Grid Magazine August 2014 [#064]

Susta i n a bl e Ph i l a d elp hi a

All Together Now Kensington co-op finds a home

Solardarity

Clean energy for community organizations

AUGUST 2014 / issue #64 gridphilly.com

Farming Social Justice for

Philadelphia Urban Creators’ amazing transformation of an empty lot—and community—in North Philadelphia

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The Myth of the Lone Genius

publisher

Alex Mulcahy alex@gridphilly.com 215.625.9850 ext. 102

Sharing values while sharing the credit

T

he July/August 2014 issue of The Atlantic has an excellent article about the Beatles songwriting partnership of Paul McCartney and John Lennon. For those of you who aren’t fellow Beatle fanatics, the two songwriters reportedly possessed very different—perhaps even opposite—personalities. In an attempt to understand the pair and their relationship, writers and fans have tried to distill each into a few distinct and opposing traits. One was naïve, the other worldly; one a traditionalist, the other an iconoclast; one was sweet, the other sour.

It’s tempting and maybe even natural in a highly individualistic society to pick apart a partnership and try to divvy up credit. However, doing so misses the magic of collaboration. It fails to understand how people with different personalities and perspectives can twist and shape an idea into something that could never be done alone. At its worst, trying to allocate credit can be a destructive process that praises one at the expense of the other.

Alex Epstein, one of the six co-founders of Philadelphia Urban Creators, bristles at the notion that he is the person behind the group, an idea that has been put forth in some stories about PUC. He always credits the team. “[It] is the only reason we are around. You can trace this all the way back to the beginning; it’s so diverse, it’s so mixed,” he says. “You have people from such different backgrounds who were the seeds of this thing. It’s really been frustrating because it’s easy for the media … [to paint] the picture of me as the guy who started this. It’s not only not true, but it’s the opposite. It hurts who we are. The whole point of this is to show people that you need a team, you need a diverse team.”

I stopped by PUC’s Life Do Grow farm on a particularly lively (and hot) July morning. Fellow co-founders Jeannine Kayembe and Troi Lauren Nichols led an inspirational and educational farm tour of about 20 middle school students from the neighborhood’s John F. Hartranft School. It was also the last day for a group of high school students from New York called New York 2 New Orleans Coalition who had worked on the farm for the past three weeks. As the students lined up to hug and get pictures with PUC co-founder Devon Bailey, you got the feeling they weren’t really ready to leave.

managing editor

Sara Schwartz sara@gridphilly.com 215.625.9850 ext. 103 art director

Danni Sinisi danni@gridphilly.com 215.625.9850 ext. 112 distribution / ad sales

Jesse Kerns jesse@gridphilly.com 215.625.9850 ext. 100 Drew Brightbill drew@gridphilly.com 215.625.9850 ext. 114 copy editor

Andrew Bonazelli PUC’s Alex Epstein and Devon Bailey with Grid Publisher Alex Mulcahy

junior designer

Corey Jameson interns

After the parade of goodbyes, Bailey said, “I have received so many blessings since I stopped thinking about myself and started doing things for other people.”

It’s not the only example of collaboration and selflessness in this issue of Grid. Our Everyday Hero, Susan Curry, placed a newspaper ad to find people who shared her values and the result of that effort was the group that founded Pennypack Farm. The Kensington Community Food Co-op has certainly benefited from some generous individuals, but it’s the whole of the community that makes it possible.

After a while, the myth of the lone genius melts away, and you start to recognize that just about everything relies upon collaboration and community.

Jack Braunstein Sylvie Luzio Frankie Pondolph writers

Bernard Brown Nic Esposito Mark Fischer Emily Kovach Andy Medici Molly O’Neill Emily Teel photographers

Kyle Huff Christian Hunold Neal Santos Cheryl Wilks illustrators

James Heimer Robb Leef controller

alex j. mulcahy, Publisher alex@gridphilly.com

Nicole Jarman nicole@gridphilly.com published by

Red Flag Media 1032 Arch Street, 3rd Floor Philadelphia, PA 19107 215.625.9850 g r i d p h i l ly . c o m

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community

Leader of the 'Pack

Ambler organizer and activist amazes all by emily kovach

Susan Curry is known throughout the Philadelphia EVERYDAY region as an environmental HERO organizer, perhaps most notably as one of the founders of Pennypack Farm, the first organic CSA-centric farm in Montgomery County.

In 2000, Curry was part of a group in the Philadelphia area studying voluntary simplicity—in her words, “Voluntarily living with very little income by significantly reducing expenses”—through the Northwest Earth Institute, a Portland, Ore., nonprofit that mentors those concerned with environmental issues. When the local group decided to start an organic farm, Curry wrote a letter to the editor of the Ambler Gazette, calling for a meeting at the Trax Café. The group became the founding committee of Pennypack Farm. “Every time we met at Trax Café, I had everyone write what they wanted our values to be,” Curry says. “I always wrote ‘bringing like-minded, progressive people together to form a community.’”

That phrase could serve as the guiding principle for Curry's life. After retiring in 1998 from a career in education working for Project SEED, a nonprofit that teaches advanced algebra and college level math to urban youth, Curry has dedicated much of her time to making a direct positive impact on her community. Thanks in large part to

Susan Curry, one of the founders of Pennypack Farm, has devoted her life to environmental issues.

her fundraising, organizing and political savvy, Pennypack Farm grew into a working organic farm with a popular CSA. Now in its 12th year, the educational nonprofit employs four year-round farmers, two administrative staff, apprentices, interns and seasonal farmers.

Andy Andrews, farm director at Pennypack, praises Curry’s dedication: “She’s been involved in everything from generating revenue through grant writing, managing volunteers, overseeing the education program and tending to the herb garden,” he says. “It’s hard to believe that anyone could do all of this at the volunteer level, but she did, and quite well.”

Curry has pursued her ideals on an academic level as well: she earned a master’s degree in Psychology and Environmental Studies at Vermont's Norwich University. There, she studied how one could be effective in shifting the cultural norms around issues of sustainability.

Today, she's an associate of the Ambler Environmental Advisory Council, where she facilitates

educational opportunities, such as workshops on composting and rain barrels, and running a light bulb and battery recycling campaign. As a member of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society’s Tree Tenders, she led the effort to plant 85 trees in Ambler in 2007. Today, she's working with the Advisory Council to encourage Ambler residents to install rain gardens.

While Curry has passed on some of her leadership responsibilities to the younger guard at Pennypack Farm, she is still involved with the farm’s Herbal Remedies Group, which meets monthly and also tends an herb garden at the farm, which Curry manages. She has been so involved that it was named The Susan Curry Garden of Medicinal Herbs in her honor.

Cheryl Wilks, a member of Pennypack Farm, has known Curry for 14 years. She says Curry is the glue that holds the herb group together, and is the group’s mentor and “wise mother.” “She’s very committed to everything she does; I don’t even know how she does everything she does.”

SALUTES Philadelphia Bike Share

In mid-June, the Philadelphia City Council passed a bill allowing Bicycle Transit Systems to operate a bicyclesharing program, and for Wisconsin-based B-Cycle to provide bicycles, stations and technology platforms for the system. The program will launch in spring 2015 with a 60-station and 600-bike system. Philadelphia will join 40 other U.S. cities with bike sharing programs, including New York, Washington, D.C., and Boston. “Bike sharing is a huge win for Philadelphia,” says Councilwoman Blondell Reynolds Brown, chairwoman of the City Council Committee on the Environment and author of the bill.

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gr id p h il ly.co m august 2014

Paul W. Meyer Paul W. Meyer, the F. Otto Haas Executive Director of the Morris Arboretum of the University of Pennsylvania since 1991, was given the Liberty Hyde Bailey Award on June 5. Bailey was an important proponent of horticulture in America during the late 19th and early 20th centuries and the American Horticultural Society award is given to an individual who has made significant lifetime contributions in the field.

