Let them eat Kale!

Objective: Increase the food security of at least one person in your community.

Before this objective, I did not even know what a community garden was. I have never lived in an urban community, and in the 20 years I have lived in the Dayton area, I have avoided the inner city whenever possible. Turns out, Dayton has several community gardens. I found a map online I could use if I wanted to tour through the locations, but not a lot of information about individual ones. I feared it may be too soon in the season, that my luck was running out on the subject. I did finally find a couple individual websites that proved useful. I learned that most of the community gardens will rent out plots to families or organizations for thier own use. Some were also involved in urban beautification by adding art or flowers to these lots. Many schools in the area have shut down in recent years and these school yards are sometimes being used for community gardens. However, none of this was the pay dirt I was looking for.

Video about Dayton's plans for Community Gardens.

Finally I found Feed Dayton Urban Farming Program (http://www.feeddayton.org/). I met with Ken Carmen at his newest community garden at 1820 E. 5th Street, which is he making into a training center for his unique program. He beleives with conviction, that he has the number one plan in the nation for urban farming. And even though I did not represent anyone who could ultimately help his organization, he was pleased to explain to me why.

'Total Resource Utilization.' It is Ken's goal to produce the most help for Dayton's poor with the least amount of resources. Here is the first part of his plan. He claims that every urban area produces far more organic fertilizer than could ever be needed. Even as we spoke, a truck full of kids helping him to fullfill thier community service were pulling up to dump off a load of leaves.....leaves Ken said, the city was bagging up and filling land.

Area kids helping out as part of thier community service.

Feed Dayton also collects wood chips from local tree service people. They use these chips one year to path walkways between the plots. In three years, the wood chips will be beautifully transformed into rich mulching material.

Ken explaining more about recycling wood chips into mulch than the average person needs to know. :)

Oh and let me tell you about these plots. Ken explained to me that vegetables actually only need two inches of dirt to grow in, if they get everything they need. It is only when the plants are in want that they develop deep root systems. So as Feed Dayton expands into more lots, they will not even have to be plowed. Dirt will be laid on top of the ground for the bed areas, while wood chips will lay in the path areas. This is less manwork and equipment needed for bed preparation. Crops that require support will be grown on some of Dayton's hundreds of miles of high fences are are scattered around the area. This way, support systems do not need to be built, again saving man hours and supply costs. Also, property owners will not have to maintain the growth along these fences.

Beautiful and already edible kale...in April!

The next part of the plan, I have to say, Ken is particularly passionate about. Instead of growing a little bit of everything, it is his goal to choose crops with the highest nutrition and harvest value. Number one on this list of crops totally blew me away: Kale. More on that later. Once the area's hunger needs are satisfied, other crops will be added, as well as shorter season crops such as lettuce, onions and garlic.

By donating 80% of what is grown by Feed Dayton, they will be meeting a crucial need by providing a highly nutritious food (yup, thats kale!), on a timely basis, to the people who need it most. Growing food for those going through difficult times allows them to focus on nutritional value, rather than popularity or market value. Agencies that feed the hungry will no longer be limited to whatever they happen to get, but they can actually plan ahead and expect high nutrition food, in the quantities they need.

This program is obviously far different than the other community gardens I had read about. All of this begs the question....if 80% is donated, who is going to be doing the work? This is where the Harvest for a Share program comes in. Area residents can come in and register with Feed Dayton to help harvest the crops. They will then be allowed to come in at designated times and then are able to keep 20% of what they harvest.

Feed Dayton will be able to operate indefinately without relying on grants or donations, and is naturally sustainable in the long term because materials necessary for the program are generated in abundance and on an ongoing basis. Businesses that contribute to thier success are recompensed with advertising and promotion on thier website.

The beauty of it is obvious and amazingly simple. And best of all, it is easily replicated. Available materials and crop selections may vary in different cities, but the principles can be implimented anywhere. At one point I was telling Ken about Urgent Evoke and about Jane McGonagal's talk at TED. I told him a little of my game ideas for high school students. He stopped me cold when I quoted Jane about how kids want to save the world. Ken told me in no uncertain terms, that this was his goal, to save the world....one city at a time with his revolutionary, but simple plan to end urban hunger.

Oh yeah....Kale, kale, the magical fruit.

Ken explaining the natural hardiness of kale.

I asked Ken, isn't kale that leafy thing restraunts put on your plate to make it look pretty. I am getting older, the memory does fail me at times. Ken laughed and said that indeed it was. He bent over and pinched off the budding tops of one kale plant and asked me if I liked broccoli. Yes, sir! I love broccoli. He handed me the greens and against all reasoning, it sure as hell tasted like brocolli. He went on to explain that the upper leaves are primarily used as salad, while the lower leaves are used as greens. I exercised my googling talents later to find that it is, in fact, one of the most nutritious vegetables out there.

Add to this, apparently these plants are impossible to kill off. I was sceptical, brown thumb that I am, I could kill off the plants at JoAnn's Fabric and Crafts if ya left me in there long enough. The plants we were talking over were large, healthy and budding...in April in Ohio. Ken took me to another plot on the other side of the lot. Here was a plot of wilty looking kale plants, though they looked like they would revive once cared for. As it turned out, these plants were just taken out of the ground that week from thier old site, where they lived the winter of repeated below zero weather. There are pictures on his website and Facebook of these things peeking out of snow. And here they were, ready to go again another year.

These wilty plants came from last years plot, where they weathered a zero degree Ohio winter.

I mused, and rubbed my chin, finally asking again about the roots and soil issue. Would these plants flourish in porch pots? Why yes they would. And now at the end of all these discoveries, interviews and picture taking, I realize I still did not meet the objective. Oh wait....I beleive I did increase the food security of one person in my community....porch pots of kale say that person was me!