After a fire, new hope for a garden in Kensington 

Trinity Thomas had walked by the Ruth Street Garden various times She d been curious about its rare expanse of green grass amid Kensington s landscape of asphalt and concrete its raised beds popping with red and yellow peppers vivid sprays of lavender and chives and cauliflower and eggplant I used to just see it a lot noted Thomas who lives down the street Every time you know it never was really open On a latest Wednesday afternoon however the gate was unlocked and about people milled around the park-like space Thomas was at last able to stroll in with her mom Taisha Diaz and her -year-old son Izair who made a beeline for a table covered with toys Kensington residents Trinity Thomas right her son Izair center and Taisha Diaz left share their opinions about the future of the Ruth Street garden at a neighborhood event on October Kimberly Paynter WHYY I love it Thomas revealed I love like the different types of flowers and that y all grow tomatoes fruits vegetables and stuff like that and give the stuff for the kids to do play and have a good time It s nice to have nice things in the region because we never can t have nothing no more in Kensington and just Philly in general she added You want to feel safe while you outside without dealing with needles fiends or like having to worry about anybody here getting hurt and stuff In fact the event the family had walked into was a celebration of the garden s persistence as an oasis of respite from the ravages of the neighborhood s opioid epidemic after it suffered a series of challenges that threatened to shut it down After being leased for years the -square-foot plot was in recent months purchased by the New Kensington Society Expansion Corporation ensuring its long-term survival and paving the way for further venture to restore losses the property suffered late last year We ve had a lot of deterrents and obstructions here in five years explained Britt Carpenter whose organization the Philly Unknown Project created the garden in But it hasn t stopped us yet and we re not going to stop Flames breaches and a huge loss Carpenter who is in recovery commented he started the garden as a tool for personal and group healing in a chaotic neighborhood In addition to providing neighbors with access to free fresh produce and eggs laid by its handful of chickens the site hosts events like Boy Scout gardening sessions birthday parties baby showers pet vaccinations and compost distribution Chickens at the Ruth Street Area Garden in Philadelphia s Kensington neighborhood provide eggs for neighbors Kimberly Paynter WHYY But that work lately faced the looming threat of interruption The property owner desired to sell and Philly Unknown a small nonprofit that runs a thrift store and does outreach to people living on the street lacked funding to acquire the land Carpenter discussed his options with Bill McKinney executive director of the NKCDC which already owned specific gardens and was working to create more green space around the neighborhood NKCDC got the site appraised and last October applied for funding from the William Penn Foundation s newly established grant project to preserve urban gardens Then the next month catastrophe hit in the form of a fire that destroyed a building next door Carpenter pointed to a now-vacant lot north of the property That used to be the wall of a building The fire ripped through it and took everything down he recalled during last week s celebration When they demolished the building it exposed the entire garden Firefighters rushing to reach the fire also cut down feet of the garden s fence along Ruth Street and drove their engines onto the property destroying eight raised planter beds he revealed Philly Unknown couldn t afford to repair the fence and the city refused to provide compensation The Ruth Street Locality Garden in Philadelphia s Kensington neighborhood is fundraising for repairs after a warehouse fire adjacent to their lot damaged the property Kimberly Paynter WHYY McKinney noted he s very familiar with the damage that vehicles can cause for example at McPherson Gateway Garden a small plot NKCDC owns on Kensington Avenue A week after we got it a car drove through the fence same way All of a sudden it was like how are we going to come up with another he reported When we got Tusculum Garden same thing Two weeks after we got that a car drove through it and where s there going to be more money Compounding Philly Unknown s woes thieves took advantage of the damaged and missing fencing along two sides of the property to enter and steal thousands of dollars worth of ladders and other equipment Carpenter declared We ve incurred a huge loss there he commented It s been an captivating ride put it that way Visions of urban farming In January the William Penn Foundation awarded NKCDC for land acquisition and to develop a Kensington Green Space plan Part of that money went toward purchasing the Ruth Street property in June McKinney mentioned that assistance was critical to meeting requirements that Kensington residents have often mentioned in locality engagement sessions New Kensington Locality Advance Corporation executive director Bill McKinney talks to the neighborhood about obtaining the Ruth Street garden on October Kimberly Paynter WHYY One of the things that came up over and over was how do we integrate more urban ag more greening into our public he described those gathered at the garden last week The foundation listened and they put money behind it What it s going to take in Kensington is consistency and a long-term vision and the vision requirements to come from the society When it comes from us it can last It doesn t matter who else comes and goes We will own it forever he commented Now that they don t have to worry about losing the site the two organizations are starting to think about its future Philly Unknown put up a proper fence at the property s northern end but the stretch along the sidewalk is propped up with boards and requirements to be replaced which will require more funding They also want to bring electricity and water to the site Purple sage in raised beds at the Ruth Street garden in Philadelphia s Kensington neighborhood Kimberly Paynter WHYY Carpenter announced he d like it to eventually serve as both a society space and an urban farm and food co-op along the lines of the acclaimed Greensgrow Farms in Fishtown which shut down three years ago Ruth Street Garden is a little bit of magic in the midst of all the chaos I call it It s a sanctuary and I really love it like that he declared We re going to make this what it really deserves to be for the society for the residents for everybody to just enjoy Catherine Reuter who manages NKCDC s gardens and green spaces noted the patch of land the fire trucks drove through could become for example a pumpkin patch or the site of a greenhouse As part of its planning effort the organization is starting to survey neighbors about what they d like to see done with the properties it oversees What does green space mean to you What do you need from it What kind of spaces What do we already have that requirements more backing she stated We re not telling the district what the plan should be We re asking all these questions to figure out what they want The Ruth Street Locality Garden in Philadelphia s Kensington neighborhood Kimberly Paynter WHYY The post After a fire new hope for a garden in Kensington appeared first on Billy Penn at WHYY