Program areas at Unity Gardens
In 2022 we hosted 34 "free pick" gardens to offer everyone in our community access to fresh nutritious food. Garden Guides greet visitor ,conduct tasting tours and give harvesting help to the 8923 guests at our primary site. Additionally, the Re Entry center garden, other hosted gardens and some local farmers donated over 3100 lbs of produce to our sharing shelves and 1300 lbs of produce to St. Margarets House, a day shelter for women. The amount of food available to our community far extended the 200,000 lbs of produce measured in 2021.
Free gardening classes and education have been expanded with some of Covid restrictions limited. We continued to host virtual classes in addition to bringing back onsite education.We also hosted classes on gardening in over 6 library locations. Series help in onsite inluded Winter growing garden series of 11 classes, Spring Farm to Fork lunch and learn series, Fall Food Series highlighting harvesting, preserving,pickling the ample harvest of the season. Offsite Garden classes were hosted at multiple sites including libraries, food banks, community centers and schools.
Unity Gardens farm to market program has helped maintain revenue contributing to organizational sustainability. In 2022 Unity Gardens expanded our traditional crops to include garlic,cut flowers,onions, and rhubarb. In addition, value-added products have also increased including cold processed honey soaps, honeycomb,garlic powder, and dried herbs. Left over fresh produce continues to support those less fortunate through food pantries, shelters for those unhoused, and other help centers.