YNDC gets $70K grant for community garden program

Staff report

YOUNGSTOWN

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s People’s Garden Grant Program has awarded an $70,000 grant to the Youngstown Neighborhood Development Corp. for its Mahoning River Corridor Garden Grant program.

The program provides grants of up to $5,000 for those establishing new community gardens to serve as community educational resources for residents of those along the Mahoning River corridor including Lowellville, Struthers, Campbell, Youngstown, Girard, McDonald, Niles, Warren and Newton Falls.

Grants will be awarded through a competitive process, in which grantees will design their garden project and demonstrate community support and resources for the projects. Projects will be chosen based on innovative design, community impact, project sustainability and the project’s potential for community environmental education.

Grantee organizations will receive both technical assistance in implementing successful projects and the use of heavy equipment during community garden build days.

The project competition will be focused on neighborhood associations and resident groups, building their capacity to respond to challenges in their own neighborhoods through the creation of urban gardens on existing vacant land and the establishment, maintenance and use of community forests as neighborhood assets.