Should cities start building community gardens to feed the poor?
Cities have all the big equipment they use for keeping the parks nice. Why not start using vacant land in the community to start vegetable gardens to supplement the food banks and homeless shelters. With the economic slump, these places are not getting the donations they used to get. This could be a way to help them out and put vacant land to use. You can buy a lot of carrot seeds with $1. Volunteers from the master gardeners programs and from the shelters themselves could do most the work after the land is prepared. Many cities have compost programs too. What do you think?
Tags: poor, Should, feed, community, start, cities, Gardens.Related posts:
We should drop price controls on farms so people can afford food.
Why not just force everyone with a house to let a homeless person live in their living room and eat from their fridge for free?
Not a bad idea and the poor can work in those gardens so they will feel they have earned something and not be burdens on society.
Once they are on their feet again, if they can be.. then maybe they can give back too.
It is an excellent idea.
Yes it is a good idea however soils must be tested to be safe for consumption the White house found out its garden contained lead and I am not sure what happened to its contents.
We in California started doing this decades ago.
But not just the poor participate. Everyone in the community is welcome.
Hey, I have an idea. Cities and all other levels of government reduce their burden on productive people, so those productive people go out and produce more, and hire more people, and everybody becomes more prosperous, and charities have more to help the poor, stuff like that. I guess since that means less government it’s a bad idea?
I think it’s a great idea…and put the poor who are benefitting from it to work in those gardens. That way, they will be contributing to their own upkeep.
Maybe the poor should start planting food to take care of themselves. Maybe it is not the job of the city. Besides, do you think the poor are actually going to care for the gardens? Have you ever tried to get an entitled person to volunteer? Aint gonna happen.
This IS being done; what you’re calling for is expansion.
Yes, it’s an excellent idea. SOME obstacles are: No all vacant land belongs to the government; much of it needs more than seed to grow food; much of it has toxic substances; few places have the organization in place to do it.
If you wanted to start such a program, maybe you should research existing ones, and pick those folks’ brains on how to start another.
An additional benefit is, a LOT of people live far from stores that even STOCK fresh fruits and veggies; all those folks would be really helped by such programs.
Have you tried typing “Community Garden” into your favorite search engine?
Here in Salem Oregon there’s a weed called blackberries that grows in the parks and people eat it for free.