggles, their triumphs, the market that they work in, how it impacts them with the farm bill as well. I mean, there’s so much that I’m learning and I’m excited to share with you as well.
Kenney: Any other stories that you’re digging into?
Shay Frank: Yeah, right now I’m working on some other news based stories. I just wrapped up a story about a new rule in Dayton about evictions, how you can get your record sealed based on your history. There’s also some more stories I’ve been working on related to OSU and research that just came out recently. There is some funding brought in by the state to help them kind of promote a new kind of research where it involves the farmers, local legislators, local landlords, things like that, to make sure that these regenerative farming practices that have been proven in previous studies to work are actually implemented in the field so that we can really create a greener future in farming. So that story just recently came out. It was also on The Ohio Newsroom. So if you didn’t hear it here locally, you could have heard it there as well.
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