Grow Ohio Valley still growing in third year
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WHEELING -- As Grow Ohio Valley continues to provide easier access to fresh and nutritious food options for area residents, a lot of preparation and hard work are required to keep the program flourishing as they begin their third growing season in the Friendly City.
With several urban farming sites already established in the East Wheeling area, Grow Ohio Valley continues to ramp up its efforts to expand the program. Two more large growing sites in two separate meadows separated by Grandview Street high above the East Wheeling are being established.
With two large "high tunnel" greenhouses already built on the west side of the hill where the former Lincoln Homes use to be located, crews with Grow Ohio Valley and the federal AmeriCorps program still are landscaping and establishing a drainage system on the nearly 3-acre site that Grow Ohio Valley leases from the Wheeling Housing Authority. Located on the opposite side of the hill, crews are installing a fence around a hilly 3-acre orchard that is being prepared to grow fruit trees and bushes.
Located above the Wheeling Tunnels, the area can be spotted by motorists traveling west on Interstate 70. Crews expect to begin planting at both sites before the end of April.
Lettuce, tomatoes, carrots, peas and other "pantry staples" are just a few of the many foods that will be grown in the new greenhouses and other gardens around the city, according to Samantha Amberg Dougherty, a West Virginia Promise Americorps Vista.
"There's been a lot of preparation all winter long of planting, mapping out flower beds and figuring out what seeds and varieties of plants we are going to order and grow. And now that it's starting to get warm we are laying down our mulch and our top soil," said Amberg Dougherty. "The greenhouse is great. They are so important, these high tunnels, because it lets us extend the (growing) season on both ends. We can plant a little bit earlier and we can grow a little bit later with the solar heat that comes in," she added.
"I couldn't wait for it to get warm and really see the plants start going .. and the landscape of this hillside over the past year I would say has completely changed. I think what's most exciting for me, is watching East Wheeling and this area have these beautiful farming and productive sites," Amberg Dougherty added.
Grow Ohio Valley Executive Director Ken Peralta said most people don't realize that everything Grow Ohio Valley is working on was from a strategic plan put in place long before they started.
"So things are proceeding at pace with that plan," Peralta commented. "It's amazing that we have this Americorps program." He said the labor resources provided by Americorps is one of the primary reasons for the program's continued success as they hope to have more than a dozen Americorps employees assisting the nearly half dozen Grow Ohio Valley employees by the end of this month. "Without that (Americorps), we would not be able to proceed with our program," Peralta said. "It came at the right time and it really opened us up to extend our reach, " he added.
"Our mission really is creating food security in our region while developing a local food economy. And we have a broad definition of food security in a sense that if you're getting food without nutrition, then you are not food secure. If you look at morbidly obese people, that's an issue of food security, just as it is with people with diabetes," he added.
Each season, Grow Ohio Valley uses its mobile market truck to reach local communities where residents might not have access to a grocery store or farmers' markets. The program is involved in the FARMacy program, in partnership with Wheeling Health Right, a farmers' market,which is aimed to increase the availability and access to healthy foods.
This program accepts the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and Electronic Benefit Transfer cards and offers food at half the normal price to those using SNAP benefits or senior vouchers.
In addition to growing and producing food locally, Grow Ohio Valley has established an educational curriculum along with "learning gardens" at two area schools, according to Amberg Dougherty.
Peralta claims research proves there can't be sustained economic development without food security.
"There is something like 75,000 people who are food insecure within a one-hour drive of Wheeling, so that's three and a half times the size of our city of people that are going to bed hungry or missing a meal regularly or worrying about where their next meal is going to come form, and that's a big deal," Peralta added.