As curator of the Morris Arboretum's living collection in 1976, Meyer earned the award for transforming the collection from a dilapidated lesser-known former private estate into a world-class public garden. He also helped found the North America-China Plant Exploration Consortium in 1991, traveling extensively throughout the world in search of new plants to introduce to American gardens.

Energy

Coordinating Agency In May, the Environmental Protection Agency gave the Energy Coordinating Agency a grant of nearly $200,000 to help train 67 local unemployed adults from low-income neighborhoods in North Philadelphia for environmental cleanup jobs. ECA is one of 18 organizations nationwide selected this year by the EPA for the agency’s Environmental Workforce Development and Job Training grants. The nonprofit helps people conserve energy to support a sustainable future for the Philadelphia region by providing energy audits, home performance, insulation, heating, full weatherization, inspection and other environmental services. photo by Cheryl Wi lks

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Open now through August 31

Pop-Up Promenade This summer through Aug. 31, SEPTA can drop you off at a pop-up park oasis. The Spruce Street Harbor Park at the Penn’s Landing Marina is where you can walk the boardwalk, hang out at the urban beach, play shuffleboard, chill in one of the 50 colorful hammocks or grab a bite to eat and refreshments at the Garces Group's restaurant and bar.

Created by Groundswell Design Group and commissioned by the Delaware River Waterfront Corporation, the project takes advantage of the marina and pre-existing park space by using expressive and colorful design elements that blend the urban backdrop with the beachy elements of a great summertime spot, day or night. Need to spend some time on the water? Rent one of the many swan boats or kayaks through the Paddle Penn’s Landing program. But don't forget the kiddos—they can spend their allowances on arcade games while enjoying typical fair fare like funnel cakes, caramel corn and cotton candy. The centerpieces are the three floating barges decked out with sand, Adirondack chairs, picnic tables, flowers, grasses and trees (previously seen at the Waterfront Winterfest). And while you’re relaxing, the seven floating water gardens from Floating Islands International are hard at work providing a home for microbes that are breaking down water-borne pollutants— cleaning the water in the marina while being aesthetically beautiful. —Sara Schwartz For more information about the Spruce Street Harbor Park, visit sprucestreetharborpark.com .

photos by ky l e h u f f

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community

Getting Their Share S

tephanie Singer and her husband, Mike, had been interested in joining a food coop for years, so when she initially heard that the Kensington Community Food Co-op (KCFC) was coming to her neighborhood she was excited. But she concedes, “I was a little skeptical at first since I know these things can take years and years.” After attending the KCFC location announcement party at the Philadelphia Brewing Company’s tasting room on May 4, her reservations disappeared. “I was very impressed by the large turnout,” she says. “It felt like this was really going to happen. At that moment, we were ready to make our financial commitment, and we joined as members.”

Singer’s reaction was welcome news to KCFC board members and volunteers. KCFC’s multiyear search for a location came to an end last summer when they targeted the shuttered O’Reilly’s Pub at 2672 Coral St. The 4,200-square foot first floor and 1,110-square foot basement fit the spatial needs of KCFC’s feasibility study, and its location—just a half-block from Frankford Avenue —was ideal. But the bigger selling points were the patio area, the 18-car parking lot, and the liquor license that was attached to the building. Once the store opens, the 30-seat café will sell prepared food and local and regional craft beer that members will be able to enjoy at the space or take home.

But with every moving piece seeming to align perfectly for the KCFC board, the whole deal still almost fell through. As director-at-large Jeff 10

gr idph il ly.co m august 2014

AN FR

I-95 VE KA

by nic esposito

KCFC

R YO

Kensington community embraces their nascent food co-op

VE DA

OR KF

Carpineta says, “During that time, the building was heavily vandalized, and a New Jersey bank foreclosed on the property. The co-op was in no position to buy the building and needed an angel [investor] to close the deal, and then two came.”

Mike and Sue Wade, who had roots in the neighborhood, purchased the site, giving the co-op a generous lease with an option to purchase.

Mike Wade says their reasons for the loan were simple: “We helped out because we’re members, and we believe in the mission and the people behind KCFC. It is inspirational to us to watch these folks take a hands-on approach to improving their neighborhood, and we are honored to be a part of it.”

According to a 2008 census, Kensington has a population of 21,635. As new development has boomed in the past six years, bringing in many more new residents like Singer, there are still only two major grocery stores serving the neighborhood’s boundaries. So, a community based solution to this lack of food access certainly appealed to longtime residents like the Wades, and their newer neighbors.

Although KCFC now has a lease on the building, there is still much work to be done to open the fully operational cooperative grocery store envisioned by the board. Interim Director Timothy Dych says, “Our goal for the coming months is for our membership to grow significantly by encouraging our members-owners to assist in getting their friends, family and neighbors to

R WA LA E R D E RIV

E

join. We are also looking for members to work on our membership, marketing, planning and finance committees. These committees will chart the course we take to doors opening.”

This will be a challenge, as the membership was at 500 members at press time, with 800 members needed by the end of 2014. These memberowners will be asked for member-loans to provide the key capital that banks and lenders require. If solid financing commitments are secured from banks and lenders, KCFC plans to start building and equipping the store in 2015, with a goal of fully opening in 2016. But as Dych points out, the members will ultimately determine that timeline, “KCFC is truly born of the people of the neighborhood, and will succeed or fail based on the support and hard work of our residents.”

If the dedication of members like Singer are any indication, meeting that timeline will not be a problem. “My husband and I love being part of a community,” says Singer. “It just feels right to invest in the long-term success of this neighborhood as we grow our family, and we are grateful that we can do that through KCFC.” For more information on membership, visit kcfc.coop/membership or email info@kcfc.coop . re n d e rin g courtesy of ma ke.

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Millions of Peaches

Making use of pick-your-own bounty story and photos by emily teel

O

nce a year, my friend Colleen and I pack ourselves into her Honda for a trip to pick peaches at Mood’s Farm in Mullica Hill, N.J. Once we make it over the Betsy Ross Bridge, the drive to our destination is a short one. Soon we’re in the orchard, shaded by the sickle-shaped leaves of the peach trees.

Relative to pick-your-own berries, peaches accumulate quickly, and it can be difficult to gauge when enough is enough. When we’ve tired of eating them fresh, in pies or chopping them into salsa, we slice and freeze them for smoothies, or opt to can them.

Don’t be intimidated by the canning process.

This Peach-Jalapeño Barbecue Sauce requires little more equipment than what you'd need to make pasta. Soon you’ll be spending an evening crowded around a grill, basting a chicken with the sweet, spicy sauce, and sipping a sangria featuring locally produced white wine. emily teel is a food freelancer dedicated to sustainable, delicious food in Philadelphia.

See more of her work at emilyteel.com .

W HAT'S IN TH E BO X?

Charlestown Farm Though some farms welcome anyone for pick-your-own, at Charlestown Farm in Phoenixville, Pa., access to the fields is one of the perks of being a Community Sponsored Agriculture (CSA) member. Not only can members expect a mix of the following (pre-harvested) in their shares, but they can also participate in “you pick” additions of berries, grapes, cucumbers, pumpkins and herbs. Farm manager Rick Rigutto says these additions encourage member participation throughout the farm’s growing season. charlestownfarm.com »» Tomatoes »» Sweet Peppers »» Hot Peppers »» Eggplant »» Cucumbers »» Zucchini »» Melons

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»» Onions »» Salad mix »» Kale »» Beets »» Garlic »» Potatoes »» Raspberries

gr idph i l ly.co m august 2014

Peach-Jalapeño BBQ Sauce makes 4½ pint jars 4 cups peach purée cup red bell pepper, finely chopped (about of pepper) cup minced jalapeño Cup onion, finely chopped 4 cloves garlic ¾ cup honey ¾ cup apple cider vinegar 1 Tablespoon ketchup 1 Teaspoon smoked paprika 1½ Teaspoon mustard powder 2 Teaspoons salt

Peel, pit and puree the peaches in a blender or food processor.

