(upbeat music) (cows mooing) - I think farming is probably the most noble industry a person can be in.

(upbeat music) - People don't realize where food comes from.

Kids think milk comes from the grocery store.

- You've worked really hard but you also never forget where you've come from and you never forget the people around you.

(upbeat music) (cows mooing) - My name is Georgene Diener and I'm honored to be your 2021 Common Threads Chairman.

On behalf of the committee, I would like to warmly welcome all of you to our 24th Annual Common Threads Awards Ceremony.

We would like to thank Valley PBS for being our media sponsor and helping us continue our tradition.

We are grateful that you are here with us this evening to celebrate all of our remarkable and talented Valley women.

All of whom have made a difference in their communities through agriculture, philanthropic, and community service endeavors.

The Common Treads Awards honor women whose roots are in agriculture and have given their time, talent, and treasures to our community and to the future of our Valley.

Common Threads was created to recognize the Valleys many women committed to making a difference as well as inspiring current and future generations to give back to their communities.

We thank you from the bottom of our hearts for your time, talent and treasure as we celebrate 24 years of Common Thread recipients.

(upbeat music) Now it is my pleasure to introduce our mistress of ceremonies this evening.

- Thank you, Georgene.

Hello everyone, and welcome to the 2021 Common Threads Awards.

We're thrilled to be here tonight to honor this year's amazing recipients.

I'm your host Christina Musson and I'm joined tonight by the Dean of the Jordan College of Agricultural Sciences and Technology Dr. Nef and president of the Agricultural Leadership Foundation, Dwight Ferguson.

Thanks so much for joining us tonight.

- And thank you, Christina, and good evening.

Recently, we've seen significant advances in the fight against COVID-19, and we can imagine that next year we'll be able to gather in person for a more traditional luncheon.

I'm sure many of you are like me and can't wait for the opportunity to safely gather together to celebrate the outstanding individuals recognized with the Common Threads Award.

We in the Jordan College of Agricultural Sciences and Technology and the Ag One Foundation of Fresno State are pleased to join the California Agricultural Leadership Foundation in recognizing Arlene, Frances, Debbie, and Jeannine for their exemplary and extraordinary commitment to agriculture and their contribution of time, energy, and resources to enhance their families, organizations, and communities.

Their actions inspire others including our students, the next generation to give back to.

I'm pleased to share a few minutes with Dwight Ferguson the new president and CEO of the foundation.

In his few short months on the job, he has brought people together from across the state.

Developed a strategic plan for the organization and is now implementing it.

We're grateful for the opportunity to partner with him, Abby and others at the foundation on this virtual Common Threads event.

Many of you were aware of the Thomas Jefferson quote about agriculturists.

Those who labor in the earth are the chosen people of God if ever he had a chosen people.

I count myself fortunate to rub shoulders with such people and I'm fortunate indeed to know so many of you who are among the chosen of the chosen.

Congratulations to the award winners and thank you all for your participation in this event.

Dwight, over to you?

- Thank you, although this event looks much different than the Common Threads luncheon you're all used to, I'm still delighted to be joining you.

This annual gathering is something we at the California Ag Leadership Foundation are very proud to be associated with.

Thanks to special events like this.

Ag Leadership can continue to prosper and produce leaders who make a difference by benefiting their communities, their companies and California agriculture as a whole.

Together we are working to build on our program's rich history and find ways to build on that well into the future.

I'm so very grateful for your help in that effort.

I especially wanna thank Fresno State, the Ag One Foundation and the committee members who worked so hard to put this virtual event together.

Ag Leadership would also like to recognize the 2020 Award Recipients who have waited so patiently for this day to come.

Arlene, Frances, Debbie, and Jeannine, thank you for your dedication to agriculture and to your communities.

Your accomplishments are most significant, and the examples that you've set inspire all of us.

Before I close, I want to encourage all of you to consider whether you or someone you know is ready to take the next step in a lifelong leadership learning journey by applying to the California Ag Leadership Program.

The application process is now closed for class 51 but applications will be back open in January for class 52.

If you'd like more information about the program or process, please visit our website.

Finally, thank you for your participation in this year's virtual event.

