Root Cause Farm will be hosting once-a-month Sanctuary Space work days throughout winter.  People can use this sign-up sheet to volunteer! Sanctuary Space Work Days: March 14th 2021 3 - 5 pm

Dr. George Washington Carver Community Workday
WHEN: Friday, February 26th from 2:30-5:30pm
WHERE: The park is located at 30 George Washington Carver Ave, next to Stephens-Lee
We will be focusing on mulching pathways, light tree pruning, and clearing invasive plants. There will be a hands on demo of each pruning technique as well as a tour of the park. This will be a recurring event every fourth Friday of the month.

Please wear a mask to this event and maintain social distance practices. Stephens-Lee is not open to the public so we won’t be able to use the bathrooms there. You might see children in and out of the facility, but they are only open for the learning pods program for right now due to Covid-19. We will have some extra tools for folks to use as well as hand sanitizer, but any gloves, loppers, pruners or weeding tools you can bring are much appreciated.

These community workdays  are being presented in partnership with the City of Asheville.

For the most up-to-date information, please visit the Dr. George Washington Carver Edible Park Facebook page Come give your time and support to Asheville's first edible forest ecosystem! We look forward to seeing you!"

Vance Elementary Peace Garden (Now Lucy S. Herring Elementary Peace Garden)
FEAST @ Home Cooking Videos:
Jordan Diamond, the FEAST Garden Coordinator at Lucy S. Herring Elementary, has launched FEAST @ Home: a series of cooking videos that teach kids how to make yummy, easy snacks using a new veggie every week. Each week for the next 6 weeks, Jordan will upload a new video to the FEAST Peace Garden YouTube Channel. Videos and a recipe will be shared with teachers every week so they can incorporate them into their weekly lessons and share with families. Students are encouraged to follow along and make the recipes at home (with adult supervision!). If you have a child that doesn't attend Lucy S. Herring Elementary but you would like to use these videos for your Home School routine, contact Jordan.Diamond@acsgmail.net to be added to the email list.
Herring Peace Garden Workdays:
Fridays from 1:00- 2:30 pm
Join us for socially distant garden workdays! BYO mask and gardening/work gloves and RSVP to cathy@bountifulcities.org or jordan.diamond@acsgmail.net
Produce Sharing:
Know someone who needs access to fresh produce? Visit the Lucy S. Herring Elementary Peace Garden or Hall Fletcher FEAST Garden on Tuesday afternoons and check out the produce sharing tables! Thanks to a generous, weekly donation from Mother Earth Food, we are able to share produce with the community through our school gardens. Join each garden's Facebook page to see updates each week.

As we welcome 2021 we see even more evidence of the need for systems change!  Last year brought us many reveals of the reckoning needed for moving toward reparations centering racial equity. Bountiful Cities work will continue to nourish our relations alongside communities creating access and pathways to resources for thriving local food abundance centered in racial equity. ​

Bountiful Cities Nursery is looking ahead and getting ready as the growing season approaches.  While we'll be growing a wide variety of edible, medicinal, pollinator, and craft plants, we're also taking requests and pre-orders for anything you might be interested in.  If you know exactly what you'd like to be growing in the coming season we're happy to start all of it in our greenhouse to help you get a head start on the Spring.  Reach out to Alex at alex@bountifulcities.org with any pre-orders or questions. ​

Ms. Jordan is continuing to create virtual content, and has begun a series of cooking classes for elementary kids! Check out her YouTube channel HERE for some kid-friendly gardening a cooking education. ​

Vance Elementary
Workdays are now from 1- 2:30 pm on Fridays- weather permitting. Please get in touch with jordan.diamond@acsgmail.net for more information. 
Winter projects include:
January- February: Installing a paving stone floor in the greenhouse 
February- March: Building outdoor seedling tables and starting seeds for spring plant sale/ garden

Fairview Road Resilience Garden
The Resilience Garden is hosting a volunteer day on Sunday the 17th from noon to 3. Please email Michael Stratton to rsvp, as they are capping capacity at 10 people fairviewroadresiliencegarden@gmail.com  ​

Michael Stratton and his community started the Fairview Road Resilience Garden this spring in response to Covid-19 with the goal of growing as much food as possible for donation. At the end of this growing season they had donated over 400 pounds of veggies to Bounty and Soul to distribute. Sweet potatoes, peppers, melons, cabbage, broccoli and beans were some of the many fresh vegetables produced and shared from their gardens. That amount of production could only happen in a brand new garden with lots of collaboration, "We built a steering committee who contributed money and labor to keep the garden going" Stratton says. Regular meetings and workdays (with masks!) in the garden helped the group stay in communication. It is not an easy task to keep a group of people focused on garden maintenance in the midst of a pandemic, Stratton and his group hope to double or triple their yield next year and their efforts will bring increased resilience to their Oakley community in more ways than one. Follow them on Facebook to find out more about their Fairview Road Resilience Garden. ​

Social Distance Garden Workdays at Vance Elementary:
Tuesdays 1pm- 4pm and Fridays 10am- 11:30 am
** Will continue until at least Thanksgiving and likely into December depending on tasks and weather. BYO face covering, garden gloves, and weeding tools and RSVP to Jordan.Diamond@acsgmail.net or Cathy@bountifulcities.org

- Donate your bagged leaves and veggie scraps to the Vance Peace Garden compost project! 
- Seeking volunteers skilled in laying paving stones to help re-do the Greenhouse floor this winter! 