Prepare a boiling water canner and sterilize 4 half-pint jars by boiling them for 10 minutes. Wash jar lids and rings, and bring to a simmer in a separate small saucepan. Don’t allow lids to boil. Turn off heat and allow jars, lids and rings to sit submerged until you need them.

In a wide, non-reactive pan, combine all ingredients and bring mixture to a boil.

Reduce to a simmer and cook, stirring occasionally, until mixture has thickened and darkened slightly. About 30 minutes.

When sauce has reached desired consistency, turn off heat and skim any foam from the top with a spoon.

Ladle sauce into prepared jars, leaving a half-inch of head space. Wipe the rims of the jars with a clean kitchen towel, and seal with lids and rings.

Place sealed jars back in canning kettle. Once all jars have been added, ensure that the water level clears the lids by at least one inch. Add more water if necessary and bring water to a boil. When water boils, set timer for 15 minutes.

After 15 minutes, turn off heat and allow jars to sit in water for five minutes. Then, using a jar lifter, remove jars to a cooling rack.

Once jars have reached room temperature, remove rings and test that all jars have sealed properly (the center of the lid should not pop when pressed). If any have not sealed, store them in the refrigerator. Store other jars in a cool place.

Peach-Jalapeño Barbecued Chicken Prepare grill for indirect cooking and preheat to medium-high.

Toss chicken pieces with vegetable oil until coated. Season generously with salt and pepper and place on grill, skin side down, directly over the flame/coals.

Grill for 5 to 10 minutes, enough to get a nice color and grill marks.

Once chicken has been seared, flip and move to the cool side of the grill.

If cooking on gas, reduce flame to medium-low.

Cover grill and allow chicken to cook for 25 to 30 minutes.

Remove cover, flip chicken pieces, and brush them with a thin layer of barbecue sauce.

Replace cover and cook for 15 minutes. Repeat, turning, basing, covering and cooking in 15-minute intervals until the chicken is completely cooked through. Total cooking time should be 1.5 to 2 hours.

Brush with more barbecue sauce and serve.

1 whole chicken, cut into parts 3 peaches, quartered 1 medium-sized red onion, cut into thick slices 1 jar Peach Jalapeño Barbecue Sauce, or one cup of barbecue sauce 1 Tablespoon vegetable oil Salt Pepper

White Peach Sangria with Raspberries 1 cup peach purée (from about 1 pound peaches, peeled, pitted and puréed in a blender) 1 bottle citrusy white wine, like Sauvignon Blanc, chilled 2 ounces (50 mL) elderflower liquor Juice from one lime

Garnish: 2 peaches, sliced 1 orange, halved and sliced 1 lemon, halved and sliced 1 lime, cut into rounds 1 half-pint raspberries 2-3 sprigs mint Ice

In a pitcher, combine lime juice, wine and elderflower liquor. Add tray of ice cubes.

Add sliced peaches, lemon, orange, lime and mint leaves. Gently stir in raspberries last.

Serve over additional ice as needed.

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ENVIRONMENT

Water, gravity and sand combine to teach Philadelphians about stormwater runoff at the Cobbs Creek Environmental Educational Center.

Watershed Moment

Cobbs Creek Environmental Education Center opens a new gateway into the park with exhibit by bernard brown • photo by christian hunold

F

or the longest time, it was a decrepit stables building in an infamous, crime-ridden park that neighbors were afraid to enter, alongside a creek that stank every time rains washed sewage into it. ¶ Then neighborhood activists led by Carole Williams-Green capped a 10-year organizing effort by converting the stables building into the Cobbs Creek Environmental Education Center in 2001, with classrooms for academic programming and meeting space for residents.

Fairmount Park increased cleanup efforts in the Cobbs Creek park and developed programming to bring neighbors into the park, including a 5k race, now in its fourth year. (Full disclosure: I served on the board of the center from 2008 to 2010.) The Philadelphia Water Department has made Cobbs Creek a model neighborhood in its efforts to reduce pollution from stormwater runoff.

But something was missing. “[It was] such an amazing facility and a little slice of habitat in the city, but it wasn’t a visitor center,” says artist Josh Robeson, who taught a summer educational program there in 2009 with Tony Croasdale, now Visitor Services Manager at the Center.

“I wanted CCCEEC to have a space like Pennypack, Heinz and Schuylkill Center,” Croasdale says. On June 6, the Center opened the Carole Williams Green Exhibits Room, funded by the

14

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Philadelphia Water Department as part of its Green Cities, Clean Waters initiative, which aims to improve Philadelphia’s waterways by better managing stormwater runoff.

Visitors at the exhibit can read about the history of the watershed and the challenges it faces today, and then experiment with stormwater runoff on the 15-foot stream table in the center of the room. A “green wall” watered by rain captured from the center’s roof presents one solution.

Urban kids can enjoy nature as well as anyone else, but an introduction helps. Paintings

by Robeson, guidebooks and iPads with nature apps are a start, but binoculars positioned for children to point out the window at the bird feeders offer connections.

According to Naturalist Program Coordinator Daniel Kobza, “As soon as kids come in the room,

they immediately run to either the binoculars or the stream table. It’s hard to keep up with their questions, especially about all the birds they see and what their names are.”

Temple University Student and Senior Docent Tykee James says, “I like that we can walk in and there’s something to do—we can finally learn and teach within the center.”

The exhibit's local wildlife diorama features male and female wood ducks, carved by Philadelphia sculptor Peter Morgan, and appear to float on the surface of Cobbs Creek. A snapping turtle lurks beneath them. But this diorama differs from the rest in that it features a large combined sewer outflow pipe.

This is Cobbs Creek, after all, a ribbon of natural beauty weaving through an urban landscape of rowhomes and asphalt streets. We can go there to enjoy the wood ducks and other wildlife—over 100 species of birds have been documented in the park, according to Croasdale—but we can’t ignore what washes into the creek from the city to either side. bernard brown is an amateur field herper and bureaucrat. He writes about urban natural history and sustainable eating.

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Energy

Green Mountain Energy's Sun Club "flipped the switch" on its largest solar installation in Philadelphia at Greensgrow Farms on Earth Day.

Solar Power, No Charge

Green Mountain Energy donates solar panels to community organizations

T

he large wooden stand high above the heads of customers picking through vegetables at Greensgrow Farms in North Philadelphia does more than just shield the sun while they shop—it’s pulling solar power, too. Equipped with 16 solar panels, the array provides the urban farm with clean, renewable energy. All told, the 5,000 kilowatt hours of power the solar array is expected to produce every year could save the organization about $1,000.

But Greensgrow Farms could not have done it alone. The nonprofit recently received a $20,000 grant from Sun Club, Green Mountain Energy’s program that provides solar panels and power systems for local organizations looking to better their communities. While the Texas-based company has been selling renewable energy since 1997, it expanded its operations to the Philadelphia area in 2012 and began looking for community organizations to offer funding for solar projects. The company now serves customers in Texas, Illinois, Maryland, New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania in markets where customers have the power to choose their electricity provider.

Rebecca Frimmer, the then-manager of Greensgrow, says solar power fits in perfectly with the 16

gr idph il ly.co m august 2014

farm’s mission. “We always talk about ways to make Greensgrow and Philly more sustainable,” Frimmer says. “It really did seem like a natural fit for us on the farm to have that clean energy.”

She said the building and installation of the solar farm stand only deepened the relationship with the Sun Club and Green Mountain Energy, adding that when Greensgrow needs help with a new planting project—or educating the community on healthy foods or urban farming—more than 15 Sun Club employees will volunteer to help. And Tony Napolillo, the Sun Club manager at Green Mountain Energy, hopes the company can continue to participate in future events at Greensgrow Farms and at the other groups the Sun Club is helping through its grant program.

by andy medici

“We are not just a company that buys renewable energy and acts like everybody else,” Napolillo says. “We all have this passion to make this a better world, and renewable energy can help with that.”