Your engagement is a testament to the loyalty, strength, and commitment of California agriculture.

I'll look forward to joining you again next year when we can hopefully all gather again in person as we share in our desire to connect, grow, and build new opportunities through leadership.

Back to you.

- Thank you, Dwight.

Today we are sharing powerful stories of four ladies who have devoted their lives to agriculture.

They come from Fresno, Kings, and Kern counties.

We begin with Fresno County.

And Jeannine Campos-Grech, a powerhouse in her family's business, Campos Brothers.

(upbeat music) - I was born and raised here in Central California.

I grew up in a small town outside of Caruthers actually.

I can't remember a day where we've not been involved in agriculture.

When I think back to my upbringing and having all of the freedom in the world to run wild in the fields with my brothers, there was also the responsibility of work.

And as our business grew, the one thing that my parents really stressed was education.

It wasn't to stay local, it was to go out work for other people, understand different facets of the industry that we're in and then being able to take that knowledge and bring it home and be able to provide a different unique perspective that broadened our viewpoints to how things get done legislatively for sure as well as commercially on a lot of other avenues.

And someone, another person that was in the Valley suggested that I apply for the California Ag Leadership Program.

And that was really a transformational sort of experience for me.

And when I completed that, I was motivated to really explore some of the water issues that we were facing.

And so that led me to Washington DC.

And I spent a few years on the hill and really enjoyed my experience first on the subcommittee on water and power dealing with Western water issues, and then I went to Congressmen's personal offices as communications director.

Part of the component of the California Ag Leadership Program that was another takeaway was that of getting involved in your community.

Big Brothers Big Sisters, I spent 10 years on the board here when I first moved to Fresno and that led me from there to volunteering at Valley Children's Hospital.

And I spent close to 10 years on their foundation board and then made the jump to the hospital board and really delved into an area of life that I had really no idea other than being a patient and or an expectant mother, and then having kids as patients there.

And so it provided this really great, unique insight into healthcare in general and really sort of expanding and providing outreach to the kids of the Valley.

I think that being raised the way we were raised with parents who immigrated to this country, started with nothing and built a family foundation and business, the key thing is no job is too big or too little.

You work really hard but you also never forget where you come from and you never forget the people around you.

And so it's one of those things that my parents really gave us a strong foundation in the belief of it's part of our culture.

You keep your cultural life so that you keep the identity of who you are and who your ancestors were.

It's a very special award to receive because my mom received the award a few years ago and it's a beautiful thing for my kids to see as well as my nieces and nephews.

I get a little emotional because I think it's this wonderful culmination of what our parents have instilled on us to be able to be nominated for and receive the award, I'm grateful.

- Thank you, Jeannine, for the gifts you have shared with us and continue to do so.

Let's turn to our next recipient.

Arlene Simas whose roots run deep in the dairy industry in Kings County.

(upbeat music) - I was born in Hanford, California.

My parents were from the Azores Islands and when they came over in a young youth, they married.

In fact my dad came first, then he went back and married her and brought her over, and she was only like 17 years old.

And then they went into partnership with the brother of his which they all became dairyman's.

My mother milked cows, my older sister did too, and she was much older than me.

She helped raise me and my younger brother but we had an older sister and an older brother which did all the other (mumbles).

So we were very fortunate.

I grew up in this dairy and I got married when I was 19 years old and I married a farmer, a dairyman.

He went into dairy with his dad.

He was young too at the time.

Unfortunately passed away now in the last year or so.

And we are in a ranch that we purchased nearby.

My folks' dairy, and then we built there and that's where we were at.

But we raised our family in the dairy farm area.

And that was her son and my daughter there present and a younger son.

That was three.

My handicapped son was the first one and he was a cerebral palsy and had seven major surgeries and all that.

So I ended up being a nurse maid really without a degree.

So I've been kind of tied up and then I had my folks.

And then in the end my mother lived with us and dad had passed away and we always combine in the farm still.

And my mother never left her house she could still see the lights in the dairy barn kind of cross.

And she'd always look out the window and say, "Well, that cow she's fresh today."

And this and that.

I mean, we were just so embedded in the situation that it stayed forever.

And it still goes on, the dairy just still goes on.

