April 29, 2005

Sowing Seeds of Sustainability

By Alison Fromme
Special to the Neighborhood Newswire

At the corner of 7th Avenue and Lawton, Stacey Parker begins her Garden for the Environment tour with a question, “Do you notice anything different about these plants?” The garden is an oasis of green within densely populated city blocks. Even the air feels different; it’s cool, damp, and refreshing, not dry, gritty, and harsh.

As the garden’s Horticultural Education Coordinator, Parker is a skilled educator. She points to drought-tolerant plants, some with small fuzzy leaves, others with whitish waxy surfaces—all adaptations that help them conserve water. These plants thrive in dry summers, she explains, when water is most scarce.

The Garden for the Environment demonstrates different ways to maximize city green space and minimize the resources needed to do so. The organization also runs school and community educational programs on composting and resource-efficient landscaping. It’s not a traditional community garden where participants care for their own patch of earth. Instead, the garden is an educational resource for schools and the public, including the city’s 700 community gardeners.

The garden is operated by the former education department of the San Francisco League of Urban Gardeners (SLUG), which promoted gardening education programs on water conservation and composting, welfare-to-work programs, and encouraged school participation in gardening for more than 20 years.

But after a series of problems in recent years, including the arrest of a former Executive Director on immigration charges, allegations of voting coercion of employees, and debt incurred from back payroll taxes, SLUG is no longer in operation. Members of the education department branched out on their own to continue serving San Francisco’s gardening community.

The Garden for the Environment was able to continue their programs thanks to funding from the San Francisco Department of the Environment and support from the Haight Ashbury Neighborhood Council (HANC). Jim Rhoads, a 15-year HANC board member, spearheaded the organization’s involvement with the garden. “We thought [the garden and its programs] were really valuable to the city,” he says. When the educators approached HANC for help, the organization offered office space, tax-exempt status, and publicity through its newsletter. “We’ve gotten lots of positive feedback about the garden,” he says.

With HANC’s assistance, the Garden for the Environment offers popular gardening programs. Educators reach-out to elementary and middle schools by visiting classrooms throughout San Francisco. Classes journey to the garden for hands-on experiences, investigating compost piles, planting vegetables, and playing garden games. Students leave with their own “worm bin” to munch on lunchtime leftovers and extend the learning long after the garden visit ends.

Community members can also join in the learning, with several weekend and evening courses offered. Free resource-efficient landscape workshops provide tips on the benefits of using native plants, conserving water, and managing pests without using chemicals, among other topics. Free composting classes, which have been taught in English, Spanish, Cantonese, Tagalog, and Russian, teach participants how to reuse organic waste, even if they don’t have a backyard big enough for a worm bin. For students and community members looking for extended hands-on practice and lunchtime lectures, summer internships are available.

One of the organization’s most successful programs is the Gardening and Composting Educator Training Program (GCTEP). Over three and a half months students learn everything from permaculture to propagation, help maintain the garden, take field trips to San Francisco attractions, and complete a community service gardening project. Students also receive gardening books and worm bins to help them get started composting at home.

A casual observer might enjoy the garden as a beautiful quiet retreat, but an afternoon with Parker makes everything radiate with meaning. Flowers overflowing from an old bathtub demonstrate creative reuse of material that would otherwise end up in a landfill. Extra roof tiles have become beautiful garden borders. Sweet-scented (and drought-resistant) chamomile provides an alternative to the water-guzzling grasses in traditional lawns. Roses bloom free of chemicals. Flowers interspersed with vegetables help attract beneficial insects. Edible mushrooms sprout from the shade of a tree. Bee hives blend into the landscape, where their inhabitants create more than 10 gallons of honey every year.

From the garden’s winding path, Parker explains the purpose of each garden element. Solar panels power an irrigation system. Reclaimed concrete serves as a funky decorative addition. Food waste is composted and used to fertilize new crops. The fresh produce grown is donated to food banks. Raised garden beds are a convenient height for wheelchair users. Workshop participants return to volunteer their time and pass on their knowledge to newcomers. And with each course taught, Parker and the Garden for the Environment sow seeds of sustainability in the city.

For additional information about Garden for the Environment or general gardening questions, call the Rotline at 415.731.5627 or visit http://www.gardenfortheenvironment.org/index.html

For information about the Haight-Ashbury Neighborhood Council, please see http://www.hanc-sf.org/