On Tuesday, Mar. 2 University of Utah Biology Professor Fred Montague, Ph.D, came to Salt Lake Community College as the kick off to Salt Lake Community College’s upcoming community garden. Montague spoke on the global imperative for the local garden.
The garden is set to open by the end of March. It will be located at the Taylorsville Redwood Campus, on the east side of the Construction Trades Building. There is an herb garden that is already located there. It will be expanded to fit the community garden. After that space is filled, they will look at expanding either at Taylorsville Redwood Campus or to other campuses.
The idea for a community garden at SLCC came from two teamed-up sources. Adam Dastrup, Geoscience Department Coordinator and chair of the Sustainability Committee, had the idea of a community garden. Jason Thornton, founder of Seeds of Hope, which provides tomato seedlings to other community gardens and organizations found many people asking about a community garden at SLCC.
“I approached Adam when I found out there was a Sustainability Committee on campus and it just kind of took off from there,” says Thornton.
After Dastrup became the chair or the Sustainability Committee, he started working with the Thayne Center and Health and Wellness. “I stared thinking of the community garden as a way to branching out to serves, branching out to live well. Obviously with sustainability. And I wanted to try to find a way to build better community on campus,” says Dastrup.
Because of size limitations, only departments and clubs at SLCC will be able to get a space in the garden. There will be a small fee, and the department or club will be in charge of weeding and watering their plot. They can use whatever they grow how they would like but will be asked to donate to community food programs.
SLCC has teamed up with Wasatch Community Gardens. They will be helping by providing seed, along with Seeds of Hope. They will be coming to SLCC towards the end of March to teach and help departments and clubs how to get their gardens going. There is also a plan to the have potlucks with Slow Food Utah.
“The hope is that one day we are going to have a very large garden and that we will plant a row, which that row of crops will all be donated to a food shelf,” says Thornton.
If your department or club is interested in becoming part of the community garden, contact Adam Dastrup at robert.dastrup@slcc.edu or Jason Thornton at jthorn20@mymail.slcc.edu.