And now we have none of our siblings actually running it except I'm a limited partner and I have my daughter-in-law and then we lost her husband which is my son.

And we have good people looking for us.

They've been there since their children started, oh, I mean they were born and they today are collegiates and gone.

So they've been with us a long time.

We belong to the T-Bird Club that was our only funny outing that we belonged to as we got older because of friends of ours says, "Oh, you joined."

And I did have a few meetings in my backyard, the dairy wives.

And I helped like at the fair when my son showed and he helped in the booth which involved a lot of kids like 4-H, and future farmers and stuff and everything like that.

Something too that I could do from home because I was tied up, and that was our story.

And church, the things I definitely my husband and I were dedicated in the health and he was president one year and we always helped with the church.

So that was my duties in life basically, and hoping the best and praying for my family and everybody that was in dire need.

And here I am, I don't expect to be here kiddo.

And you guys look very good.

(Arlene laughs) - Thank you, Arlene, for all you've done over the years.

Frances Squire grew up on a farm in Corcoran and began many jobs at a young age.

(upbeat music) - I was raised in Corcoran where my family farmed starting about 1910.

My grandparents came to South of Corcoran when my father was about two years old and they started farming the Tulare Lake bottom that continued until his death in the late 1970s.

I had cousins who continued farming until fairly recently.

And as a child, I would go out and help pick the ends of the rows and then the pickers dumped the cotton into a big trailer and people got in and stomped it down so you could get more cotton in the trailer.

Eventually they had module makers and it all became very mechanical.

But as a kid it was great fun.

It was like a trampoline except this huge thing of cotton.

So great memories out on the ranch working with a lot of different people, a lot of different cultures and was involved with 4-H as a kid which I think was a really important part of my life.

It taught me number one, public speaking which was really important.

And number two, project management.

I raised a couple of steers so I always had a love of agriculture.

And when I went to Cal Poly, I went as a journalism major with an agriculture concentration.

I decided in fourth grade I was going to Cal Poly.

I just knew that was where I was meant to be.

I always loved San Luis Obispo, still do.

I went back to Corcoran after Cal Poly.

My plan was hopefully to farm with my dad and I had worked at the newspaper during college vacations and they excused the editor and hired me.

So at, I don't know, 21 or 22 I became the editor of a weekly newspaper and I did that for four or five years.

So Ed and I got married and I moved to Fresno where he worked and he started an engineering firm.

We have two children.

Our son Wesley is the fourth generation in my family to be involved with San Joaquin Valley agriculture.

He's Fresno State grad, Fresno State MBA.

My husband is a Fresno State engineering grad.

Our daughter flew the coop and went to college in Hawaii.

Her name is Katie, Katie Wilson.

And she now lives in Alabama where my husband is from.

And so consequently, we spend a lot of time back and forth between here in Alabama.

And then I also have an extra son who came to us from Argentina about 20 years ago with a group of young men playing soccer and he wanted to come back to the US and get a master's degree and get a PhD.

And so he got his masters from Fresno State and he has a PhD in biomechanics and he has my two grandchildren, Nico and Bella.

Nico is gonna be one of the top runners in the Valley.

So we're saving our money for the Olympics in the future.

I went to work for PG&E, worked there full-time for eight years and then on contract for another 12 years.

Worked all up and down the Valley.

I probably know every rural community in the Valley like very few people.

And I just recently resigned from the Parkway board but I have great passion for river camp.

My daughter grew up a river camper, and now we're offering that opportunity for children in Firebaugh.

So I'm very committed to making connections in agriculture with people who will support that program mostly for the children of their workers.

But it's a great opportunity for children to learn about the river as a resource for agriculture, but also as a community resource and for wildlife habitat.

I worked for Frank Gornick at West Hills College, and Frank, he's a real dynamo.

He turned West Hills from a small little college that was really in trouble into a national leader in community college education.

So it was fun to work alongside him, and so precision Ag at West Hills started right about the time I did in about 2000 or 2001.

And so very early on we were training not only our students, but also area farmers and how to use these tools.

We were doing great things out there.

I'm really proud of my time that I spent there and the work we did.

