GREEN BAY (NBC 26) — Green bay non-profit New Leaf Foods promotes access to healthy food right from your own backyard.
“Growing your own food, seeds you can get for very very little money and produce many pounds of food," said communications coordinator Veronica Woodke. "Dollar for dollar what you put into it and what you put out of it it’s a no-brainer.”
Every year, the organization installs 75 raised garden beds throughout the community during its New Leaf Garden Blitz. When community members purchase a garden box, the non-profit will install the garden at their homes over the course of one weekend. The organization has installed over 800 gardens in the Green Bay area since 2014.
“If you have a space to put your own garden box, the blitz can come and install a garden bed on your land or if you are renting and your landlord approves, we can bring it there too,” Woodke said.
This year, the blitz plans to work specifically with immigrant families, Howe and Nicolet Elementary School families and veterans.
“The goal is that each year we connect with different underserved communities and try to bring them in not only to serve them but to try to get them to volunteer with us,” Woodke said.
But they need the community's help to achieve their goal. After the blitz, New Leaf Foods partners with the Brown County Community Gardens Program to bring in garden mentors to help new gardeners sustain their gardens.
The program is currently in need of more garden mentors to teach these gardeners new techniques and help them grow their own produce. All mentors are trained and little gardening experience is necessary to be a mentor.
Aside from the blitz, the garden mentors are also able to help gardeners who rent one of 13 community garden plots around Brown County. The program serves over 250 families, about 70% of which self-identify as low-income.
“We want to get low-income individuals working with us in order to rent their plots and produce all sorts of vegetables, culturally appropriate produce, in order to help support their families and bring to market,” said Aubrey Fliss, the Brown County Community Gardens Coordinator.
Mentors are assigned one or more new gardeners and the pairs meet five times either virtually or in person, at a location decided by each pair such as at the mentee's home or community garden, over the course of the season. All mentors are required to complete an orientation and a background check to become an official volunteer of Brown County.
The Garden Mentorship Evening Training dates and times are April 6th from 6-7 p.m and April 7th from 9-10 a.m. Those Facebook events can be found here and here. The deadline to apply to receive a mentor is April 15th, and can be done through the purchase of a garden box.
For more information about becoming a mentor, click here.
