Community garden plants awareness

SANDPOINT — To a gardener, an unplanted bed is like an unwrapped gift.

Give them a plot of good soil and they will tuck seeds into the ground, water and wait. In a small way, they perform a ritual re-enactment of the creation story, where green sprouts push their way into the light to reward belief in the promise of life.

For the second year, volunteers from the Sandpoint Transition Initiative are coordinating activities at the Sandpoint Community Garden. This year's garden, members of the STI Food Group explained, promises to be bigger and more bountiful than Year One, which delivered a harvest that overflowed from family dinner tables until it eventually filled the shelves and refrigerators of local assistance groups.

The plan got off the ground — or in the ground, to be more precise — when the city of Sandpoint donated about a third of an acre of unused lawn space adjacent to Dub's Field. The garden then took shape as rectangles of cardboard were laid out and then covered with mulch and soil.

By summer, the place had been transformed from field to farm plot.

The most productive sections were the 8-by-8-foot beds gardened by individuals, families and community organizations. Less successful was the experimental “communal plot” — a section of the garden that seemed to attract some folks who were more than willing to get in on the planting and harvesting part of the process, but less inclined to invest their time in all of the watering and weeding that needed to happen in between.

Lesson learned, STI volunteers noted, adding that they have converted the communal space into 24 new garden beds for this year's growing season.

“The first year had growing pains — just like plants grow,” said food group member Gaea Swinford. “This year is quicker.”

Bed spaces have nearly doubled, compared with 2009, and now total 60 separate planting areas at the Sandpoint Community Garden. Of those, about 15 were still available as of the middle of last week. Volunteers expect them to go fast, partly because the garden itself is a much more visible entity this year. Using lumber donated primarily by Idaho Forest Group, STI volunteers enclosed what had been freestanding mounds of soil in new bed frames for 2010. With the help of business supporters such as Out of the Woods and Misty Mountain Furniture, they also erected a community garden sign facing Hwy. 200.

“I'm sure we've gotten people off the streets to sign up because of the new sign,” said Pat Wentworth, who, along with Elissa Wadds, Michelle Goode and Mary Catherine Role, works as a volunteer coordinator for the garden. “What's happening is that it's becoming viral. Because the garden is now such a visual thing, we got a call from the Mennonite Church and they want to start a community garden.”

Other groups already involved in community gardens or in the early stages of starting one include Northside Elementary School, Sandpoint Middle School and Love, Inc. of Bonner County — the local affiliate of a national Christian organization chartered with helping people in need.

The growth in local gardening fits perfectly with STI's overarching goals of building sustainable communities, Wentworth pointed out.

“We're looking to have a self-sustaining, resilient community and food is a big part of that,” she said.

Mary Catherine Role said STI hopes to offer cooking and food preservation workshops, as well as mentoring programs for those interested in starting their own garden projects, including education seminars on mulching, composting and other gardening techniques.

“We get asked all the time, 'How do we do that?'” she said. “We don't know everything — we'll all learn together.”

Based on experience from the preceding season, Wentworth believes the volunteers now have plenty to offer — if only to point out the pitfalls along the way.

“I see our role as being consultants in what you don't do, because we had such a big learning curve,” she said.

On a voluntary basis, gardeners are asked to tithe 10 percent of their harvest for distribution to local organizations — an effort that resulted in more than 1,000 pounds of food going to the Bonner Community Food Center alone last year, with additional food donations going to other area groups.

This year's harvest should be considerably larger, thanks in large part to donations of landscape and building materials from a host of local businesses, including Sandpoint Building Supply, Idaho Stone, Ponderay Garden Center, Zero Point and Aspen Ridge Landscape.

A community garden shed, donated by George Weaver, could still use a few more tools, the volunteers said. At present, there is only one shovel and one wheelbarrow that must be shared by all of the gardeners.

As interest in community gardening spirals out to other groups, STI members expect these new projects to have an impact on how residents view the importance of where their food comes from. If nothing else, the combination of these gardens and continued growth in things like the Sandpoint Farmers Market and the Six Rivers Market food cooperative will help teach children that food does not originate in the supermarket.

“It's all part of creating awareness of the community you live in and building sustainability,” Swinford said. “It can happen — not just through STI — but through every person who has three feet of dirt and grows something to supplement what they'd normally buy in the grocery store.”

Not that the group wants to steer customers away from local grocers. To the contrary, it hopes to steer those stores closer to stocking local foods.

“It's coming,” Swinford said. “People want to be able to go to the grocery store and be able to buy food that was produced where they live.”

The STI volunteer suggested starting small — buy one or two items grown locally and ask the store manager to carry more of them. Along with fresher food that hasn't gobbled up fossil fuels and gone stale as it gets shipped around the world, STI members explained, the shift to local produce also provides an outlet for family farmers seeking to make a living in the immediate area.

“It's about building community,” Wentworth said. “And it's catching on.”

According to Swinford, STI is the “invisible catalyst” in activating positive things that already were happening in and around Sandpoint, with the community garden becoming perhaps the most visible example to date.

“People come together and work together at the community garden, but the heart and soul of it is much bigger than the project,” she said. “It ain't about the broccoli.”

Sandpoint Community Garden plots are available at $15 each for a four- by eight-foot bed, or $25 each for an eight- by eight-foot bed. For information or to make donations of tools or garden materials, call (208) 265-9828 or e-mail Wentworth at pwentworth1@yahoo.com

If weather cooperates, those interested may also want to stop by the community garden today to participate in the growing season kick-off party and see demonstrations on mulching and watering throughout most of the day.