Contact Jordan.Diamond@acsgmail.net for more info. Also check out this blog post  Jordan recently wrote for Asheville Greenworks/ Bee CityUSA about her monarch project at Vance. ​

​I just want to start by acknowledging that I know I haven't been as active or responsive to all of my emails and other forms of communications as I usually am. I've been trying to still get things done and respond to folks as efficiently as possible, but I am aware I'm not as fully present as I usually am. The injustices faced by People of Color on a daily basis has been taking a toll on my mind, body and soul (on top of still trying to navigate the current pandemic situation). The recent murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor at the hand of United States police officers, and the murder of Ahmaud Arbery at the hands of United States citizens has been weighing heavy on my mind, as well as the other lives that have been lost due to similar situations in recent years. As a "black" man in America raising a "black" son I find it frightening and at times hopeless to attempt to live a normal life in this country, this country where I was born, and my parents were born, and their parents and generations before them leading back to the times of slavery.
The systematic racism that this country is running on is more apparent than ever, and it breaks my heart to realize there are some that still don't see it or care to acknowledge it. I have attended local protests and seen first hand the way the local authorities have responded to the citizens who they have sworn to protect, I have also seen the way agitators in the crowds have played a part in attempting to tarnish these protests. While at times things seem like they may never get better, I do have a great appreciation for the people who have reached out to me personally to check in, and to those who I have seen speaking out and showing up to battle these injustices in various ways. When I look and see faces of all colors standing together to show the world these injustices won't stand, it inspires me to hold on to hope and keep my faith that maybe things aren't as dark as they may seem. So, I want to say thank you to everybody that is invested in this fight, and I hope that you are down for the long ride, because it's been a long one and there's a lot of work to still be done.
On behalf of myself and the Community Garden Network that I coordinate I wanted to make sure to let it be known where I stand, and let it be known that I'll do everything in my power to fight against these injustices that I myself face as well as many others.
​

~Isa Whitaker, Community Garden Network Coordinator

Dear Bountiful Cities Supporter,
 
Whether it is managing grief, holding on to moments of joy, or some other response, each one of us has our own experience and ways of dealing – perhaps changing daily – with the COVID-19 outbreak.  In recent weeks, I have been struck by both the significant human toll and the outpouring of support for one another in our communities.  As I reflect on so many responses to the pandemic, I am reassured by the work that Bountiful Cities is doing, and has been doing since its inception.
 
Today, as always, Bountiful Cities remains committed to partnering with community groups, focusing on dialogue, trust and community needs, to create urban agricultural spaces.  We know now, more than ever, how important it is to share agricultural skills and resources to promote social justice and economic viability.*
 
As Bountiful Cities gets seeds in the ground and harvests cool-weather veggies, we have our eyes set on the coming months, recognizing that long-term food security efforts must be part of a coordinated response.  We center racial and economic equity by working with existing partners and communities that invite our collaboration, supporting the community garden network, maintaining local school gardens, and ensuring that gardening tools and supplies are available to community and individual gardeners.  At the same time, we continue to co-build capacity of communities for growing food, such as identifying land and providing technical assistance through our advocacy efforts and engaging in residential services through Grass to Greens.
 
The victory gardens of the past must be reshaped for today’s world, so that we are growing with and for each other, not only now but into the future.  We know that people of color and people with lower wealth have once again been the most devastated because of the failings of our political, social, and economic systems.  Only when communities act with their own self-determination are our systems and outcomes different, and better for all of us. 
 
As you read Bountiful Cities’ newsletter, I hope you will note the ways that the staff and organization continue to join with each other and our partners to sustain the fundamental shifts necessary to move forward and be healthy.  If you can support these efforts now, please donate.
 
Thank you for your ongoing support of Bountiful Cities.  We hope you are well and safe, send you the very best, and hope to see you soon.
 
Keep well,
Ameena Batada
Chair, Bountiful Cities Board

Our Food Systems are Changing! 
Community and Home Gardens Provided over 40% of produce in the US in the 1940's Victory Garden Era. ​

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Home Grown Gardens Can Feed Us 
Are you growing a garden for the first time? Or the first time in years? Mountain Xpress reports a huge surge in garden supply sales in THIS ARTICLE.

That's WONDERFUL! Did you know that in the 1940's home gardeners and community gardens produced over 40% of the produce consumed in the US? We can do that again, and we NEED to do it again. Find out more about Bountiful Cities Community Garden Network in this article from Mountain Xpress.
 
Our Food System is Changing - let's make it BETTER
LISTEN to this podcast from Reveal on Essential Farm Workers and READ this article from Politico about how Coronavirus is increasing Food Waste for a taste of how the Food System is already changing. We can make it better, more just, and equitable right now.

Bountiful Cities has been supporting low-wealth communities working to achieve LONG TERM FOOD SECURITY through urban agriculture for the last 20 years. We need your help TODAY to sustain EVERYONE in our community in this time of change! 

​Please donate today to help us GROW Food Security