L.A. Green Grounds

This week has been a flurry of activity. Two dig-ins, over a hundred volunteers, from far and wide–North Hills, Orange County, Cerritos, Santa Monica, La Habra, Glendale, Pasadena, Lawndale, W Hollywood, Redlands, Inglewood, Sherman Oaks, Torrance, Encino, and Compton, as well as our beloved Los Angeles. And even the ice-cream truck stopped by.

Mid-afternoon on May 4, digging in compost, as the ice-cream truck serenades dig-in volunteers.

Dig-in host David V (in hat) confabs with a neighbor, as volunteers Stephanie, Jacque, Kimberly, Virginie and Maylin plant the herb garden.

And in new news, we got two lovely and substantial donations in hand.
One is a super-generous gift of $5000 from the CAA (Creative Artists Agency) Foundation based in Los Angeles. Their gift will help us build our infrastructures, so we can acquire, use and share resources like tools, seeds, and software. Many many thanks for your generosity!
The second one is another local donation–super-local, from a neighborhood council in LA, the North Area Neighborhood Development Council, based in a part of S LA where we have hosted several dig-ins. In LA, neighborhood councils are independent citizens groups housed in each neighborhood. Their support of our work based on results seen on the ground means a lot to us!

A spring dig-in: Feb 3 on W Martin Luther King Blvd

We thank you for your interest in our work, and for your ongoing support. We have prided ourselves on running a low-overhead operation. To make sure that our ongoing operations remain steady and accessible to anyone, we are now able to take tax-deductible donations.

We are partnering with The LA Community Garden Council as our fiscal sponsor–a 501(c)3 organization, aka a non-profit organization. This means that donations that you make will now be tax-deductible.

Your generous support will allow us to extend our services to those in need of healthy, nourishing food gardens throughout South Los Angeles, California. First, here’s how to do it via Paypal.

If you are giving a donation by check, please make the check or money order payable to our fiscal sponsor, “Los Angeles Community Garden Council” or “LACGC.” In the “memo” part of the check, please write, “LA Green Grounds.” The tax ID # you may need is 31-1734705.

You can send your tax-deductible donations to:

LA Green Grounds, P.O. Box 165, Topanga, CA  90290.

[Address the envelope to Green Grounds, just not the check...]

Once again, thank you for your donation to LA Green Grounds. With your support, we will continue to grow connections between people and their communities, one garden at a time.

Should you wish to contact or make a contribution to our amazing co-founder Ron Finley directly, please do so at his website here.

LA Green Grounds
www.lagreengrounds.org

LA Green Grounds would like to thank everyone for writing in and showing so much support for the work we do. The March Dig-In is at capacity!

We really appreciate it and look forward to honoring Mother Earth this April with a Earth Day Dig-in. To LA Green Grounds, every day is Earth Day.

The Expo Park community in South Los Angeles has seen a flurry of activity in the last few months. In October (2012) CicLaVia–a large block party and bike ride–came down the Figueroa Corridor. A few weeks later, the Space Shuttle Endeavor moved down the street on a two day journey to the nearby California Science Center. Now, since February, there is a new front yard edible garden gracing W. Martin Luther King Blvd! Thanks to all volunteers that helped set up the garden, Fumi for being a wonderful host, and Sachiko for taking the pictures.

The 4^th annual LA Hunger Action Day was held today, November 1st., in downtown to oppose the criminalization of growing, distributing and selling food. LA Green Grounds represented beautifully.

During the summer months LA Green Grounds takes time off from Dig-Ins (due to the heat), but activities continue in earnest. Last weekend we held our first Summer Harvest Fest, which we’ll write about soon. In the meantime we’re catching up on posts and pics from earlier in the summer. Below we’re happy to feature photos from Sandra and Roberto’s wonderful June Dig-In near Exposition Blvd, where a front-yard was transitioned to another South LA edible garden. (Thanks Sandra for taking the pictures!).

The massed insects that recently are attacking Maggie & John’s collard greens (and now on their strawberry) are the dreaded “Bagrada bug”. It’s a new (relatively) pest that’s come over from Arizona (in 2009), and is spreading throughout the southland. It breeds prolifically, eats cabbage family plants, but also is getting onto lots of other vegetables – so this is a serious pest. There were so many that Florence suggested to John that he vacuum them up, drop them into soapy water, and then into the trash.

Left photo by Florence, right photo by Flickr/MargaretheBrummermann

LA Green Grounds Dig-Ins tend to be photogenic (if we may say so ourselves!). Whether of volunteers working hard to reclaim front-yard soil, or of smiles as people gaze onto a new edible garden, we snap photos of all Dig-Ins (and other related activities) for our Flickr page that we also compile into follow-up posts here–and link to other sites that do the same. Recently, volunteer Elon Schoenholz added a splendid new approach to our media efforts, setting up a tripod and camera at Maggie, John and Sekou’s March Dig-In and producing a time-lapse video of the event in their Vermont Square neighborhood. Check it out below (clicking play will take you to the video on Vimeo):

LA Green Grounds Dig-In from treelon on Vimeo

As Elon writes, “LA Green Grounds volunteers design and build the new gardens, generally in front yards, teaching volunteers along the way and fostering community.” It is great to see the garden building so wonderfully captured in Elon’s video, which sets a great precedent for future sharing opportunities through media. Next time you’re at a Dig-In, bring your camera, and capture some smiles.