Youth growing food in the East End
A while back we reported on an exciting neighborhood meeting that happened in the East End concerning ways to develop a local food economy in this so called “food desert.” As it turns out, this meeting was extremely successful at galvanizing action. In the short interim, several initiatives have been underway, including the following:
To take the pulse of area residents, a group of middle school students, sponsored by a Partners for Youth grant and the direction of the East Seventh St. Center, under the name S.e.e.d.s., has administered a market survey by going door to door to collect information on interests in fresh food. Not only did they compose the survey themselves, but also these youth have also been growing and selling fresh food throughout the summer, with great success.
A new awareness campaign was launched to promote the hope and energy around local food. Yard signs reading “Food Grown Here” are being distributed to anyone growing food in the city. The signs were generously funded by the Bluegrass Community Foundation with the design done by Cricket Press. They’re asking for a $10 donation per sign, of which every cent will go to the East End Renaissance Fund that will help revitalize and beautify the historic East End of Lexington. Visit foodgrownhere.org for more information.
Much anticipated and now publicized here, here, and here, the all-new East End Community Farmers Market will be formed. This market will be opening this Saturday, August 7th at the Pavilion on E. Third St at the intersection of Midland and E. Third St. The market will run every Saturday from 8am – noon and will help bring fresh local produce to an area that’s gone without for too long.
With all this momentum around food in Lexington, it begs the question, how devoted will we as a citizenry be to a local food economy? Can we put our money AND our mouths to it?
In the interest of full disclosure, I work for Seedleaf which has been involved in all of these efforts.
{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
I am ecstatic! Such great news for our community!!! I am grabbing my sign this week!
Becca, Though this link is a few years old it still shows what can be done. When we have reached this point you will have done something really cool. Let’s make it happen.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/mar/26/cityfood
Some steps toward progress are just steps – and then there are giant leaps. This Market’s opening is a leap. Thank you to all who have added positive energy in the past year to make this long-term dream begin to come true. Now let’s all go buy useful foods and goods from the vendors.
That was a wonderful piece Streetsweeper, and I couldn’t agree more. Let’s make it happen. Lexington has so many advantages to developing such a urban food economy, plus the rich support of our surrounding region, our fertile soils, and our agricultural heritage. We have a responsibility to our citizenry to make it happen, but I, for one, will savor the experience.
Since we’re sharing articles here, I’m listing another I found over at Grist. It’s about city governments that are planting food plants instead of ornamentals. Tomatoes in front of the court house. Sounds good to me.
http://www.grist.org/article/food-smart-city-governments-grow-produce-for-the-people/
Actually, Lexington also has pockets of this, although not initiated by the City government (or at least not to my knowledge). In particular, the Martin Luther King Neighborhood Association was inspired by the folks in Boston at EarthWorks (http://www.earthworksboston.org/) and put together a public community orchard spread through 3 locations, one of which is a median strip at Fourth St. and Elm Tree. Similarly, my neighborhood association (Aylesford Place) followed suit last fall and put in fruit trees and shrubs all over the neighborhood. However, until LFUCG gets behind it, I think it’ll still be hard to get major changes with city lands, particularly due to zoning and ordinance concerns.l