Week 8 Reflection

The other day I went to Tom Brown Park with my sister and her dog and I thought about how Tallahassee does a great job of providing parks and natural spaces for its citizens. There are numerous trails and parks that can be enjoyed, and Tallahassee’s has an award winning Parks, Recreation and Neighborhood Affairs department that has won acclaim for Cascades Park from the National Recreation and Parks Association (NRPA). So it’s safe to say that against other cities Tallahassee comparably does a good job of preserving the natural environment. A love for the natural environment drove this allocation for park space, just as the need for and the love of agriculture can better allocate space for sustainable agriculture and urban gardening. If in an emergency, parks in Tallahassee can be used for agricultural space. But Tallahassee already has a number of urban gardens, such as the community garden in the Seminole Manor neighborhood. I visited a group meeting for the garden one Saturday and discussed how the garden worked to provide better food access to its residents. I thought it was a great means of bringing the community together as well as being an educational opportunities for the children of the community to understand where their food comes from. These kinds of opportunities, coupled with a respect for nature and healthy eating options, can help promote the idea of sustainable agriculture and environmentalism among residents.

Week 8 Reflection

Community gardens play a very important role in the neighborhoods in which they are located. They can educate people about the origins of food. These gardens also bring people within the community together which strengthens the bonds within the community. These gardens also provide healthy affordable food for those who participate or for those in need within the community.

When I was a kid, my mom used to take me and my two sisters to a community garden in Orlando. To this day, I still vividly remember learning about gardening and the importance of clean, healthy food within a community. We would always take home some sort of vegetable or fruit that my mom would serve for dinner later that night. I always thought it was cool that we would eat something that we had created with our own two hands and pulled out of the ground earlier that day. The food that we ate from the community garden was much more enjoyable than any produce we would've bought at Publix.

I think everyone should go to a community garden at least once in their life because it is a very enlightening experience. You will meet other people within your community that care about food safety and accessibility. It is a great alternative to buying produce at the supermarket. You will know exactly where your produce comes from and how it was grown.

Gardens as Learning Spaces

This week's readings focused on planning for food production, but many of the readings touched on the fact that urban farms and community gardens are often spaces that focus on more than just food production. The Cobb article was about how land trusts, formally used to simply preserve pristine land, are now being used to preserve working land, such as urban farms. The Hodgson article expands on the topic of urban farming and mentions that in addition to food production, urban farms can be environmentally beneficial, can promote local economic development, and be used as learning tools: in schools and in the larger community. I personally have experience with this last point. Every semester students at my undergrad had the opportunity to participate in a student-initiated and -run class that worked in the campus's organic garden. My second semester I participated in this class. The class structure of working in the garden necessitated that, well, we learn something. Therefore, a large part of the class was reading about organic food, sustainable food production, and environmental stewardship. However, the class also focused on the role that public gardens have in their communities, the importance of eating well and sharing food, and of course, on taking care of the garden. This was my first experience gardening - literally, at all - and I found a lot of value in learning how to weed, plant seeds, properly water (we used a combination of drip irrigation and more traditional watering), turn compost, and harvest. My proudest semester accomplishment was coaxing some beans to grow up a wire structure I had built with another student. The class also drew campus attention to some of the college's "edible landscaping" - throughout campus we had many mulberry trees and a lot of trees that grew clementine-like fruits (I still don't know exactly what kind of fruit it was but it was delicious). One of the most important aspects of the class was organizing a "garden party" at the end of the semester as a campus-wide event. Nearly all of the food served at the party had been grown in the garden and it was an opportunity for students in the class to raise awareness about the garden and to share the harvest with others. Even though I did not participate in the class every semester, I nearly always came back for the garden party.

More so than an opportunity to learn about organic gardening and foster a community through food and environmental stewardship, throughout my time at my undergrad I came to see the campus's organic garden as an incubator for other campus-wide sustainability initiatives. The organic garden was started by students and was the first example of a campus community striving to be more sustainable. As awareness about the organic garden spread and its importance in campus culture grew, so did ideas for other sustainable campus initiatives. Largely because of the needs of the garden, a campus-wide composting initiative became institutionalized. Because students were so aware of the food resources available, students created an "edible landscaping" map of campus. The community garden was also a meeting space for food activists, who participated in food justice protests and organized community events around food. The student-run cafe on campus began accepting donations of food from the garden, and even started their own garden. So when I think of "community garden" or "urban farm," I don't only consider their food production value. I know so much more can be borne of a group of people coming together and growing and sharing food with each other and the community.

