Lawrence Grassi Middle School and Canmore Community Daycare are going to get a whole lot greener thanks to local business Farm Box receiving permission from Canadian Rockies Public Schools (CRPS) to install a new community garden.
The CRPS school board gave a green light to the green thumbs behind homegrown and successful local group Farm Box last Thursday (Jan. 23) at the board’s regular monthly meeting.
“The season started off with a bang with all of the construction. We had students involved in painting rain barrels, had biology students come up to help plan our crops ... and harvest the vegetables,” Farm Box member Christian Wright said to the board on the success Farm Box had in 2013 with its Alpine Edibles program located on the roof of Canmore Collegiate High School (CCHS).
“We saw that there is an opportunity and involvement for high school students and Alpenglow; it was really neat to see the impact and that we couldn’t keep up,” Farm Box co-owner Crystel Vultier said to the board on the company’s success. “We saw that there is an opportunity, a hunger and a need for more.”
Farm Box figures they were able to grow around 600 pounds of vegetables in 2013, and want to continue and expand the trend in the coming season by offering even younger students a chance to learn and take part in gardening practices.
“What a neat opportunity to start off to a younger age; the younger kids are, we saw how keen they were,” Vultier added on the advantages of getting a younger audience to start taking part in local gardening.
“We identified a space between Lawrence Grassi and the daycare – it’s not heavily used for any purpose and a great location and that’s what we are here to propose.”
Farm Box said they would use the same model as was implemented at CCHS in 2013, with the group saying the model for the new project would be similar to the Canmore Community Garden.
“A difference in this garden is it will be more collaboration with students in building the garden,” said Vultier.
The board expressed concern as to any foreseeable problems with wildlife being attracted. “It’s like it has become a non-issue,” Vultier told the board, using the success of the community garden as an example of what Farm Box has learned to curb attracting wildlife to the area.
“The raised beds would certainly be an extra barrier along the fence,” Vultier said. “They would be one to two feet off the ground and it will also be provided with wildlife fencing.”
Farm Box estimates the new project will cost close to $9,500. Farm Box co-owner Avni Soma stressed to the board that education would be a major factor and component for the new project.
“I’ve heard a tremendous amount of positive impact throughout the year and I’m very excited about the project,” CRPS superintendent Chris MacPhee said.
“Nothing but good things can come from this, and I would like nothing better than to approve this project,” board trustee Kim Bater added.
