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Back to the land for Port Moody food garden project

Port Moody won’t become Green Acres just yet.
garden
A plan to plant vegetable and fruit gardens in parts of Port Moody has been referred back to staff for further study to increase involvement from the community.

Port Moody won’t become Green Acres just yet.

At its meeting Tuesday, council referred a proposal to spend almost $40,000 to install food gardens in planters in front of city hall, as well as at Pioneer Park and in front of the Art Centre, back to staff to find a way to get more community involvement included in the project.

Mayor Rob Vagramov said while the idea of the city growing vegetables and fruit is admirable, the increasing need for community gardens as more people move into condo towers and townhouses where they can’t plant gardens of their own demands a more community-based approach.

Coun. Steve Milani agreed, “People want to get their hands dirty.”

In a report, Port Moody’s general manager of environment and parks, Lesley Douglas, said the program would expand on a 2017 initiative that placed 16 container gardens with fruit and vegetable plants in front of city hall. Weekly tours were conducted to promote discussions and sharing of food production best practices.

Douglas told council the program was discontinued in 2018 because the fruit and vegetable planters required more maintenance like tilling the soil than planters filled with display plants.

In her report, Douglas estimated installation and maintenance costs of $17,790 for 16 large planters in front of city hall, $9,970 for construction and maintenance of a raised planter in Pioneer Park, and $8,030 for a victory garden in existing plant beds at the Arts Centre.

She said the garden program would be supplemented by backyard gardening workshops and a family-oriented education program on edible gardening. The produce would be shared with various community organizations.

“It’s about food literacy,” she said, adding participants could then take the knowledge they gained back to their own gardening projects.

Coun. Amy Lubik said the value of food sovereignty and resiliency has been driven home during the current COVID-19 pandemic as people turned to their gardens to fill their time in self-isolation.

“People find solace in the small gardens they have, or even the couple of pots they have on their balcony.”