The Explorers Urban Garden Project, Prince George, British Columbia

The Fraser Fort George Museum Society was established in 1958. Incorporated in 1981 as a BC Society, the Museum has been operating in its current location since the 1970s. The Society has named their garden project the Explorers Urban Garden Project. The project focuses on environmental gardening, recycling, composting, food security, urban greening and quality of life. It began as a healthy snack program in their preschool and afterschool care programs, but they found that children were unwilling to eat many fruits and vegetables being offered to them. Many children had no idea that food even GREW! This prompted the Society to explore food sources with the kids in their care, and the Explorers Urban Garden Project was born.

Cook Community Garden, Colingwood, Ontario

Multiple organizations have united to form the Collingwood Community Gardens Initiative and the Cook Community Garden — Free Spirit Gardens, Elephant Thoughts and The Environment Network. Their combined mission is to increase the capacity of their community to grow their own food and contribute to the creation of a sustainable food system. The Cook Community Garden will give hundreds of community members the opportunity to learn how to grow their own food in workshops, whether they rent a plot at the garden, have a balcony at their apartment or have their own yard. The garden will also provide access to fresh, nutritious food, social involvement, some physical activity and education to local youth and the greater community.

Common Ground Community Garden, Kinston, North Carolina

In 2010, local residents founded Common Ground of Eastern North Carolina (Common Ground ENC) to help address the challenges young people are facing in Kinston. By building a community garden in this food desert, Common Ground ENC intends to increase food production at the community level, close to the residents with little food security. They will offer training to gardeners in horticultural skills, sustainable methods of cultivation and healthy food preparation. Local community groups can adopt beds to grow food for the local food pantry and charities. This educational garden hub and natural play space will provide opportunities for elderly citizens to share their horticultural wisdom with young gardeners. It will also help youth in this under-resourced side of town experience nature right at their doorstep. Both of these of these benefits will help cultivate community in a town divided by age, race and class. The garden is being built along a heavily travelled urban corridor that suffers from municipal neglect and poverty-related blight. It will both beautify this important entrance to town while building community and inspiring civic pride in local residents.

Harmony Community Garden, North St. Paul, Minnesota

Independent School District 622’s Community Education Department was established in 1977 as an independent citizen Advisory Council representing various sectors and interests. Over the years, they have offered various programs to meet the needs of their community, including English Language Learners (ELL) programs, Early Childhood Family Education programs, after school and summer programs for pre-K–12 students and programs for senior citizens, persons with various disabilities and the general public. Inspiration for the Harmony Community Garden came about through interest expressed by the local immigrant population. They worked together to create a vision for this project that includes: growing healthy food for their families; learning about gardening, horticulture, food preparation and preservation; reaffirming connections to the land; and intergenerational and cross-cultural learning. At the core of their vision is a commitment to creating community through gardening, creating something of beauty together, learning from and about each other and sharing and supporting each other within the project as family.

Rincon Mountain Garden, Tucson, Arizona

With the help of some local extension agents and master gardeners, the Community Gardens of Tucson (CGT) was formed as an independent, not-for-profit, volunteer organization. Since that time, CGT expanded garden educational opportunities by developing and sustaining additional gardens throughout Tucson and assisting other organizations in developing their own community gardens. The new Rincon Mountain Garden will offer the adjacent northeast Tucson community the opportunity to experience urban vegetable gardening. It will also provide an outdoor setting for neighbors to get to know one another and exchange information about gardening and other issues pertaining to the health and well being of the community. There are also a number of local food bank that will receive donations of vegetables from gardeners growing excess crops.

Pine Tree Lane, Hermiston, Oregon

Umatilla-Morrow Head Start is a private non-profit that serves children and families in seven rural counties in northeastern Oregon. It’s an innovative network of individuals working in partnership with others to strengthen families and communities. Head Start is committed to providing a comprehensive educational program to families and children in the communities they serve. They believe the educational process begins at home, so they assist parents in working with their children to understand developmentally appropriate practices. After having recently participated in a public health initiative to assess and evaluate its strengths and resources, they developed a three-year plan for improving the health of local citizens. The goal is to produce bearing gardens at 80% of their sites by 2014. Head Start centers are strategically place in communities, many located in low-income neighborhoods. They are in a position to increase the amount and variety of fruits and vegetables consumed by children and the neighborhood in which they live by growing their own. In addition, they hope to give children the opportunity to plant, water, harvest, prepare fruits and vegetables and taste and enjoy new foods.

