SALT LAKE CITY — After several years on a one-acre, urban farm just west of the Gateway, Wasatch Community Gardens in Salt Lake City is moving.
The garden grows thousands of pounds of fresh, organic produce every year, which is then donated and shared with local partners, including food pantries.
But it's nearly moving day for the garden and volunteers are needed to make the transition as smooth as possible.
“How do you move a farm," reflected Hannah Whitney, Director of Individual and Corporate Giving, "It goes piece by piece, shovel by shovel, dump truck by dump truck.”
The garden is moving to an open space along 1300 South between 700 and 800 West, previously the Cannon Greens Community Garden, from their current "Green Phoenix Farm" location at 622 West 100 South.
"We’re packing up, the soil has been moved," said Katie Dwyer, Director of Communications for the gardens. "The greenhouses are being deconstructed, and it will all transfer over here.”
It’s taken a few years to find a suitable, open space and then plan the move, which will happen this Thursday.
The Cannon Greens community garden was closed in 2019 due to urban contamination, but leaders previously announced that they worked with Salt Lake City to remediate the area and transfer carefully built soil into the new space.
The Green Phoenix Farm was built to be a mobile garden area, as the gardens have been leasing the space.
“This is very much a can’t do it alone situation," Dwyer explained. "Whether it’s corporate sponsors, volunteers, individual donors, this is very much a community effort.”
One of their corporate sponsors is Tito‘s Vodka, which sponsors a nationwide event called "Love The Block."
"They like to work with partners like us around the country to build more green spaces like this, productive green spaces, which is exactly what we want to do as well," Whitney said.
While growing and sharing healthy food with the community is tremendous, Whitney says their job training program is equally important and rewarding.
“We are able to work with women experiencing and facing homelessness and giving them opportunities to learn job skills, job training that can be applicable in many ways," she explained. "And also help them with some steps they might need to get to a space where they have housing, where they have a job.”
Moving day for the gardens is Thursday and volunteers can sign up to help with the process by clicking here.
