While controversy grows in Westport over the future of the Community Gardens, dozens of gardeners are crowing.
They’ve just won a national award.
The American Community Gardening Association — a nonprofit with 252 members including parks, school gardens and urban farms — has named Westport the “Sustainability” winner. The honor “recognizes a community garden group leading environmental stewardship efforts in the care of their garden and the environment.”
The Westport Community Gardens won, director Lou Weinberg says, because “we are an organic garden, we compost all our waste, we have wildflower beds and milkweed beds, we are a monarch butterfly waystation, we are part of the Pollinator Pathway and Green Corridor, we donate fresh food, we support our local garden club, we support Eagle Scout projects, we build community, and we have created an ecologically rich habitat in a preserve surrounding the garden that is home to wildlife including resident and migratory birds and thousands of pollinators.”
Weinberg gave credit to “the town of Westport, Parks & Recreation Department, Public Works Department, dozens of local, state and national organizations, and hundreds of town residents who have spent over 100,000 volunteer hours building the Westport Community Gardens and the Long Lots Preserve.”
The award will be presented tomorrow, in Houston.
A few dozen of the Westport Community Gardens. There are 120 plots on the site.