In addition to Greensgrow, the Sun Club is helping three other groups purchase and install their own solar arrays: Spring Mill Fire Company in Conshohocken, Pa.; the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society’s Meadowbrook Farm in Abington Township; and Green Woods Charter School in Northwest Philadelphia.

Once Green Mountain Energy donates the money and helps set up the system, the recipients own the solar arrays outright. Green Mountain Energy grants hundreds of thousands of dollars a year—there is no official dollar goal the company looks to award—to nonprofits looking to upgrade to solar. The Sun Club has gotten involved in dozens of communities it has operated in since it began giving money to charities for solar projects in 2002. Since then, Green Mountain Energy has donated more than $2.5 million to help install more than 600 kilowatts of solar power—avoiding 924,000 pounds of carbon photos courtesy o f n ewsworks

Equipped with 16 solar panels, the array provides Greensgrow with clean, renewable energy and could save the organization about $1,000 in energy costs every year.

dioxide, or the equivalent of planting 110 trees a year. And what does Green Mountain Energy get out of all this? Helping promote solar power is part of the organization’s mission, and by helping nonprofits produce power, Green Mountain Energy can educate communities on renewable energy and help promote solar power.

Any organization can apply for a grant from the Sun Club, Napolillo says. They just have to own the property and have a suitable place for a solar array, and Green Mountain can help them work out the rest, including technical details, finding vendors and even how to build the array. But the Sun Club gives special attention to schools, community service organizations and groups that help promote food security in urban areas.

“The ones that make it through the application process that are the most compelling are the ones that have a great mission, and the solar power would enhance their ability to meet that mission,” Napolillo says.

In that category is Meadowbrook Farm. The Sun Club is giving the organization $40,000 to help power its 12 greenhouses. The solar array that will be attached to the greenhouses will be completed Oct. 11, according to Alan Jaffe, its director of communications. The solar energy will help power the organization’s environmentally

“We are not just a company that buys renewable energy and acts like everybody else. We all have this passion to make this a better world, and renewable energy can help with that.”

—tony Napolillo, Sun Club manager, Green Mountain Energy friendly growing operation and create a learning opportunity for visitors. “It’s a fantastic thing for us to be able to power our greenhouses and practice sustainable energy,” Jaffe says. “We are trying to change people’s ways of thinking about horticulture and how they work in their gardens.”

But solar power can also teach kids about relying less on fossil fuels. At Green Woods Charter School, kindergarteners through eighth graders study the ponds, creeks and artificial wetlands spread across its four acres. Built on top of a former brownfield site—an area that contained hazardous pollutants or contaminants—the school jumped at the chance to use solar to power the water supply pumps that fill the creeks and ponds with water recycled on site.

The 10 solar panels—mounted on a pair of twin poles across a few dozen feet—were made possible by a $30,000 grant from Green Mountain Energy’s Sun Club, and will be up and running by the end of October. “This is a great chance to not just use solar electricity for power but also to educate a community and teach children about how solar power works,” Napolillo says.

The school created a curriculum on how solar energy works and how it benefits the environment, according to school technology coordinator Nicole Starke. Students also held an art contest and are filming a documentary. And an energy monitor will be installed so students can measure how much energy the panels generate and gather data on how they are affected by weather.

“We can’t take students to the Brazilian rainforest, and we can’t take them to other faraway places, but we have been given a chance to show them firsthand how solar energy works,” Starke says.

“There are so many things we can teach them.”

The second-graders are already excited. “It will make us a better school for helping us learn about nature,” says student Eadin McAllister. Fellow second-grader Dylan Balcer is interested in learning more about the large batteries that help keep the solar power flowing at all times. “They store the energy so that if the sun is not shining that day, we can still have energy,” he says.

For more information about the Sun Club, visit greenmountainenergy.com . august 20 14

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From

the Ground Up

Philadelphia Urban Creators take root in North Philadelphia, enacting their bold plan to educate, energize, empower and unite story by Molly O’Neill & photos by Neal Santos

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long 11th Street in North Philadelphia, a short drive from City Hall, are blocks of crumbling rowhomes and crowded public housing apartments, interrupted by the conspicuously new townhomes and condos of Temple University students. Vacant lots abound, edged by rickety fences and rife with weeds and litter. A few parks stand eerily empty, their rusty basketball hoops and crumbling concrete a testament of neglect. In the middle of it all stands a most unlikely neighbor: a farm.

The Philadelphia Urban Creators co-founders, left to right: Golden Murray, Troi Lauren Nichols, Jeannine Kayembe, Devon Bailey, Alex Epstein and Denzel Thompson

A chain-link fence surrounds the lot where a warehouse once stood. Inside, a graffiti mural painted over a brick wall proclaims the farm’s name, Life Do Grow. This property, at 11th and Dakota Streets, is the beating heart of the Philadelphia Urban Creators (PUC), a nonprofit organization striving to enrich the lives of North Philadelphia residents through urban agriculture.

It’s an unexpected burst of life in the middle of the neighborhood.

When 22-year-old New York City native Alex Epstein, one of PUC’s six co-founders, first arrived at Temple as a freshman, he says, “At orientation, they kept telling us not to go into North Philly, that it was too dangerous.” Epstein, who had organized several high school volunteer trips to New Orleans, was no stranger to blight, and saw the neighborhood as an opportunity for growth. “The idea of moving into a community that wasn’t mine and not interacting with it was absurd,” he says. “That’s not why I came here.”

The first inklings of the PUC surfaced in 2010 when Epstein gathered a group of 18 teenagers, Temple students and North Philadelphia residents to volunteer at Our School at Blair Grocery (OSBG), an urban farm and education center in New Orleans. That group included Jeannine Kayembe, a Los Angeles native who had moved to Philadelphia to pursue her career as a spoken-word poet, and then 14-year-old Denzel Thompson, who had met Epstein at an after-school program. In New Orleans’ Lower Ninth Ward, says Epstein, the North Philadelphia residents recognized many problems similar to their own at home. august 20 14

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A mural welcomes visitors to Life Do Grow farm. At right, Denzel Thompson is honored by Queen Latifah after he won a TeenNick HALO award for his work with PUC.

Denzel’s the one changing the world right now. … [I]t shows that his generation is not just about texting all the time or doing a crazy dance. They have gifts and abilities, and they’re connecting people in a way that no other generation has been able to do.”

Queen Latifah, to BET “I’ll never forget this,” Epstein says. “The Philly crew was all playing basketball, and the New York kids were just kind of hanging out on the side, and there was a drive-by shooting right in front of the school where we were working.

We saw a guy get shot and killed. And all of the New York kids, including myself, freaked out, and the Philly guys just kind of went on like nothing happened.”

“We hear gunshots all the time,” Thompson says. “When I don’t hear gunshots, then I think something’s wrong.”

Sowing Seeds When the group returned home, they started planning. First came more trips to New Orleans to work with OSBG founder Nat Turner and others helping to transform the post-Katrina landscape into a healthy, sustainable space. “There were evolutionary mindsets all around us,” Kayembe says. “We were watching people change the food system through organizing, through shared values.”

The PUC team spent nearly two years gathering interest and forming an identity. In addition to Epstein, Kayembe and Thompson, the core group of founders include Devon Bailey, a construction worker who owns an apartment and workspace across the street; Troi Lauren Nichols, a vocalist and dancer; and Golden Murray, a recreation therapy student at Temple.

In early 2011, the physical footprint of the farm was established. The Village of Arts and Humanities, a local nonprofit arts and culture or22

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ganization, supported the establishment of PUC through a memorandum of understanding. The Village had worked with the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society and Philadelphia Parks and Recreation caring for the land on which PUC was established, as well other parks and gardens in the neighborhood. The founders and a crew of neighborhood volunteers began clearing, cleaning and building at the site, gathering discarded lumber, pallets and tires to build planters. Donations of paint, plywood and corrugated roofing helped to complete the first few structures. Life Do Grow was ready to live up to its name.

