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Austintown Community gardens planned
AUSTINTOWN
Establishing community gardens was on the minds of two people who came to speak at the public-comments section of the Austintown school-board meeting.
Both Dale Basista, founder of the Austintown Community Gardens and 1st Free Food Forest, and Christina Farr, Austintown Fitch High School cheerleading adviser, talked about their idea of creating a garden for both students and the community at large.
Farr said she thinks a community garden could be built on one of the vacant lots from Austintown schools that were razed about two years ago. She said she would like to use the site to plant organic vegetables.
The board said they would be in discussion with both Basista and Farr on the possibility of adding a garden on district property.
The board, at its meeting earlier this week, accepted the donation of four free epinephrine auto-injectors from Mylan Specialty and a prescription written by Seva Gedra, a nurse practitioner.
Epinephrine auto-injectors are used to help people who have life-threatening allergic reactions to bee stings and other things. Ohio House Bill 296 passed in April to allow all schools to use the auto-injectors without a license in case of emergency.
An auto-injector will be kept in each district school.
Toward the end of the meeting, superintendent Vincent Colaluca mentioned that Fitch High School expanded its drug testing to student drivers this school year. Any student who wants a driving pass will be put into a pool for random drug testing.
“We’ve been working on this since the summer of 2013,” he said. “The board wants us to look to increase drug-testing for all our students and staff as much as we can.”
Colaluca said drug testing students sets an example for them of what to expect when they enter the workforce. He said the district also is looking to expand drug-testing to all school employees.