Ribbon cutting ceremony held at Georgia Brown’s new student garden
Paso Robles Library and Recreation Services Director Julie Dahlen, Georgia Brown Principal Ellalina Keller, One Cool Earth representatives Gregory Ellis and Victoria Carranza, and Paso Robles Water Resources Manager David LaCaro join the 4th and 5th grade students of Georgia Brown Elementary in the grand opening of their new native plant and vegetable garden. Photo by Skye Ravy.
– City employees, school representatives, students, and members of non-profit organization One Cool Earth gathered together on Friday to celebrate the grand opening of a new native plant and vegetable garden to be used by Georgia Brown Elementary’s fourth and fifth grade students.
The garden was primarily funded by two grants facilitated by One Cool Earth, a group that primarily supports youth, garden education, and green operations at schools. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s School Yard Habitat program helped pay for native plants and irrigation. A Nutrition Education and Obesity Prevention grant from the San Luis Obispo County Health Department paid for the vegetable beds.
The native plants were grown at Liberty Continuation High School as part of a student-run nursery. In addition, more than 30 dads, moms, and kids pitched in to provide labor to install the garden.
Ryan Harper, Floyd Butterfield, and Paul Ashton were instrumental in the organizing and planning of the project. Initial planning for the garden was donated by Josh Carmichael of Carmichael Environmental.
The garden started as a project to convert a lawn into a native habitat and drought tolerant landscape. In addition, the vegetable beds will be adopted by the fourth and fifth graders in hopes to increase their excitement about fruits and vegetables and learning outdoors.
“We realize that vegetables do you require water and our hope is that people can see that the lawns are an unnecessary use of water where children are not playing and we can mitigate our usage in order to grow healthy food for these children,” said Victoria Carranza, who works with One Cool Earth and was instrumental in obtaining the grants for the project.
To learn more about One Cool Earth visit www.onecoolearth.org.