Scotlandville Gardens Park, Baton Rouge, Louisiana

The Scotlandville Community Development Corporation (SCDC) is a volunteer-based not-for-profit organization, dedicated to providing service and support to the community. SCDC’s mission is to be a catalyst for change by revitalizing the community through affordable housing, economic investments and social development. In collaboration with community partners, SCDC maximizes resources and neighborhood participation to produce an economically sound community and provide support and assistance in many areas. The community garden promotes the “community development” philosophy, which is at the core of all of SCDC’s efforts. The Scotlandville Community Garden will assist in addressing the Food Desert issue in the community, while providing enjoyable opportunities for gardeners to watch their vegetables and fruits grow. The community garden will have individual/family plots as well as community beds. In the community beds, food will be grown for the food bank and other local organizations. The goals of the garden are to increase community understanding and appreciation of the health benefits of organic gardening, to teach community residents how to grow an organic garden and ultimately increase and grow community self-respect and pride.

Light of Christ Community Garden, Federal Way, Washington

The Community Garden Project was initiated in February of 2011 by the Light of Christ Church Care Ministry Team. The primary goal of the project is to bring together diverse social, business, ethnic and political groups to design, build, manage and harvest a community garden to help feed the needful of their community. Community citizens of all faiths or no faith are welcomed and encouraged to participate in the preparation, building, harvest and distribution. The project will help break down barriers, increase communication, foster cooperation and focus participants on others and away from self. A portion of the harvest will be combined with other local community gardens to support food banks, Meals on Wheels and homeless support efforts. They hope that ultimately the garden proves to its gardeners that as much as we are different, we are alike.

Tibbs Garden, Indianapolis, Indiana

Noble was founded by a group of parents with children who had developmental disabilities and felt their children deserved an education. Since then, Noble has evolved to meet the changing needs of individuals with disabilities — primarily developmental disabilities — and their families. They envision a day in which every person with a disability is recognized and appreciated for who they are and for their contributions to the community. Because there was a need for more food in local neighborhood food pantries, they partnered with Old Bethel United Methodist Church to start the Shared Garden project. Through this project, they will grow fresh produce, donating approximately 90% of it to Old Bethel Community Outreach food pantry. The remaining produce will stay at Noble to be used in cooking classes. Old Bethel church members will work alongside the individuals they serve to plant, cultivate, weed and harvest the garden. In return, individuals served by Noble will volunteer at the food pantry stocking shelves and assisting customers. This project is a true partnership. The volunteers who work side-by-side with the individuals Noble serves will see that people with disabilities have gifts and talents to share just as they do.

Carbondale Community College, Carbondale, Colorado

The Carbondale Community Garden Initiative is comprised of local citizens that have been working with the town’s Parks and Recreation Department to create the new community vegetable garden. Over the past two years, exploration into garden location was completed and a site was finally selected. The City of Carbondale donated a portion of its newest city park to be home of the Carbondale Community Garden. They look to the garden to provide a place for community members to grow their own food. In addition, they hope the garden creates opportunities for strong connections between community members from different parts of the city. Carbondale has a large immigrant population, many of whom come from farming and ranching backgrounds, providing educational opportunities from different cultural gardening practices and allowing for community members to relate in ways that will create genuine and long-lasting ties.

Garden Makeover Recipient

East Side Community Garden, San Antonio, Texas

Green Space Alliance (GSA) has helped foster 33 community gardens in economically constrained neighborhoods throughout San Antonio since 2006. Their involvement in local community gardens includes organizing and guiding neighborhood groups, designing and constructing gardens, promoting local gardening practices and managing funding and budgets. The East Side Community Garden was an idea developed by a group of local women who brought the idea to GSA for their help and expertise. The goal of the garden is to enhance the surrounding urban space, foster greater community engagement, provide educational opportunities and offer a safe, healthy place where residents can go to socialize and exercise.