Most important word in community garden is not garden

“The power of community gardening and other similarly organized small-scale farming efforts in nontraditional areas such as urban America is not found so much in the rate of return to the food supply but in the rate of return to society.”

p. 62

Patch of soil as a right like clean air and water

“Whether people are motivated by the myth of self-reliance, the fear of a cataclysmic event, or simply the wish to make something ugly into something beautiful, society should permit them to stand in humble repose on their own tiny plots of land and to make what magic they can of it.” p. 58

Despite seeing gardening as not contributing much to eliminating food security, he does see it is important for cities to engage citizens in gardening.

“Everyone who wants to garden should be able to do so.  Just as we are entitled to clean air and water, we should be entitled to a small spot of earth into which we can drop our seeds and direct our attention.” p. 190

Marginal contribution to food security

“Hartford’s community gardens have made only a marginal contribution to the city’s food security, with the exception of a relatively small number of ardent gardeners who have significantly augmented their food supplies.” p. 57

But this doesn’t necessarily mean there isn’t potential.  Cities have never really put an all out effort into gardening for food security.  Maybe if they did it would be more successful.

Kaufman and Bailkey: Farming Inside Cities

“Farming Inside Cities: Entrepreneurial Urban Agriculture in the United States,” prepared by Jerome Kaufman and Martin Bailkey at the University of Wisconsin in 2000.

Detroit as birthplace of community gardening

After Detroit started its projects in 1890 there were 19 cities which had similar gardening projects by 1898. p. 56

Failed garden attempts

“Having witnessed many sincere but ultimately failed attempts to transform dirt, water, and seed into food, I tend to look somewhat askance at those who suggest that more of us, if not all of us, and especially the poor, should ‘grow their own.'” p. 55

Natick Community Farm

in Massachusetts, started by Mark Winne in the 1970s, still operating today

p. 53-54

Green Power youth farm

Weston, MA

historic example from the 1970s – not sure if it is still operating

p. 51

Food systems thinking

“Food systems thinking doesn’t permit us to isolate one segment of food activity from another.  We can’t, for instance, think only about farming without also thinking about eating.” p. xix

Community context as important as income

for hunger and food insecurity “the community or environmental context is just as important as the income of an individual household.” p. xviii