Archives

How one neighbor turned her property into a vibrant hub for community care and connection

When Leila McCabe of Oakland, Calif. wanted to find a way to connect more closely with her neighbors, she didn’t have to look far for a solution. McCabe’s home sits on a large double lot, and she had always dreamed of starting a community garden. So McCabe, her husband, and son thought: What better way to build relationships on her block than to turn their property into a thriving garden open to all?

As McCabe looked around the under-used land on her lot, she thought about the recent SNAP cuts, the high cost of food, and the impact these things were having on her friends, neighbors, and family. “I realized I didn’t want to create a small garden just for my household,” she says. “I wanted to do something that could benefit more people.”

So McCabe reached out to Tandi Family Farms, an urban farm and farm school that is reviving WWII-era “Victory Gardens,” to suggest a collaboration with her own organization, Beloved Communities Network (BCN), which is focused on strengthening relationships, belonging, and collective power in communities. Tandi agreed to the partnership, and BCN secured a rapid response grant to help McCabe bring forth the bountiful garden that she envisioned.

“Instead of two or three above-ground beds, we were able to include six raised beds in the front and 12 large in-ground beds in the back,” McCabe says. “We were also able to add fruit trees, 10 barrels, grapes, a living fence of passion fruit, native plants along the side of the house, and a full irrigation system.”

BCN and Tandi Family Farms teamed up to recruit volunteers to help build the garden and shared news of the event with folks in the neighborhood. And on a single day this past February, over 50 volunteers showed up. By late March, they began planting. The garden has now produced over 1,000 pounds of food, including more than 300 pounds of leafy greens. 

But for McCabe, the true harvest has been the new relationships forming in the community. “The people who are working and tending to the garden are also the people who are taking home the produce and cooking with it, distributing it to others, and sharing meals,” McCabe says. “It’s a community of care that’s being built. It’s not a transaction.”

She says the garden’s welcoming energy has transformed the block’s culture. Every Wednesday, volunteers come to tend the garden and distribute or pick up food. Folks who used to offer only a wave now stop to introduce themselves and ask questions. Neighbors, like the affectionately named “Super Mighty Dave,” regularly show up to drop off piles of compost and offer a helping hand. The garden has also become a place of learning and fun for neighborhood children.

And it’s not only neighbors getting involved – local organizations have lent their support, too. Habitat for Humanity donated a small playhouse. The Little Town Library in Oakland installed a hugely popular neighborhood library and seed library. And the Neighborhood Council now helps out with volunteer recruitment, events, and food distribution. 

McCabe is deeply inspired by all she has seen blossom right in her own yard. Just a few short months ago, the Beloved Community Garden began “with a simple but powerful idea,” McCabe says: Transform an underused yard into a place where neighbors can “grow food together, build relationships, share resources, and strengthen their ability to care for one another.” Today, McCabe and her neighbors are looking forward to their first fall harvest celebration in October, which will support the shared work around community food access and neighborhood resilience. 

McCabe likes to sum up all she has learned from the Beloved Community Garden with this: Years ago, a neighbor’s fire scorched a wild plum tree in her yard, leaving it seemingly dead. But when the community planted new fruit trees right next to it, the old tree miraculously sprang back to life, overflowing with plums. The tree became a lesson in interdependent thriving: we, too, are part of an ecosystem, and our ability to flourish is bound up with what is growing and being nurtured around us. Just like the garden, these Oakland neighbors are proving that tending to neighborhood connections can help the whole community thrive.

The post Growing a Beloved Community, One Harvest at a Time appeared first on Aspen Institute.