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TIM CURRAN
THE MID-COUNTY MEMO
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| Portland Community Gardens Coordinator Leslie Pohl-Kosbau, from left, helps cut the ribbon at the community garden dedication ceremony held last month with Madison senior Kedir Hussen and PP&R Commissioner Nick Fish. |
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| At the opening of Madison High School's community garden senior Kedir Hussen explains his role in creating the garden. Seated are, from left, Portland Public School Board member Ruth Adkins, Madison High School Principal Carla Randall and City Commissioner Nick Fish. MEMO PHOTOS: TIM CURRAN |
According to Portland's Community Gardens Coordinator Leslie Pohl-Kosbau, Madison's garden is small to average sized compared to Portland's other community gardens. Three years in the planning, the garden is roughly 247' long by 58 feet wide and is divided into two sections: the community garden, with 26 plots, each at least 200 square feet, with two raised beds for the elderly and disabled, and the high school's educational garden.
The seventh partnership between the city and the Portland School District, it is the first at a Portland high school.
The city paid for the fencing, irrigation and soil amendments. The city manages its section and the school manages theirs, with some overlap.
Madison students and teachers, aided by two AmeriCorps members, planned and helped build the school garden and partnered with the nonprofit Village Building Convergence, under the umbrella of another nonprofit, City Repair, to design and construct the garden's primitive-style outdoor classroom structure.
In his second keynote speech of the day opening a community garden (the first was earlier that day a few blocks south at Vestal Elementary School), PP&R Commissioner Nick Fish lauded Pohl-Kosbau, “There's very few times when you can say that you were in the presence of someone who started a movement. Let me tell you, this 34th community garden in Portland is the culmination of a lifetime of passion, advocacy and work, and that's Leslie.”
Fish went on to say, “We love community gardens at Parks and we love them for the same reasons that you do: they bring people together, they build community, they help us grow healthy food, they teach young people about ecology and the environment.” Fish said that these new plots will count toward the City/County Climate Action Plan goal of 1,000 new garden plots in the next two years. Another goal of Fish's is to see a community garden at all 27 Portland public schools, but also, because there are five school districts within the city limits, he'd like to see a garden at every one of those schools as well.
Fish asked the attendees, “Wouldn't it be wonderful if there was a community garden at every school in Portland?” and they responded with whoops and hollers.
For Madison students and senior project partners Kedir Hussen and Noah Bentley, a portion of their senior project was participating in the planning and construction of the garden. Another part is providing compost for the garden by altering the school cafeteria's waste stream each Wednesday to collect compostable garbage.
“Our main goal with my partner was to use composting primarily to change a wasteful habit at an American high school,” said Hussen. “Because, like at lunch, if you see a student, all the fruit, all the bananas - just goes to waste. You could use it, since we have a garden right here, to make compost to make nutritious soil. Like for fertilizer for the garden. That way you can get healthy, natural, really good food.”
With another garden scheduled to open at Gilbert Heights in the David Douglas School District, Kosbau said in the future there maybe one at Parkrose High School, too. “They've got a lot of room. There's also a proposed garden for the Beech property when it gets developed,” she said. “We want to build community through gardening so we want people that live close to their garden.” Currently, there is a community garden at Senn's Dairy Park at Northeast115th Avenue and Northeast Prescott Street in Parkrose.
The Portland Community Gardens program has been in existence since 1975, averaging one new opening per year,. To sign up for a community garden plot, go to the PP&R Web site, http://tinyurl.com/y8gmy9z, and fill out the online form. If you have questions about the Portland Community Gardens program call Pohl-Kosbau at 503-823-1612.
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