[Community_garden] Community gardens sprout in New Haven, Connecticut

[Don Boekelheide]

Yale Daily News
New Haven, Connecticut. USA

Wednesday, Jan. 17, 2007
www.yaledailynews.com/articles/view/19412

Community gardens sprout in city

Maggie Reid 
Staff Reporter

Asphalt streets and concrete sidewalks might not offer
the best atmosphere to grow fruits and vegetables, but
New Haven community gardening and green space programs
offer city residents a chance to cultivate their own
gardens in the midst of an otherwise urban jungle.

Officials said these programs, including the Community
Garden Program, the Greenspace Program and the
Community Garden at Edgerton Park, have made New Haven
a high-profile proponent for community gardening in
urban environments. Community Garden Director Cordalie
Benoit, who is currently compiling a list of similar
urban programs in Connecticut, said her early research
indicates that New Haven is one of the top-ranked
cities in the state.

Benoit said the Community Garden Program was
originally conceived decades ago by a New Haven
citizen in order to improve the aesthetics of a city
littered with vacant spaces. The program has
continued, despite the lessening availability of
vacant space due to urban renovation and construction,
because of the way these gardens strengthen the
communities around them, she said.

“Although there’s no longer an acute need for the
program, it’s useful in community building,
beautification, and creating leadership among the
gardeners,” she said.

The Community Garden Program provides individuals with
areas to grow their own fruits and vegetables within
the city. The organization has about 50 gardens
throughout New Haven on various types of land, from
vacant city lots to public housing sites. The gardens
are split up into raised land beds that are given to
interested citizens free of charge.

Benoit said the organization distributes plots to
residents with a variety of backgrounds, including
undergraduate and graduate student volunteers.

“Each garden is a grass-roots activity,” she said.
“The wonderful thing is that people from all
socioeconomic backgrounds like to garden, and this
gives everyone the same opportunity.”

The Greenspace Program offers another way for urban
residents to access greenery. Run by the nonprofit
Urban Resources Initiative for the past 12 years, the
Greenspace Program focuses on urban forestry, giving
communities the opportunity to grow sustainable plants
in the public domain. Although the URI helps the
communities by providing the necessary materials and
offering design guidance and expertise, Greenspace
Director Chris Ozyck said the residents do all the
work themselves.

Ozyck said the program not only enhances community
bonding through the physical labor of gardening, but
also helps revitalize run-down urban areas.

“Turning a vacant lot where people used to dump
garbage into a resource where kids can play sends a
message that people who live in that community care,”
he said.

Although the benefits of such programs are garnering
attention in New Haven, the fundamentals of city
planting may still pose problems because of health
risks in urban soil. Cultivating fruits and vegetables
in city environments might lead to contamination of
the products, officials from Greenspace and New Haven
Land Trust said.

“We’re concerned about what’s in all urban soils, so
we’ve been trying to get a handle and figure out what
the lead issues are and other heavy metals that might
be present,” Ozyck said.

Both Ozyck and Benoit said their organizations have
taken measures to ensure the safety of food grown in
the city, mostly by providing raised land beds and
safe soil for the gardens.

Although personal food production is the primary goal
of these programs, Benoit said, there have been
efforts to expand the projects so as to supply local
farmer’s markets. The New Haven Land Trust, which
fosters the Community Garden Program, and CitySeed, an
organization that coordinates local farmer’s markets,
have been working together to provide the locally
grown food to CitySeed’s network.

But CitySeed Director Jennifer McTiernan H. ’99 said
problems with the relatively small sizes of the urban
gardens and the limited amount of food the gardeners
supply might hinder collaborative efforts.

“The gardeners [only] grow enough food for themselves
and their neighbors,” McTiernan H. said. “[But]
bringing in community farms could stock our entire
farmer’s market.”

Benoit said she hopes to one day create a large-scale
farm in an urban environment, as she believes local
food is healthier.

Charles Alvarez ’09, who had a fellowship with
CitySeed last summer, said it is important to make
local food more available because of the health
benefits it provides as well as the economic boost it
gives to area farmers.

“[The Community Garden Program allows] for a special
focus on underprivileged communities and places that
don’t have much access to healthy foods,” Alvarez said.