Last night Student Council passed a resolution supporting the creation of the Community Garden Project, a project proposed by the Environmental Sustainability Committee that aims to create a sustainable on-Grounds garden during the spring semester.
“We want to educate people on growing sustainable food and teaching them where their food comes from,” Environmental Sustainability Committee member Connie Migliazzo said. “We want this to be something that is used to bond the Charlottesville community and the University community.”
The garden would be used to grow produce that could be used to benefit the Charlottesville community, Environmental Sustainability Committee member Sarah Yates said.
“Our vision is to have the produce go to lower-income people in the Charlottesville community,” Yates said. “That might take several different forms; for example, there is a homeless shelter that is being started downtown that would open this summer which would coincide with when our produce would start coming out, and they’re really interested in serving local produce.”
In addition to providing produce for those in need in Charlottesville, committee members also hope the garden will be an educational opportunity for the University community. Migliazzo explained that the academic aspects of the program are based on a garden that currently exits at Yale University.
“There is a program at Yale that is exactly like this, where they have an academic component where they now have a concentration in sustainable agriculture under their environmental sciences department and they have courses in the garden,” Committee Co-Chair Melissa Warnke said. “The garden is not only used for extracurricular activities but also for classes.”
Committee members also hope to use this academic component of the garden to ensure they have volunteers to tend to the garden during the summer months, when many University students are not in Charlottesville.
University Landscape Architect Mary Hughes, who has been in contact with the committee, noted the importance of ensuring there are student volunteers to help with the garden during the summer.
“There is the seasonal problem considering the fact that our classes end in early May every year, and that’s just about time that you would start to plant the kind of summer crops that everyone most desires,” Hughes said. “There are also very few student workers during the summer ... it will take a lot of planning to ensure they have a workforce here throughout the summer if they want to grow a summer garden and keep it because it runs contrary to normal class schedules.”
Migliazzo said the academic aspects of the project will hopefully increase summer participation in the project.
“We would want to have internships or work-study programs set in place by the time summer comes so we will have students who have an incentive to stay [during the summer].” Migliazzo said, adding that the committee is looking for an academic department interested in sponsoring a program like this one. The project cannot finalize a location or make concrete academic plans until the committee gains this support.
“We’re currently in the process of talking to the environmental sciences department and the department of urban and environmental planning and looking for institutional homes in both places so this [project] can become a part of those departments and hopefully gain more support,” Migliazzo said.
After committee members find an institutional home for the project, they will then be able to address the issue of location.
“We have three potential locations, and those conversations are still evolving.” Warnke said. Yates added that the location of the garden should be convenient for students and faculty.
“The location is tentative right now, but we definitely want it to be on Grounds because one of the most important things to us is accessibility to the people in the U.Va. community and to the Charlottesville community, and if they have to drive 30 minutes to get to the garden, that kind of defeats the purpose,” Yates said.
After Council passed this resolution during its regular meeting, it held a full-body meeting in the Newcomb Ballroom to discuss with the entire body all other projects and pieces of legislation Council has worked on during this semester.
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