The Victory Garden Initiative's "blitz" is back to tackle food insecurity — one garden bed at a time.
The Victory Garden Initiative's annual blitz organizes volunteers to install garden beds across the city, while also providing soil, seeds and optional mentorship to help new gardeners get started. Since beginning the blitz in 2009, over 7,000 raised garden beds have been installed throughout the city.
The blitz was cancelled last year due to funding issues, for the first time in 14 years.
The price of the beds is income-based, meaning they are cheaper for those making less than $40,000 per year. Sinceree Dixon, volunteer programs and blitz coordinator at Victory Garden Initiative, says that the organization's mission is to combat food insecurity, and that income-based pricing helps people with lower incomes afford to grow their own food.
For Dixon, maintaining a garden bed is more than just a summertime hobby. Rather, it is a manageable step that a person can take toward taking control of what they eat, magnified with every bed installed.
"With each garden bed you're providing residential properties, schools, churches and businesses with an education on growing your own food," Dixon says. "It creates generational change."
The deadline for garden bed order is April 12, and beds will be installed between April 20 and May 4. You can order a raised garden bed to be installed at a location of your choosing here.
Volunteers needed
In order to install the garden beds, the Victory Garden Initiative is looking for volunteers.
"Each blitz brings together hundreds of volunteers, so that fact that we have that showing of support really speaks to the importance of our program in the city," Dixon says.
You can sign up to volunteer here.
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