The Colorado AgrAbility Project will host an AgrAbility winter workshop from noon to 5 p.m. Jan. 14 at Pueblo Community College Southwest Campus, 33057 U.S. Highway 160 west of Mancos.
The workshop will be hosted by Montezuma County Extension Agent Tom Hooten and will feature an introduction to AgrAbility, outlining the program’s functions and how it serves farmer and ranchers by making farm visits to assess work tasks and recommend ways to accomplish chores less painfully and more safely.
Staff members will also introduce ways to be part of the solution in suicide prevention as the rate of farmers’ suicides in Colorado continues to climb.
Professor Norm Dalsted will give an update of what farmers need to know on the Farm Bill.
The workshop is a partnership with Colorado State University Extension and aided by a grant from the USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture.
AgrAbility workshops helped Ryan Davis, whose spinal cord was injured in a car accident in 2014, learn about assistive technology. Assistive technology provides adaptations to the large farm equipment he uses.
Candy Leathers, AgrAbility program manager, put them in touch with another AgrAbility client in the area, who provided a demonstration of a flatbed lift that would lift him from the truck cab, or ground level and insert him into the cab of farm equipment.
Through the combined efforts of AgrAbility and the Division of Vocational Rehabilitation, and with coordination, collaboration, creative and open mindedness Davis is working safely on the farm once again.
To register, call Candy Leathers at (720) 435-5539 or cleathers@goodwilldenver.org