In its first growing season, the farm produced tomatoes, peppers, string beans, collard greens, broccoli, mint and lettuce. PUC was able to host its first few small farmers markets, and even begin producing and selling salsa to nearby market Leotah’s Place. Now in its fourth season, the farm has expanded its harvest enough to offer a twice-weekly farmers market through the peak summer growing times.

As Thompson, now 19, circles the lot, he points out feathery carrot tops, rainbow chard, sturdy kale, delicate asparagus sprouts and more. A vermiculture system creates compost from neighborhood food scraps. Rows of vegetables receive water from a homemade, gravity-powered irrigation system. Giant rain barrels stand all around the property so no water goes to waste.

Compost piles have been ingeniously placed around plastic-paneled plant houses, allowing the heat released from the composting process to warm the insulated structures. At the center

of it all is a huge hoop house and accompanying solar panels, donated by Magic Johnson. In 2012, Kayembe won the athlete’s “What Inspires You?” video contest, and he sent materials and staff to North Philadelphia to erect the structure. The very next day, Hurricane Sandy tore it down. Johnson’s team, thankfully, returned to rebuild it.

The following year, Thompson won the TeenNick HALO (Helping And Leading Others) award for his work with PUC. Over his four years with the organization, Thompson transformed from an obese, depressed eighth grader to an engaged, active teenager by learning to grow his own food. “That was a great point of me growing out of depression,” he says, “and actually enhancing myself.” He lost over 100 pounds along the way, and his metamorphosis helped him secure a grant from HALO and a surprise visit from Nick Cannon. At the awards show, aired on Nick at Nite, Queen Latifah honored Thompson. She told BET, “Denzel’s the one changing the world right now. … I’m really proud of him because when the world gets to see people like him, it shows that his generation is not just about texting all the time or doing a crazy dance.

They have gifts and abilities, and they’re connecting people in a way that no other generation has been able to do.”

Growing the Business Although grants have paved the way for PUC’s major accomplishments, the members are working to develop more sustainable longterm funding methods. The farm grows herbs, greens, sprouts and wheatgrass for a few local restaurants, including FUEL Philly and Kamal’s Middle Eastern Specialties. PUC also offers an Adopt-A-Greenhouse program, whereby restaurateurs and market owners can spend $2,000 to $3,000 up front to have a customized hoophouse built to house menu-specific produce. Iovine Brothers Produce has one such structure, where wheatgrass, microgreens and several different types of basil thrive away from hungry squirrels.

Jimmy Iovine, co-owner of Iovine Brothers Produce, says PUC approached him because his store is known for supporting youth education at the Reading Terminal Market. The Iovines grew up in North Philadelphia as well, so they were eager to give back to that community. “We were kinda hooked,” says Iovine. “We love the whole idea of what they’re doing, the urban growing and cleaning up the neighborhood and teaching the kids. The whole thing is close to our hearts.”

The Iovines have formed a close relationship with PUC, helping to find buyers for produce that PUC needs to sell, and working with the farm to help boost its wheatgrass production and sales. “I think that if they do wheatgrass that well,” Iovine says, “other people will want it, knowing where it comes from, knowing how it gets distributed—it’s local, its good quality, the price is right.”

Another partnership option is the Adopt-AGarden program, which is still in incubation.

For $6,000, a restaurant can sponsor the development of a community garden, including raised beds, vegetable rows, a vertical herb wall, greenhouse and compost system. PUC will train local community members to manage and maintain the garden, and harvest crops. Fifty percent of

the produce grown will be sold back to the restaurant at market value, and the other half will be designated for those working on the garden.

Rachel Voluck, a Temple senior who volunteers at Life Do Grow, believes that these programs have potential to be the cornerstone of PUC’s funding. “With the growth in the local food movement,” she says, “I think many restaurants in Philly would be interested in partnering with PUC to source produce.”

The PUC team offers contract projects as another way to meet its funding needs. One such project was a greenhouse built at Carver High School of Engineering and Science. PUC partnered with the school to design and build the structure as a celebration of its graduating class of 2014. Other services include ecological sur-

There were evolutionary mindsets all around us.

We were watching people change the food system through organizing, through shared values.”

Jeannine Kayembe, PUC co-founder Troi Lauren Nichols, left, and Jeannine Kayembe share a light moment after wrapping up a tour of Life Do Grow farm.

veys, landscaping and training to help clients maximize use of their new sustainable systems.

For individuals or organizations who want to learn new skills, PUC offers an Urban Innovation Program. Modules from Communication to Community Organizing and Environmental Literacy to Entrepreneurship are practiced in the field, through work in PUC’s farms and gardens.

After four years of cobbling together an income from these fledgling programs, grants and farmers markets, PUC is finally beginning to stabilize its budget. “We’re hard workers, so we really like to make our own dollar,” Kayembe says.

Serving the Neighborhood PUC’s methods of educating and strengthening the North Philadelphia community are as varied as its funding sources. The farmers market program is a source of income, but its primary goal is introducing healthy eating to potential customers from the Philadelphia Housing Authority tenements across the street.

“We want to create that commerce of getting people used to buying organic food, because government food is ridiculous—the powdered milk, the cheese in the block,” Kayembe says.

“The folks who live in the project aren’t used to buying local produce, and that’s something we want to try to turn around.”

She refers to the forces at work in a food desert as food injustice, a term she learned from the organizers at OSBG. When she discovered that the corner stores in blighted areas like the Lower Ninth Ward and North Philly receive food shipments that have been sitting on trucks for six months or more, she was shocked. “I realized, wow, they’re holding food back from people.”

And although the North Philadelphia residents under 25 might be more drawn to fast food, Kayembe says the older residents are asking for kale and collards and tomatoes and onions—soul food staples. Almost everybody in that neighborhood, she says, has been there for 40 to 50 years, and for the most part, the seniors and people with disabilities are forgotten. “I’ve seen people cry because everyone wants to feed the babies, nobody wants to feed the seniors,” she says.

PUC also runs a variety of after-school programs for juveniles who have already had run-ins with law enforcement. The organization is in its first few weeks of a pilot program with the Institute for Development of African American Youth (IDAAY), a local agency that works to provide at-risk youth with the skills they need to escape the pitfalls of inner-city life.

For 15 weeks, teens in IDAAY’s Don’t Fall Down in the Hood program come to Life Do Grow after work to help plant, weed, paint, hammer, saw— and communicate.

IDAAY Executive Director Archye Leacock says that the team-building and problem-solving skills gleaned from urban farming are directly applicable to neighborhood life. If the teens can learn to work together, to respect each other and august 20 14

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the land, to speak with others of all ages, they can be more productive members of their own communities.

Don’t Fall Down in the Hood Program Director Wesley Jones says, “A lot of our young men feel devalued, and they feel like they have no place in the community.” But in their work with PUC, he says, “they become part of the solution.

They are helping transform a blighted area from start to finish, and that gives them a sense of satisfaction. It gives them confidence and helps them feel like part of the community.”

One project that IDAAY participants are

currently working on involves establishing and maintaining satellite community gardens.

Around the corner from PUC on Dakota Street, there had been an empty lot filled with chesthigh weeds; 14 raised beds now grow buckwheat, onions, herbs and other vegetables. Neighbors from each house on the block are asked to choose a bed where they can grow whatever they’d like to harvest for meals at home. PUC helps teach the neighbors how to garden, and asks only that they continue to care for the crops on their own.

A beehive tucked behind the garden houses pollinators to encourage biodiversity.

Leacock hopes that by the end of the program, the IDAAY crew will be able to bring homegrown produce back to the agency to cook family meals for participants. “From the moment of planting to the moment of eating,” he says, “what a success!”

Devon Bailey, PUC’s Site and Development Manager, offers both construction training and self-defense lessons as outlets for at-risk youth.

In his warehouse across 11th Street from the farm, a punching bag dangles from the ceiling, and stacks of lumber and building materials line the walls. The neighborhood kids gravitate toward

Troi Lauren Nichols talks to a group about food justice.

