Jan. 20, 2011 - Community Gardens are being established in small communities and within cities all over the USA with much success. Perhaps, it's a "comeback" from the Victory Gardens planted after World War II -- in which citizens planted gardens together on available plots and shared the bounty. These gardens helped to feed the nation and to increase community involvement in creating a local, sustainable food economy. Today, community gardening appears to be a viable solution to a number of problems. For one, we can expect food costs to soar -- with 1) energy costs rising,2) the environmental impact of conventional agribusines taking its toll on available resources, and3) transportation costs for food that travels an average of 1200+ miles to reach the supermarket. Benefits of a Bonham Community Garden include:
Building relationships -- having fun, working together
Providing a local, sustainable food source for those who choose to participate
Growing fresh, nourishing food for families and individuals to enjoy for a healthier, tastier diet
For over a year, CORE has been nurturing the seed of an idea -- a Bonham Community Garden! The City of Bonham, Habitat for Humanity, and other local organizations have offered their support of such a project. We have located several potential locations -- several sites in East Bonham (just off Hwy. 56 East) and possibly one in South Bonham. Although you would not have to live in the available areas to obtain a gardening site in a Bonham Community Garden, it is very important that citizens who do live in these areas be a part of the "planning process" -- especially, in the site selection process!!
On Tuesday, Feb. 8, at 7:30 p.m., CORE will be hosting a Bonham Community Garden Organizational Meeting in the May Room of the American Bank of Texas, 120 W. Sam Rayburn Drive, Bonham, TX. All citizens of Bonham (and surrounding areas) are invited to attend. It will take YOU and other citizens to help this seed become a reality. Whether or not you plan to actually garden a plot, there will be many ways to get involved. For instance, a Sunday School class could help fund and/or build a fence, a local service organization could help to purchase needed tools, a Scout or 4-H group could help to create paths between gardening plots once a garden design is established. At the organizational meeting, we will definitely discuss the site location, as well as many other organizational aspects and start a plan for getting this project underway this spring.
In Vivian Elisabeth Glyck's book, 12 LESSONS on LIFE I Learned from My Garden (subtitled Spiritual Guidance from the Vegetable Patch), Glyck's first chapter is entitled "Preparation is Everything". She states that the lesson she's learned is, "If you don't have a good foundation, your growth will flounder." That's why the meeting on Feb. 8 is not just a beginning, but also an important ingredient for its success. It takes a community to create Community Gardens!
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