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Schools

Helix Community Garden Vote Again Delayed by Board, Dismaying Backers

"I don't think [garden advocates] got the word of where our position was going to go today," said board member Priscilla Schreiber.

A planned community garden at Helix Charter High School remained on hold Thursday when the Grossmont Union High School District board again voted to postpone a decision on an agreement with the city of La Mesa.

More than a dozen garden backers couldn’t hide their looks of disbelief.

“A lot of the issues that they brought up are in the joint-use agreement—which they’ve had for months. Do your homework,” Mindy Swanson said after the meeting.

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Swanson is a San Diego County school garden coordinator who works with the childhood obesity initiative.

On Jan. 12, a vote on the agreement was stalled due to concerns voiced by board member Jim Kelly, who wanted to make sure the district was exempt from legal liability.

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Thursday, those and other issues were brought up by schools Superintendent Ralf Swenson at the district center on Main Street in El Cajon.

“We should more carefully review any other laws in the state of California that might impact this [joint use] agreement and also take a look at any district policies to determine the viability and legality for permitting communities of the school district property for individual community gardens,” Swenson said.

He commended Helix for “being responsive to the interest extended by the community,” but said he wanted to learn more about policies regarding nongardening visitors, foot traffic, maintenance during and after school, restroom facilities and general upkeep.

“And just a number of other issues that I think we’ve not had the time to adequately investigate in terms of a staff report that we could then bring to the board,” Swenson said.

Although Helix executive director Rani Goyal on Monday said “We'll know Thursday” whether the board supported the garden, it became apparent that board members had not intended to vote on the issue, leading to more frustration.

Board member Priscilla Schreiber offered her sympathies to the garden backers.

“I’m looking at our speakers, and I don’t think they got the word of where our position was going to go today,” said Schreiber, adding that she’d previously spoken with Swenson about his concerns.

“I wish you had gotten that message first and foremost, and had better understanding before you came to speak,” she told the audience.

Ten of the approximately 15 people who came to show support for the garden addressed the board.

Helix teacher and community garden leader Debi Byrd hailed the multiple learning prospects a garden could provide.

“As I emailed the majority of you, the opportunities for the students in this garden are endless,” Byrd said. “We have our senior projects. … We have community service hours that they must complete. … This could be part of that community service.”

She added that students could also learn about decomposition, nutrient cycling, geometric shapes, and that it would be an ideal place to write an assignment for English class or for one-on-one student counseling to take place.

Tennessee native Charles Anacker spoke of growing up on his parents’ farm and volunteering time to work on the garden.

“I took gardening and farming really for granted,” said Anacker, 65, a master gardener in training. “There’s a lot of us out there with a lot of time and energy on our hands who’d like to devote to something like this.”

Community involvement would be essential to the garden’s year-round success, as it would prevent the fruits and vegetables from dying and students from having to start over after holiday and summer breaks, the board was told.

La Mesa resident Susan Taylor, a and master gardener who collaborates with 17 other schools, said she wrote emails to each board member earlier in the week, but that she never got a response.

In that correspondence (attached), Taylor commended the district for being so progressive, stating that the San Diego Unified School District is only now beginning to explore the idea of a similar garden.  

“The whole district is extremely multicultural and the garden is a wonderful place for the community and students to get together,” Taylor said. “Because everybody’s got a grandmother or an aunt or somebody who has some kind of a garden, and the students really relate to that.”

She added: “I think it’s a good idea; I think the community has done all the work to get it ready. It’s part of a national movement that’s going on that I don’t think can be rolled back. It’s out of the bag.”

But Swenson said setting a precedent may be more cause for concern than celebration—as the district has yet to see firsthand any positive or negative consequences that come from mixing the general community with a student population.

“It’s that fact that led us to the need for more careful consideration, as, in fact, we have not gone down this path before,” said Swenson before directing staff to “more carefully investigate the implications.”

Yvonne Garrett, La Mesa’s assistant city manager, and La Mesa Community Garden coordinator Judy Jacoby also addressed the board, though Robin Rivet was the last person to speak.

An administrator of the urban forestry program at the California Center for Sustainable Energy, Rivet is also the daughter of a lawyer and botanist.

She said she “grew up with the sense that we should probably defend rather than thwart these types of activities.”

“We do live in a litigious society, but I also just really think that we have to be practical, we have to be thinking ahead, and I [would] appreciate your vote in favor of this project.”

The next meeting will be held at 6 p.m. Feb. 9 at the El Cajon education center,  924 E Main St., though Swenson made no promises that studies would be done and a decision made at that time.

“We’ll see what we can do,” he said.

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