Week 8: Analysis on Urban Agriculture Readings

Urban agriculture can be defined as the intersection between local urban planning and agriculture. Traditionally, land use planning has de-emphasized the concept urban planning combining with agriculture as an effort to reduce public health impacts.  Large scale farming replaced outdated techniques which ultimately resulted in their removal in the urban setting and into the rural areas.
In modern times, urban agriculture is governed heavily at the local level in the form of community gardens, community outreach programs, training for food production, and etc. In summary, urban agriculture works to address the challenges that metropolitan areas face in the production, distribution, and marketing of food and other organic products. Urban agriculture can be supported in the form of noncommercial, commercial or hybrid methods. Interestingly, urban agriculture finds itself battling the stigma of being a rural activity by not only civilians, but government agencies. As a result, funding tends to be inadequate. The current attitudes posed against urban agriculture will fall in the responsibility of planners and politicians alike to bring awareness and collaboration.


A community in Boston decided that they wanted to design, build, and maintain their own garden by committing themselves to collaborative decision making for the project. Community gardens are a valuable asset in communities with individuals that are low-income or immigrants. The piece weighed the advantages and disadvantages of community gardens in the context of scale, time consumption, effort, and product. The progression of a community garden is heavily based on how far the community wants to take it. According to the piece, the community garden grew into a farmer's market because it increased the community's awareness and interest in food in the perspective of economic development, social justice, nutrition, and public health. In the case of the South End/Lower Roxbury Open Space Land Trust, this heavily diverse community garden founded in the early 90s was initiated by a fundraising event to protect scattered plots in the area. The relationship between the non-profit organization and the local government is remarkable given the fact that most of the beneficiaries, close to 75%, were people of color. How may low-income dense populated individuals that live near MSA's such as - Greater Los Angeles Area, New York City, Miami-Ft. Lauderdale, etc utilize community gardens?

African American owned farmland have went from an estimated 15-20 million acres 50 years following the Civil War to less than 2 million acres in modern times. This dramatic decrease in land ownership amongst black farmers stem from policies in the 20th century. This trend is not limited to politics, in general, popularity of agriculture in the subsequent generations is dwindling. The article examines farmland preservation in conjunction to urban planning using innovative methods and strategies that include commerce and industry. The piece used Warwick Township as a case study reflecting a countywide farmland preservation program in the early 90s.  With $100,000 the township invested in a partnership to buy 75 TDRs from farmlands and create a bank, which resulted in negotiation with a township rather than the farmers individually. As of 2002, the township and its partners have bought 447 TDRs and preserved 1,1184 acres to date. Since 2001, the township has put over 688,000 into farmland preservation as a result of 278 sold TDRs, each averaging a modest 1,500 per acre. The article explained the ease of implementing such a plan to be easier in northern U.S due to the fact that in general, there is little public owned land. In regards to developing areas, I wonder how can this type of micro-financing strategy be implemented in those areas that face challenges with property rights?

Urban Agriculture development will need to be sustainable in order to support a growing United States population in terms of: meet human demands, enhance environmental resources and quality, economic viability, and the quality of life for society. The basis for any issue to gain public attention is by scientific research and recommendations. Food systems, although a fundamental components of our ecosystem, lacks scientific research to implement effective policies to directly guide food systems. Examining agroecosystems could provide socioeconomic and public health impacts outcomes. The lack of social entrepreneurial concerns in food systems seems to really be the reason that solutions to food systems come from the local-community level rather than the state or federal level. As majority of our population live in MSA's, I do wonder how sustainable agriculture can be achieved at a large-scale? I would expect that economics of scale may play a significant role in reducing food prices in these areas.

Week 8: Conserving Farmland through Planning

While urban agriculture and community gardens are sexy and cool to discuss (I totally need to have a rooftop garden at some point in my life), I'd like to bring up some points I thought were interesting from the Tom Daniels and NRC Sustainable Agriculture readings.

The Daniels reading was intriguing because it presented something positive that has been done to conserve lands. "The average age of these landowners is 57, meaning that tens of millions of acres could change hands within the next 20 years." This is somewhat scary, as the best option for the heirs of these farmers that are land rich but cash poor is to sell the farm when they acquire it. Greedy development could easily come in and take over, further adding to our sprawl.

