Groundwork Indy inspires youths to pick up gardening
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Local farmers say COVID-19 is creating a demand for fresh local produce.
Groundwork Indy wants to make sure young people and anyone else wanting to learn will have the skills to make sure that produce is available.
Groundwork Indy is transitioning from winter to a new growing season. Organizers said knowing your way around a garden insures you always can eat.
Inside its urban garden, people will see much of what they will find in any garden, plus young people next to the herbs and carrots.
“Trying to help them reconnect with their roots, which is the ground,” said director Darren Boyd about the work the kids do.
They raise gardening knowledge and much more. That’s been part of the mission at Groundwork Indy since it started years ago.
“Gardening used to be what most people of color did for sustenance. We had to have it just to live and we’ve gotten away from that,” Boyd said.
In the last few years, he said, there’s been a big push for the youth to reconnect. About 50 young people from ages 14-24 work in the program’s gardens around the city.
“So I can get better and work with the team,” Avontay Wray said.
He’s been working in the program for two years. It was his mom’s idea, but he says he’s grown in more than one way.
“How to communicate with others and also how to present myself and talk to others.”
Boyd said the work is more valuable in areas such as the Riverside neighborhood, which is considered a food desert lacking grocery stores.
So it’s often hard for people to access groceries and even hard at times to access fresh veggies and fruit. Add to that, COVID-19, he says, has created an unexpected spark in interest.
“Everybody wants to get into that whether it’s just tomatoes and peppers. Or if they want to go a little bit deeper than that and have carrots and beets and onions and potatoes. Everybody is getting into the act,” Boyd said.