For the homeless, low-income and “food insecure,” access to fresh produce is often nonexistent. As the new coordinator of the YMCA’s Southeastern Massachusetts Food Security Network and an employee with the healthy communities initiative, Mass in Motion, Stephanie Reusch wants to change that.

“I have this grand idea to make a difference,” said Reusch.

A soon-to-be dietician and amateur pig farmer, Reusch splits her time between Rochester and New Bedford. The Old Rochester Regional graduate studied nutrition and dietetics as the University of Rhode Island where she realized she wanted something more than to become a traditional dietitian.

“I wanted to know more about food than the clinical side of things,” she said.

Reusch enrolled at the University of Gastronomic Sciences in Italy and dug into the grassroots “slow food” movement that emphasizes food that is good (nutritious), clean (free of chemicals) and fair (giving proper compensation to food producers.)

Learning about the politics, culture and environments of food in Switzerland, Greece and Italy was eye opening for Reusch.

“That gave me a completely different view on food and understanding it,” said Reusch.

The experience, including an internship at a communal ecovillage in Iceland, convinced Reusch to get her dietitian certification and find ways to use her experiences to help develop networks of healthy communities at home.

Through Mass in Motion, Reusch is working to establish farmers markets in New Bedford that are accessible to low income residents and that accept SNAP and WIC.

The Food Security Network, in many ways, is an extension of that – connecting residents, farms, food pantries, nonprofits and businesses to provide better access to healthy, nutritious food.

“It’s about building a community so that we can make the most efficient ways of getting people to the food who need it most,” Reusch said.

The network, funded by the Marion-based Island Foundation, began several years ago, but hasn’t quite gotten off the ground. As Reusch seeks to rectify that, she will work with the various community entities to build a solid membership for anyone interested can come to the table.

Ideally, the Food Security Network will become a hub to support a broad variety of community needs, beginning with the New Beford area and eventually expanding across Bristol, Plymouth and Norfolk counties.

For example, if someone donates 100 packages of sausage to an organization that serves dinner, that group could call the network and the food could be reallocated to Mercy Meals, an organization that serves breakfast to the needy.

Reusch also wants to add local farmers to the membership, to help out food pantries and encourage folks on the South Coast to purchase produce in the community.

“We have a lot of farmers around here but a lot of people aren’t really buying local food,” she said.

Workshops that get help people engage with healthy food are also on Reusch’s agenda, whether it be cooking demonstrations or classes on butchering.

Reusch herself, is getting her hands in the dirt with a small “hobby farm” she started with her boyfriend on her parent’s Rochester land. The two are learning to raise a rare heritage breed of pigs called American guinea hogs that will eventually be used for food.

It’s a learning process as are all of Reusch’s endeavors, but they all fit into her desire to see more good, clean fair food on the South Coast.

“People should be able to have access to that,” she said.

Anyone may join the Food Security Network. To learn more about it and the needs of the community, contact Reusch at semafoodsecurity@ymcasouthcoast.org and visit the website (still in progress) at smfsn.weebly.com. Learn more about food on the South Coast here.