Devon Bailey shows off the farm’s hard working vermicomposters.

Volunteers, students and interns work together on the farm. Left to right: Dashaun Kemp, Damier Kemp, Griffin Cloud-Levine, Daquan Kemp and Lucas Johnson.

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We love the whole idea of what they’re doing, the urban growing and cleaning up the neighborhood and teaching the kids. The whole thing is close to our hearts.”

Jimmy Iovine,

Iovine Brothers Produce Co-owner

him as a former self-professed “corner boy” who began using his skills for good.

“I speak what I hear in my neighborhood,” Bailey says, “so when the young’uns come, they understand what I’m saying because everything is in hustle terms. Something as simple as compost, it’s a hustle, because I’ve got two parts that I’m getting for absolutely free. I put them together and I take care of them, and I wait a little bit of time, and guess what? Boom. I’ve got a profit.”

Bailey’s motivation for helping is simple: “It just feels like the right thing to do. There’s no thought process behind it; it’s just, ‘What are we doing next?’”

Blockparty, Hoodstock 2014 PUC hopes to take its model nationwide. The team has already established community gardens in New York, and worked with organizations like Growing Power for inspiration.

Growing Power founder Will Allen established

Alex Epstein, Troi Lauren Nichols, Jeannine Kayembe and Devon Bailey pose in front of the Iovine Brothers Produce greenhouse. Above, Vinnie and Jimmy Iovine, owners of Iovine Brothers Produce with greens from Life Do Grow farm.

his first urban farm in Milwaukee in 1993, and began teaching neighborhood children how to grow healthy food. Today, Growing Power operates multiple farms in both rural and urban Wisconsin and Illinois, and last year it employed over 300 at-risk youth in urban agriculture and community food system development. Allen’s daughter, Erika Allen, met with PUC in Chicago, and Kayembe says that working with Growing Power helped PUC realize how great a responsibility it is to feed the community. The Urban Creators knew they needed to step up their outreach efforts, so this year, they’re hosting the first annual HoodStock.

On July 19, PUC will throw what they describe as “the largest cultural festival in North Philadelphia in over five decades.” Life Do Grow and its surrounding blocks will welcome traveling poetry festival Brave New Voices, the Philadelphia Youth Poetry Movement, the African American United Fund, Ignite Good, GrassROOTS Community Foundation (co-founded by Philadelphia hip-hop artists the Roots’ Black Thought) and other organizations. The day will begin at 8 a.m. with volunteer activities, including setting up backyard and balcony gardens at the Fairhill Apartments development across the street.

Participants will also conduct a neighborhood cleanup, which will conclude by repurposing plastic bottles to make seedling and herb planters as party favors.

From 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., HoodStock will feature live music, art and storytelling circles, as well as free blood tests, dental exams and health education. Local vendors will showcase homemade jewelry and clothing, and PUC will offer a farmers market. Brave New Voices’ MC Olympics will take place at the festival, and Opera Philadelphia’s Marc Bamuthi Joseph will perform. Between 1,000 and 2,000 people are expected to participate.

“This is our coming-out ball,” Kayembe says.

“I hope that HoodStock can show North Philadelphia and its leadership and council people that we’re a really large resource, and we have all these great ideas and we really know how to organize well.”

HoodStock could very well be the tipping point for PUC. The team is incredibly serious about its mission, and is ready to share it with a wider audience.

“This one thing, food, can literally cure every last one of the intangible crises,” Kayembe says.

“Violence, hunger, health—people are violent because they’re hungry. People are shooting people because they haven’t eaten breakfast in so long.

In this neighborhood, it feels like the walls are closing in, so of course you’re gonna want to explode out of that.”

And PUC is in it for the long haul. Bailey says, “I had somebody ask me, ‘How long are you willing to do this? Are you willing to put 20 years-plus into this?’ I am. I live here. This is my community. Hell yeah.” 

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jul

02

Local Craft Beer Tasting at the Philadelphia Museum of Art

Hosted in the museum’s Great Hall “Beer Garden,” the beer tasting will feature Philadelphia-area brew masters offering samples of locally made craft beers and snacks.

to

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→→ Wednesdays, July 2 through July 30, 6 p.m.

to 8:30 p.m. $22 for members; $25 for nonmembers. Reservation required. Great Stair Hall, Philadelphia Museum of Art, 2600 Benjamin Franklin Pkwy. philamuseum.org/ wednesdaynights .

jul

GMO NJ’s Summer Film Festival

Hosted at the Collingswood public library, King Corn is a documentary about two friends on a light-hearted journey into the dark center of the American food system. There will be refreshments and door prizes.

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→→ Thurs., July 17, 6:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. Free.

Collingswood Library, 771 Haddon Ave., Collingswood, N.J. gmofreenj.com

jul

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Library Open Hours at Mariposa Food Co-op

The Mariposa Co-op’s Food Justice and Anti-Racism Working Group have been gathering a rich collection of books on cooking, nutrition, social justice and community organizing since 2012. It is now open for public browsing hours the first Sunday of every month and every Friday evening. Anyone can browse our library’s materials in person during open hours, but only Mariposa member-owners may check out books. →→ Fri. July 18, 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. 4824 Baltimore Ave. mariposa.coop/bhmlibrary

jul

This curated outdoor market features vendors of antique, vintage and upcycled furniture, clothing and antiques. Patrons can also expect fresh-cooked or small batch pre-packaged food, as well as jewelry, art and handmade goods created by local artisans and designers. Each market will host between 40 and 60 vendors.

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→→ Sat., July 19 and August 16, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Free.

McCall Schoolyard, 325 S. 7th Street (between Spruce & Pine Streets). franklinflea.com .

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jul 19

Ward AME Farmers Market Kick-Off Party

This summer, Urban Tree Connection and Partners for Sacred Places are collaborating on a new community farmers market at the Ward African Methodist Episcopal Church in West Philadelphia. All are welcome to celebrate the fruits of their labors at a launch party in the Ward AME parking lot. In addition to food samples and fresh, affordable vegetables from the farmers market, the party will include cooking demonstrations, a Moonbounce, kidoriented activities, food trucks, health coaches and nutrition advice. →→ Sat., July 19, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Free. The Ward AME Parking Lot, at 44th and Brown St. facebook. com/events/321150508034437 .

jul

Schuylkill Banks Kayak Tours

The Schuykill Banks will be offering professionally guided kayak tours of the Schuylkill River between Walnut Street Dock and Fairmount Water Works on weekends and some Thursdays through the summer. Moonlit night tours of the river will also be available. Both include a half hour of instruction and require moderate exertion.

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Franklin Flea

PENCIL IT IN!

jul

→→ Sat. July 19, beginning at 6 p.m. Walnut Street

Dock. $40, registration required. To register, visit schuylkillbanks.org/stories/2014-kayak-tours or call 215-222-6030 x100.

To have your event considered for publication in Grid, email events@gridphilly.com. Submissions are due on the 19th of every month. For a full list of calendar events, visit gridphilly.com.

02 TO

Outdoor Yoga at the Philadelphia Museum of Art

Every Wednesday through July 30, the Philadelphia Museum of Art will bring its pay-what-you-wish yoga classes outside. Attendees are advised to bring their own mat.

30

→→ Wednesdays, July 2 through July 30,

6 p.m. to 7 p.m. Free after pay-whatyou-wish admission. East Terrace, Philadelphia Museum of Art, 2600 Benjamin Franklin Pkwy. For more information, visit philamuseum.org/ wednesdaynights .

jul

Create Your Own Game Workshop

The Department of Making + Doing will conduct a workshop on building video games, using Scratch, a kid-oriented programcoding language developed at MIT. Participants will explore the basics behind programs as classic as Pong and as experimental as homemade controllers made of bananas and rubber gloves.

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→→ Sat., July 19, 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. $35. Ages 13 and up.

3711 Market St. For tickets, visit dmdphilly.org .

jul

Annual UC Green Pruning Club

The Pruning Club, open to the public every Monday, works to neaten up overgrown urban foliage and train trees. Participants should bring gardening and pruning supplies, though the club has its own supply. Locations vary weekly; check website or call for details.