Luckily, local governments are taking the initiative to conserve these lands. Methods include forming land trusts and transfer of development rights program. The Partnership of Rangeland Trust (PORT) that started in Colorado has been able to conserve ranchlands through leveraging funding. Ranchers can donate or sell easements to the fund, and in return, the value of the land is reduced so that heirs can avoid or have lower federal taxes on the land.

The Warwick Township's transfer of development rights program (TDR) shifts development from farmland onto designated growth areas. The township created a bank of TDRs and eventually established a "revolving funding program" as they would receive the development rights, turn the farms into TDRs, and then sell them to developers. This essentially diverts development to where Warwick wants it while preserving farmland.

The NRC Sustainable Agriculture reading discusses first, the definition of sustainable agriculture, and then what actions need to be taken to create it. Much research needs to be done on the synergies between human needs, the environment, economics, and the quality of life of farmers. The idea is that, through research, evaluation, and feedback, we will make small advancements towards sustainable agriculture while pursuing larger goals. Also, in my opinion, the connection made by the committee between America's and Africa's agriculture is not as strong as they say it is. I won't get into it, but I feel as though more local knowledge should be a major pursuit before attempting to implement any of these "expand market" points.

So here is my question: Is there a farmland conservation organization near Tallahassee? If not, how might one work?  Could the proximity to the state government be an advantage in starting one?

Week 8: Readings

This week’s readings demonstrated how community gardens and land trusts play a role in urban agriculture. Hodgson et al (2011) states that “community gardens were responses to deindustrialization, depopulation, increases in acreage of vacant land, and the failures of urban renewal but also to immigration”. She explains that urban agriculture increases access to fruits and vegetables, especially in low-income areas that have limited access to affordable, healthy foods and it provides opportunities for public health programming to improve nutrition, knowledge, attitudes and dietary intake. According to Cobb (2011), a community garden is a catalyst. “It increases the community’s awareness and interest in a host of shared concerns seen through the lens of food: economic development, social justice, nutrition, and public health”. Even though there is health, social, economic and environmental benefits, there are also risks to urban agriculture. Hodgson et al mentions a study that found that community gardens can lead to “increases in tax revenues of about half a million dollars per garden over a 20-year period”. She also mentions another study that assessed the neighborhood effects of 54 community gardens in St. Louis, Missouri, and found that the median rent and median housing costs (mortgage payments, maintenance costs, and taxes) for owner-occupied housing, as well as home ownership rates, increased in the immediate vicinity of gardens relative to the surrounding census tracts, following a garden opening.  Thus a risk for low income neighborhoods that decide to open a community garden is gentrification. Based on recent research there is a possibility that opening a community garden as a way to provide food security and revitalize a disadvantaged community, can ultimately lead to an increase in their rental property’s value, therefore escalating their rent. This is a huge concern! The people we are trying to help are in the end being harmed. A possible solution is having a rent control policy in place for all rental properties, but I worry how long this will last under the pressures of development and urban renewal. Do you have any other suggestions as to how we can prevent gentrification prior to implementing a community garden in a disadvantaged neighborhood?  

Leadership in Community Gardens

In Cobb’s article on community gardens, four essential elements that contribute to the preservation of community gardens were identified as “a mechanism for long term protection, long term sustainability of the owning organization, maintenance of the land so it can be seen as a neighborhood asset, and strong community support.” I think all of these characteristics lie in a strong leader, which in turn raises a question: what even is a strong leader?

I’m sure we all have ideas about who this person is, but in the end the term is pretty subjective. One person might value a leader’s ambition to sell the produce from the garden, while another may value their patience when working with senior citizens or children.

A strong leader would be able to acquire whatever mechanism allows for a long term ownership of community garden lands (Whether by land tenure or some other means). Additionally, he or she would be able to run the community organization in a sustainable way as well as have the knowledge and the capabilities required to keep up with the land’s appearance and productivity. They would also be able motivate and incorporate the community into the operation.

Although I’ve had many opportunities to meet strong leaders within our Tallahassee community, from non-profit owners to business entrepreneurs, one person specifically sticks out in my mind: the woman who runs the farm I work at. Not only is she does she have an infinite wealth of knowledge about permaculture, agriculture, and all things farming, she is encouraging, patient, and ambitious. She represents someone I think who would excel at running a community garden in a low-income neighborhood.

My questions to the class are: what does leadership in the community garden context looks like to you? Do you agree this is the most important factor in the garden or is there one you place more value on?