Community Garden Growing in Prominence
By: Julian Gutierrez
In 2013 Huerta Del Valle opened its first communal garden with support from local colleges, businesses and the City of Ontario. Its original goals were to uplift the community, provide community space, a source for organic food and a means to achieve food security amid one of Ontario’s food deserts. The project started with a modest fifteen plots and a field of potential.
The community garden has quadrupled the number of plots in Ontario to sixty, but that is not the only means for the community to access organic food. While the community gardens work for those that can reserve their plots in time, some people cannot be involved due to time or land restraints. For these members of the community, Huerta Del Valle has its urban farm at the location where they grow fruits and vegetables for the community. On Wednesdays, all produce sells for one dollar a pound in-person. The farm also offers boxes of assorted fruits and veggies that can be tailored to meet dietary requests, making local organics not only accessible but affordable. To support the garden and farm, a composting section has been established to help replenish the soil. Food waste from our community that would be dumped in landfills is collected by Huerta del Valle to be composted. In this effort, the Ontario site composts roughly 500,000 pounds of organic waste each year. Huerta del Valle holds workshops and classes on subject matter pertaining to sustainability and organic gardening, like Vermicomposting or Pickling. For those that have an interest in urban agriculture, there is an extended training program called “Agricultores del Valle”. Those undergoing the program receive hands-on training as well as instructional workshops and lectures. These urban farmers may get access to tracts of land to grow organics for their own businesses, known as incubator plots.
The success of Ontario Huerta Del Valle has allowed nonprofit to find new partners and expand rapidly. Its second location was initiated in Jurupa Valley, this expansion is supposed to imitate the model in the Ontario garden but has more than three times the acreage by comparison. Plots for the garden are still available for this site, going for $30/year. Its official opening occurred on Apr. 19, 2019, and features more fruit trees than the Ontario location due to its establishment on a former orchard. The success of the Jurupa location has led to two more site proposals in Jurupa Valley at the Crestmore Manor and the Jensen-Alvarado Ranch. Altogether these additional sites would provide roughly 28 acres of garden, farm space and allow trained farmers from the Agricultores program to have access to plots of land to grow organics and practice the business aspects of farming.
In 2018, the farm submitted requests and plans to work five acres of space at the Louis Rubidoux Nature Center. This space would be dedicated to row-cropping, grazing, composting and a host location for garden and farming workshops within the Rubidoux and Riverside area.
A partnership with Loma Linda Health has resulted in a one-acre plot to be developed into a communal Garden in San Bernardino with the intent to use it as a garden and host space for future workshops. This location is currently looking for donations to pay local artists to create a mural.
To supplant the need for compost for all this land expansion, a second location is being proposed in Ontario. Ontario Carbon Farm is expected to become the main composting center for Huerta Del Valle while also serving as a Carbon Farm to help reduce CO2 emissions.
Its been a long time coming for Huerta Del Valle, but they are enjoying the fruits of their labor.