| Habitat AmeriCorps Team Spruces Up Community Garden |
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| Monday, 27 April 2009 14:29 |
The AmeriCorps team from Habitat for Humanity – New York City recently joined with neighborhood residents to spruce up the Hull Street Community Garden in Ocean Hill-Brownsville, Brooklyn.AmeriCorps members, Habitat-NYC family partners, volunteers and community members gave their day to hands-on chores: cleaning up, laying new mulch, building new picnic benches, painting a gazebo and building a new storage shed. Kids worked alongside adults to clear debris and mulch the plants and flowers. They also hosted a barbecue lunch and led environmental education and art projects for neighborhood children. The 12 members of AmeriCorps’ Habitat-NYC team commit almost a year of service to help build Habitat homes in New York City. They also complete an independent community service project, and this year’s team decided that restoring the Hull Street Community Garden would help strengthen the community where Habitat-NYC is constructing a 41-unit affordable housing complex.  “Everyone was proud of what we accomplished together,” said AmeriCorps member Ben Snipes. “All of the children had fun with the kids’ projects we had planned, but they were more interested in helping everyone else work to fix up the garden. They were picking up trash, shoveling mulch, hammering nails, sawing 2x4’s and doing any other task we asked of them – under the watchful eye of parents and friends.” “This project gave me an opportunity to dramatically improve the look and health of the community garden and exercise my gardening skills,” said Alan Yang. “Participants took great ownership of their work,” he said. One of Habitat-NYC’s future homeowners was so enthusiastic he decided to join the garden “so that he can grow his own food and have a quiet place to relax near his home.” “Congratulations on a wonderful community service day at Hull Street yesterday!” said Josh Lockwood, Executive Director of Habitat-NYC. “People were in high spirits…and the park was truly being transformed before our eyes.” The Hull Street Garden was started in 2000 by the Green Guerillas, under the city’s Green Thumb program, which provides informational, financial and organizational assistance to over 200 gardens in New York City. Individuals maintain their own garden plots, and the community is responsible for the common space.  It is located on a third of an acre at 196 Hull Street, near Mother Gaston Boulevard. It is named for Capt. Isaac Hull, who commanded the U.S.S. Constitution (“Old Ironsides”) during the War of 1812. |
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