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→→ Mondays through the end of August, 6:30 p.m.

to 8:30 p.m. Free. For more information, call 215-573-4684 or visit ucgreen.org .

p h oto cou rt esy o f f l ic kr user JR P

jul

Moving Meditation This low-impact moving meditation class blends elements of yoga and Tai-Chi in an effort to increase blood circulation and flexibility, and reduce stress. It involves both standing and seated movements with stretches that can be easily adjusted for those with reduced mobility.

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→→ Tues., July 22 and Thurs., July 24, 6:30 p.m. to

7:30 p.m. $60. Mt. Cuba Center, 3120 Barley Mill Rd., Hockessin, Del. To register, call 302-2398807, email education@mtcubacenter.org or visit online at mtcubacenter.org

jul

Intro to Soap-Making In this hands-on-workshop, attendees will learn all about hot process soap-making. Students will create a halfpound of customized, scented, vegan soap to take home and learn some basic chemistry.

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→→ Wed., July 23, 6:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. $49. The

Department of Making + Doing, 3711 Market St. To purchase tickets, visit dmdphilly.org.

jul

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jul

New Moon Farm Dinners A collaboration between food-forward eatery High Street on Market and cheese courtesan Madame Fromage, this locally grown, community-centered dinner series is open for reservation. The family-style, outdoor dinner will include locally curated cheeseboards and a meal prepared by the High Street team. Attendees will have the chance to tour the farm and meet the animals after the meal.

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→→ Sat., July 26, 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. Cherry Grove

Farm, Lawrenceville, N.J. $85. For reservations, visit madamefromageblog.com .

jun

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Dig, Grow, Play, Taste & Cook at Longview Farm

Kids and adults are welcome to join educator Jackie Botto at Longview Farm to taste test fresh foods from the fields and explore daily farm chores. Participants will explore different food cultures, harvest ripe crops, hang out with our furry farm friends and make natural crafts. →→ Sat., July 26, 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. Longview Farm,

Kidchella at Smith Memorial Playground

The Smith Memorial Playground is hosting their first kids concert featuring Brady Rymer, The Not-Its! and Walter Martin, all noteworthy and kid-friendly artists. The Smith Memorial Playground is a non-profit in Philadelphia’s East Fairmount Park dedicated to the development of healthy, safe and strong children, families and communities. →→ Fri., July 25, 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Free for members,

$10 for non-members. Smith Memorial Playground & Playhouse, 3500 Resevoir Dr., East Fairmount Park. For more information and tickets, visit smithplayground.ticketleap. com/Kidchella . RSVP by July 18 at info@ smithplayground.org .

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Opening Reception & Talk with LandLab Resident Artists at the SCEE 26 The Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education will host the official unveiling of Maggie Mills, B.H. Mills, and Marguerita Hagan’s completed LandLab installation.

Visitors will be the first to see the artists pollinator-friendly garden in full, midsummer bloom. The artists and scientific experts will speak on plant-pollinator interactions and their importance in our ecosystem. →→ Sat., July 26, 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. Free. The

Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education, 8480 Hagy’s Mill Rd. schuylkillcenter.org .

3215 Stump Hall Rd., Collegeville, Pa. By Donation. greenerpartners.org/events .

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Camp at Bucktoe Creek Preserve

Enjoy a private camping spot, group activities, and helpful camping instructors and naturalists. Explore the forests and meadows of the preserve on a walk to find wildlife, or take a night hike and listen for owls in the forest. A snack for the campfire and breakfast will be provided. Bring your own bag dinner. Use your own tent, borrow ours, or stay in an Adirondack shelter (limited quantity, call 302- 239-2334 or email DNSINFO @delawarenaturesociety.org to reserve.)

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Sunday Bird Walks Every Sunday morning, a Delaware Nature Society staff member leads a hike through the meadows and woodlands of Bucktoe Creek Preserve. Available through Dec. 28.

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→→ Sun., July 27. 8 a.m. Free. Bucktoe Creek Preserve:

432 Sharp Rd., Avondale, PA. To register, email office@bucktoecreekpreserve.org. For more information, visit bucktoecreekpreserve.org/calendar.

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Grow It Yourself (GIY) Workshop Series

On the last Wednesday of each month through November, partners of the Community Farm and Food Resource Center at Bartram’s Garden will hold free classes teaching Philadelphians how to grow their own food. This month’s workshop revolves around the basics of harvesting and post-harvest handling. →→ Wed., July 30, 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. Free. 5400

Lindbergh Boulevard. To register, email tyholmberg@gmail.com . For more information, visit bartramsgarden.org/event/grow-it-yourselfgiy-workshop-series-6/

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Yoga Hike Take a two-mile hike through Pennypack Preserve as yoga instructors weave in deep, relaxing yoga poses throughout the hike. Each pose along the hour-long event is designed to build strength, balance and flexibility while helping you connect with the natural surroundings. All levels welcome (moderate inclines on the trail). Wear comfortable layers and walking shoes; bring a yoga mat and water.

The classes meet in front of the Visitor Center.

Proceeds from the classes support the preservation of the land.

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→→ Thurs., July 31. 5:45 p.m. Pennypack Ecological →→ Sat., July 26. 4 p.m. to Sun., July 27 at 11 a.m.

$10/$25 for members or per household. $15/$35 for non-member or non-member household.

Bucktoe Creek Preserve, 432 Sharp Rd., Avondale, Pa. bucktoecreekpreserve.org/calendar.

Restoration Trust, 2955 Edge Hill Rd., Huntingdon Valley, Pa. nourishingstorm.com .

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Anyone can volunteer at Mill Creek Farm, an educational urban farm in West Philadelphia. Join the Mill Creek Farm crew every last Saturday of the month for planting, weeding and other cool projects.

Dress for the weather and getting dirty, and bring a water bottle and any snacks. Bring a picnic lunch or a potluck dish to share.

Deadout Launch Party Launch event for Deadout, the sequel to Jon McGoran’s acclaimed ecological thriller Drift. This free event features local mead from Stonekeep Meadery, beer from Iron Hill Brewery, snacks from Weavers Way Co-op, live music, free access to Morris Arboretum’s grounds, and a reading and book-signing by McGoran. Local beekeeping, food and sustainability groups will have information about the topics and themes addressed in the book, including GMOs and the disappearance of honeybees.

→→ Sat., Jul 26. 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Mill Creek

→→ Wed., Aug. 6, 6 to 8 p.m. Free. Morris Arboretum,

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Volunteer Day at Mill Creek Farm

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Farm, 4919 Pentridge St. For more information and to register, email millcreekfarmphilly@ gmail.com or visit millcreekurbanfarm.org .

100 E. Northwestern Ave. jonmcgoran.com .

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Hummingbird Session

The Delaware Nature Society’s naturalist Joe Sebastiani leads this education session about one of the region’s most fascinating and beautiful birds. Aside from exploring the birds’ life cycle and migration patterns, this session will also instruct on creating a welcoming environment.

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→→ Wed., Aug. 6, 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. $30. Mt.

Cuba Center, 3120 Barley Mill Rd., Hockessin, DE 19707. To register, visit mtcubacenter.org

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Second Saturdays Volunteer at Awbury Arboretum

Second Saturdays Volunteer at Bartram’s Garden

Every second Saturday of the month through October, Bartram’s Garden is looking for volunteers to help with outdoor work. All levels of expertise are welcome. Volunteers are asked to please bring their own gloves.