I have to say thank you to first of all to West Hills College for nominating me for Common Threads, to Fresno State and to the Ag Leadership Foundation for recognizing women in agriculture.

I'm very honored to be selected.

Over the years I've watched some pretty amazing people receive this award.

So as my dad said I'm walking in tall cotton.

So I just wanna thank everybody who's made this happen for not only me but for all the women that it's happened for over the years.

And hopefully COVID will be behind us, and next year there'll be a luncheon and we can go back to honoring people in person.

But thank you to PBS for allowing us this opportunity to talk about agriculture and its importance in the Valley.

- Frances embodies the spirit of philanthropy.

Our next honoree comes from Kern County and has started a business with a mission.

Let's meet Debbie Wise.

(upbeat music) - My name is Debby Wise and I was born and raised in Kern County, grew up just outside of the Taft area and attended Cal State Bakersfield after high school to play softball.

That point my life kind of took a change as I had an injury and kind of pivoted.

I'd met my husband going into my freshman year.

He was back from college at Clemson and he was farming.

And I think that I definitely changed courses.

I went from gonna be a school teacher to over the next few years transitioning to being a farmer's wife and playing a supporting role.

We've been fortunate to raise our children, living out on the farm.

And in 2016, my role kind of changed from being a supporting role and a stay at home mom and a farmer's wife to kind of taking a lead in an operation.

And I was able to have the opportunity to step up.

And I am president of one of our cattle companies that is called Redhouse Beef.

I was always really involved in the production process and how that's always intrigued me connecting community to the farm was always something that I loved.

But my youngest daughter has down syndrome and we went through a variety of health journeys.

And in about 2013-14 we really discovered a lot of auto-immune issues and things.

And so I as a mom really became focused on nutrition and a lot of what that would look like in our home and what we were feeding them.

And for me one of the biggest things was I would travel to the Bay Area and to LA and I would take ice chests to go to grocery stores that had product that I knew we raised in the Valley or on the coast very near, but they weren't even available in our own community.

So for me to see us be able to vertically integrate and control that product and get to then put that product into our community and have true transparency of the life cycle is a really important, and really powerful thing for me.

Most of my time when I am not taking care of my own family or business I usually am serving on some type of board that is advocacy for either youth or within the special needs community or trying to bring an agricultural program to something.

We just offered our first internships within the beef organization.

And so those internships were for two FFA students for the summer.

So I'm really excited next week to have my first kid start working at Redhouse.

And feeding your community or like nourishing your community is one of the most rewarding things you can do.

We feed, I mean, we are the breadbasket.

Not only do we feed the world in many of the products that the world relies on only come from our state.

We definitely feed our nation.

And so I think if you kind of look at what the opportunities are and truly look at the impact on every single person's life that you're making, it's a pretty incredible opportunity.

I definitely wanna thank my husband and Maddie and all the different friends and family that when I received the phone call about this reward I was so humbled and just wanna thank the Common Threads team and Ag One and Ag Leadership.

One, for selecting me, like I said, so humbled and grateful for this opportunity.

Serving my community and serving the ag industry is where my heart is.

And I am just privileged for the opportunity to get to represent a group of some incredible women out there.

- These four recipients have a passion for agriculture and a desire to share that passion with others, whether it's through charity, business schools, or even church.

And their goal is to make an impact in their communities and hope that in doing so, they inspire others to do the same.

Thank you everyone for joining us tonight.

- And we would like to thank the following individuals who have contributed certificates of recognition and resolutions for the honorees.

Senator Dianne Feinstein, Congressman David Valadao, Congressman Devin Nunes, Assemblyman Joaquin Arambula, Assemblyman Frank Bigelow, Assemblyman Devon Mathis, and Assemblyman Jim Patterson.

- Can you believe our first virtual event is over?

Well, I look forward to next year.

Thank you to each of you, our sponsors, and elected officials who have supported us through the years.

Thank you everyone for joining us tonight.

See you next year.

- Thank you so much for joining us this evening to honor these four amazing women.

We hope to see you again next year, hopefully in person.

And remember, please consider becoming a sponsor for next year's event.

And don't forget to send in the names of those you have on your mind as a future honoree.

Thanks again, and enjoy your evening.

(upbeat music)