More gardens means more Good Food for Families throughout Southeastern Wisconsin
MILWAUKEE [March 21, 2012] – Growing Power and the Green Team announce the 20,000 Backyard Gardens Initiative that aims to grow gardens everywhere. The non-profit organization and local business have paired up to offer Southeastern Wisconsin residents a set of comprehensive services to install socially responsible and sustainable gardens using Growing Power’s nutrient-rich, high-microbial compost and the Green Team’s sustainable landscaping services.
The two organizations are committed to providing one FREE garden to a needy family for every ten gardens purchased and installed! Once the home garden is installed, residents will be responsible for maintenance and harvesting. However, Growing Power will offer classes and trainings on sustainable agriculture, including composting, vermiculture, and raised garden beds maintenance, which are three main components supporting these home growing systems.
“Essentially, we want to help build over 20,000 gardens in our community using the successful methods we’ve used at Growing Power for the last two decades,” shared Will Allen, Founder and CEO of Growing Power, the lead organization of this initiative. “If people have access to food at home, from their own backyards, we are helping them achieve a level of food security that is immediate and most beneficial to them and their families,” he continued, “the most important aspect of this initiative is the compost and soil we are going to use. It is all-natural, nutrient-rich, and sourced from our own community’s waste.”
Every cubic yard of compost installed in these gardens diverts 1,500 pounds of food and organic waste from the landfill. On average, a home garden will use 7-14 yards of compost to support healthy and vibrant raised-bed gardening. That’s equivalent to diverting over 10 tons of food and organic waste from the landfill per home garden!
Growing Power and the Green Team will hold a press conference on Friday, March 23 at 10:00 AM at the Growing Power Community Food Center, 5500 W. Silver Spring Drive, Milwaukee, WI 53218, to answer questions, invite partnerships, and discuss this initiative and the implications in more detail. Local organizations such as the Urban Ecology Center and the Victory Garden Initiative have expressed their support for Growing Power’s 20,000 Backyard Garden Initiative and plan to attend the press conference to share worthy information about related garden programs offered through their organizations. As Ken Leinbach, Executive Director of the Urban Ecology Center put it, “Our mission at the Urban Ecology Center is about getting people outside while connecting with each other. Canoeing the Milwaukee River, planting a tree or growing your own food are all great ways we accomplish this. It’s about getting out there and getting your hands in the dirt. We love the idea of generating 20,000 home gardens and are excited to support Growing Power’s initiative to do so in conjunction with the efforts of our partner the Victory Garden Initiative, Milwaukee Urban Gardens and many others in the city. Together this bold initiative can become a reality.”
Gretchen Mead, Director of the Victory Garden Initiative agrees. Gretchen added, “The Victory Garden Initiative builds communities of people who grow their own food. This is no small undertaking. We are so thankful to have Growing Power working side-by-side with us to create a socially and environmentally just food system in our great city. This year 20,000 gardens, next year 100,000!” Gretchen and the Victory Garden Initiative hopes more people join the Victory Garden Initiative, May 20th-26th, for the 4th annual Victory Garden Blitz.
Note to Editors: The press is invited to a public event announcing the 20,000 Backyard Gardens Initiative at the Growing Power Community Food Center in Milwaukee, WI. Will Allen, founder and CEO of Growing Power and Bradley Blaeser, Principal of The Green Team, will be present to discuss this initiative in more detail. Several local organizations have been invited to this event.
DATE: Friday, March 23, 2012
TIME: 10:00 AM CST
LOCATION: 5500 W. Silver Spring Drive
Milwaukee, WI 53218
About Growing Power
> Growing Power was started in
Milwaukee, Wis., in 1993 by Will Allen, a 2008 winner of a MacArthur “Genius Award” who has long worked to produce and deliver healthy food to low-income communities. It is a national nonprofit organization and land trust supporting people from diverse backgrounds, and the environments in which they live, by helping to provide equal access to healthy, high-quality, safe and affordable food for people in all communities. Growing Power implements this mission by providing hands-on training, on-the-ground demonstration, outreach and technical assistance through the development of Community Food Systems that help people grow, process, market and distribute food in a sustainable manner. Their vision is to inspire communities to build sustainable food systems that are equitable and ecologically sound, creating a just world, one food-secure community at a time
About The Green Team
The Green Team (of Wisconsin Inc.) services southeastern Wisconsin providing sustainable landscape management for residential homes to large commercial and municipal landscapes. The Green Team is committed to reducing its footprint by providing services that reduce your footprint, like installation and management of rain barrels, compost, and native and vegetable/edible gardens. Using best practices like proper mowing height and green energy (Bio-diesel, waste vegetable oil, electric, Energy for Tomorrow) use further show our commitment to the environment. Will Allen and Bradley Blaeser of The Green Team met in 1996 collaborating on the inaugural fish and worm systems built at Growing Power.
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