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→→ Sat., Aug. 9, 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Free with registration. The Francis Cope

House at Awbury Arboretum, One Awbury Rd. For more information, visit: awbury.org/events/second-saturdays-historic-awbury-

→→ Sat., Aug. 9, 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. 5400 Lindbergh Blvd. To register, email tgreenberg@ bartramsgarden.org . For more information, visit bartramsgarden.org/volunteer

Eating Seasonally

A day of outdoor field work for volunteers with engaging service-learning projects chosen by Awbury’s Landscape Director, Denis Lucey. Every second Saturday of the month, to October 11, participants are also encouraged to explore the sites of Historic Germantown after a morning of volunteer labor.

arboretum-field-work-studies/

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Franklin Flea

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Solar States Cycle City Bike Tour

Join farmers John and Larry as they give participants a short tour of Longview Farm and discuss what it means to eat seasonally and locally. Participants will harvest a seasonal vegetable in the field (wear clothes and boots for the weather) and then learn how to make some tasty recipes.

Franklin Flea is a curated outdoor market featuring top vendors of antique, vintage and upcycled furniture, clothing, collectibles and antiques. Patrons can also expect fresh-cooked or small batch pre-packaged food, as well as jewelry, art and handmade goods created by local artisans and designers. Each market will host between 40 and 60 vendors.

Get your bike and gear out for a fun and easy-paced 10-to-15 mile ride exploring some of Philadelphia’s inspiring solar projects.

The ride will end with a happy hour at Standard Tap, which also has a solar array. Plan on meeting up at our office (Crane Arts) around 10 a.m. for an introductory information session and tour of Solar State’s solar array.

→→ Sat., Aug. 9. 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. $12. Longview Farm

→→ Sat., Aug. 16, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Free. McCall

→→ Sun., Aug. 16, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. 1400 N. American St., Ste. 401. facebook.com/solar.states/events

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& Market, 3215 Stump Hall Rd., Collegeville, Pa. For more information and to register, visit greenerpartners.org/events .

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august 2014

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Schoolyard, 325 S. 7th St. (between Spruce & Pine Sts.). franklinflea.com

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The Family Stone Two-century-old stone mill gets a second life generations later by Mark Fischer

M

y grandfather, Henry Fischer, was a master miller in Bavaria when he decided at age 20 to immigrate to the U.S. A classic American immigrant story of hard work and new beginnings, he eventually owned his own moving and storage company in Doylestown, but his passion for water mills remained. In 1947, he bought the run-down Castle Valley Mill property, spent a year restoring the house, and moved his family in. While he never got the mill running again, he continued to make repairs as time and money allowed, and collected mill stones and machinery— including an 1830 rolling screen, 1910 seed cleaner, 1888 disc aspirator and a 1880 Nordyke-Marmon stone mill— from all over Bucks County as mills were torn down or turned into restaurants and gift shops.

My father, Robert Fischer, lived at Castle Valley from age 12 until he left for a career in the Air Force and aviation. Though it was his cherished childhood home, milling was not in his future.

Fifteen years ago, my wife, Fran, and I bought the homestead from my grandmother, Jean Fischer’s estate when she passed away. We rerestored the house and moved in as the third

and fourth generation at Castle Valley. The mill was a big old building full of dirty old machines and in dire need of restoration. I had always fantasized about getting it running, but I was focused on my own business in corporate aviation safety consulting.

Life is funny though, and about three years ago when I agreed to a buy-out of my share of the consulting company, I was finally able to do something with the mill. My then 14-year-old son, Curran, and I signed up for miller training classes through The Society for the Preservation of Old Mills, learning all about grist milling in the 1800s. Fran was supportive of our adventure and we slowly started restoring and restarting several small mills and cleaning machinery. We now have two small 12” mills and a medium-size 20” mill running, giving us a capacity of about 1,000 pounds per hour. I pressed my daughters, Deming and Liesel, into service bagging, cleaning or manning the table at farmers markets. Soon we realized that this might be a sustainable family business. There is something wonderfully “connected” about all this. We interface with farmers, high-end chefs,

artisanal bakers and history buffs. We work in sync with the seasons and the harvests, each bringing a different set of challenges. We go to bed tired, but deeply satisfied.

Our goal from the start was to support our local food shed and farmers by buying our grain locally, cleaning it on the original machinery and milling it as whole grains on the authentic stone mills. Very early on our customers demanded non-GMO products but were flexible about organic as long as it was locally grown. We buy from farmers such as Meadow Brook Farm in Kintnersville, Pa., and small family farms from Lancaster or Chester County. The varieties of wheat depend on who was successful growing what. We encourage farmers to grow heritage varieties that were once common in this region due the their flavor rather than just high yields.

Stone milling keeps all the nutritious and flavorful components of the grain (bran, germ and endosperm) thoroughly mixed throughout the flour. Stone milling is like scrambling an egg— all the components of the seed are mixed together. Modern commercial milling crushes the wheat into smaller and smaller bits and sifts out the white starch (called the endosperm), while completely removing the bran and the germ of the seed. No wonder people are becoming more sensitive to commercial wheat—it’s barely food.

So three years into this adventure, we have all the necessary grain cleaning machinery running, storage bins built, two of our smallest sets of millstones whirring away, and we are providing locally grown, locally milled, stone ground flour, grits and meals to some of Philadelphia’s best bakeries and restaurants like Fork, Twisted Tail, Avance, Philly Bread, Silk, and Johnny Brenda’s. It’s been quite a ride and there is always work to be done. Now to get the water turbine running again, build bigger grain storage silos, bring the bigger mills online, install a heating system into the mill. …

Mark and Fran Fischer own Castle Valley Mill in Doylestown, Pa Learn more about Castle Valley Mill at castlevalleymill.com .

Each month, Dispatch features personal reflections on adventures in sustainability. Have a story you’d like to share? E-mail getinvolved@gridphilly.com 30

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august 2014

illustration by james hei mer

40th STREET summer series

FREE live music

august 30 The Highwater Preachers

Nation Beat

August 30 September 27

Saturdays 6pm

Nation Beat’s audacious energy seamlessly bridges folkloric Brazilian maracatu with classic NOLA roots music attracting an ever-growing legion of fans from across a wide demographic.

At the green space at 40th & Walnut streets, behind the Walnut West Free Library

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Produced by:

The Highwater Preachers have been raising eyebrows in the burgeoning local bluegrass scene with their fresh, earnest takes on classic mountain songs, incorporating precision picking and soulful vocal harmony. Led by the remarkably accomplished Sarah Larsen on fiddle, this troupe of young pickers (featuring members and guests of many other local folk/bluegrass bands) carries the torch of hard-driving traditional bluegrass music.

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All the world’s A clAssroom

Stepping out of a lecture hall and into the real world.

Lindsay Shafer Master of Environmental Studies ‘13, University of Pennsylvania To learn more about Lindsay’s coursework experiences, and how she used her time in the field to make a difference, visit www.upenn.edu/grid

Staff from Penn’s MES Program are here to answer your questions face-to-face on the second Wednesday of each month.

Walk right in.

Imagine venturing to Marseille, France to mingle with international government officials and top environmental leaders to discuss the importance of water on the political agenda. Envision kayaking down the scenic Maurice River in New Jersey to get up-close and personal with the local ecosystem. These are some of the remarkable experiences Lindsay Shafer (MES ’13) had as part of her coursework while pursuing a Master of Environmental Studies at Penn. “I really enjoyed the idea of hands-on experience and being encouraged to get out into the field,” Lindsay commented.

Lindsay had the opportunity to attend the 6th World Water Forum in France with Professor Stan Laskowski and about 25 peers as part of the Global Water Issues course. While there, she honed her writing skills by blogging about the conference for StudentReporter.org. Other courses had her exploring landfills and water treatment facilities, writing grants and helping solve storm water issues on a local urban farm.

Her capstone project also offered the hands-on experience she was seeking. Partnering with a research ecologist with the US Forest Service Philadelphia Field Station, Lindsay developed a field manual, arming citizen scientists with protocols for monitoring urban tree growth, longevity and mortality. “I was attracted to the idea of the capstone being a project, not a paper, and it gave me such valuable experience in many ways,” Lindsay said. The field manual is so successful that Lindsay is currently volunteering her time to collaborate on phase two of the project.

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www.upenn.edu/grid

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@PENN_EES