Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has filled four senior staff positions at USDA, including naming a deputy administrator for the Farm Service Agency and the chief of staff for the Farm Production and Conservation mission area.
Scott Marlow, who started an agricultural consulting business, was named deputy administrator for farm programs in FSA. Tim Gannon, a veteran of USDA during the Obama administration, was tapped to be chief of staff for Farm Production and Conservation.
Andrea Delgado will serve as chief of staff for the Natural Resources and Environment mission area, which oversees the Forest Service. Sara Bleich was selected to be director of nutrition security and health equity for the Food and Nutrition Service.
“The collective expertise of Tim, Andrea, Scott and Sara will continue our efforts to effectively serve people in communities across the country – and around the world. They are valuable assets to the work being done at the Department,” said Vilsack.
Marlow was CEO of Long Rows Consulting, where he oversaw the analysis of risk management, credit, and disaster assistance programs. He also provided training for farm services organizations, providing education on how to work with farmers in financial crisis and the mental health impacts of farm transitions.
Marlow also has 20 years of experience at Rural Advancement Foundation International, most recently as senior policy specialist.
Gannon most recently worked on the Biden-Harris campaign in Iowa as the coalitions adviser. He was responsible for outreach and communications with farm, agricultural, rural and activists groups focusing on policy proposals and their impact to rural America.
Gannon previously worked at USDA during the Obama administration as the director of advance in the Office of the Secretary and was also the associate administrator in the Risk Management Agency.
Delgado most recently served as the government affairs director at the United Farm Workers Foundation, focusing on living and working conditions for agricultural workers across the United States.
Before that, Delgado worked at Earthjustice and held roles as the legislative director for the Healthy Communities Program and was also the senior legislative representative. She also was a policy fellow with the National Latino Coalition on Climate Change.
Since the beginning of the Biden-Harris administration, Bleich served as senior adviser for COVID-19 in the Office of the Secretary. Before that, she was a professor of public health policy at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and focused on food insecurity issues, as well as racial injustice within the social safety net.
During the Obama administration, Bleich was a White House fellow, and worked at USDA as a senior policy adviser for the Food, Nutrition and Consumer Services mission area.
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