Chasing substantial money for eight Lower Terrace Raised Beds

We are looking at needing to find up to $2500 for each Raised Bed we install (to the new BCC Standard). One way to get that done is to bludge major donations of materials, tools, labour and so on from everyone we can find, which is going well and will bring down the unit price a fair bit. Another is to stage construction to allow the donors to recover a bit and then ask them again. A third is to achieve Incorporated Association status, which opens up a lot more sources of funds, both private, charitable, business and government, in time to get more done this year. So far we have we applied for one specific Raised Bed grant via the Lord Mayor of Brisbane:

We asked for $2500, and were approved in outline last week, and this week we submitted another application to our State MP Michael Berkman for substantial funds as well:

We hope these sources plus some of our own ingenuity and in-kind contributions (like $700-worth of MicroShade arsenic-free timber sleepers from Bunnings Indooroopilly) will build us three to four beds of our own commissioning and construction. 

Meanwhile, Walter Taylor Ward Councillor James Mackay has also agreed to consider our applications for rather smaller amounts to cover a second 1000 litre IBC water tank from Tilkey, and several sets of metal shelves for our tool shed.

Much more importantly, Cllr Mackay has also agreed to prioritise funding our Raised Bed shortfall enough to get us to eight Beds (via the next round of what used to be known as the Suburban Initiative Fund but is now the Lord Mayor's Community Fund - the funding that paid BCC Asset Services to construct our first two Terraces in 2018/19 and 2019/20). 

The same source paid for four new Community Garden Raised Beds in Toowong and Chapel Hill from next year's allocations. That funding stream won't be available for us until after July 1 and Bed delivery will take some months more (and be paid at full price), so we are keen to get on with building our own Beds asap.

Special General Meeting to ratify Incorporation

Dear Members,

 

The St Lucia Community Garden Committee invites all its Members to an important Special General Meeting to be held at 3pm on Saturday 20 March at the Community Garden. 

 

The purposes of the SGM are:

• to ratify the proposed Constitution of the St Lucia Community Garden (SLCG) 

• to ratify the proposed Membership classes for the Incorporated Association, 

• to convert Members of the current unincorporated SLCG Association into valid Members of the new Incorporated one.

These steps are all required before we can submit our Application for Incorporation. 

 

The 6 February SGM elected the current Committee, voted in favour of seeking Incorporation for the SLCG and agreed to proceed to apply for Incorporation on the basis of the circulated draft Constitution.

Current Members need to approve converting their Membership to membership of the Incorporated Membership.

Please also bring with you:

• Your membership cards - only Members may vote at the meeting, one vote per membership

• A blanket, towel or cushion to sit on. We're planning to sit on our stone walls, so something clean and soft would be useful.  Or a folding chair. 

Looking forward to seeing everyone there.  

Please send apologies to: members.stluciacommunitygarden@gmail.com

 

Kind regards,

 

Tineke Schoonens, Secretary,

St Lucia Community Garden

 28 February: 2021 SLCG Snaps

 

Sweet Potato, Cucomelon and Tomatoes all doing their thing

 

 

Basil galore. It's been a good year for most herbs

 

 

A temporary green hedge for a year or two: pineapples!

 

Edible (and drinkable) flowers galore

Native edible "violets", native "parsley" and European parsley too . . .

Donated Shade House Number 1

Donated Shade House Number 2

Pumpkins proving particularly popular

Really getting there: a place for stuff and a place to put the stuff to good use

No, I don't get bigger. I am a cucomelon and I look like a melon but I taste like a cucumber.

Sometimes we don't see the progress because we are too close to the day to day

The two main elements of the BCC Compost Hub: the public part (front), and the SLCG bays (rear)

You put a small lump of sweet potato in decent soil with water and sun and stand back.

Alongside the butcher birds and the kookaburras that share the Park with us, we have some regular thick-kneed parenting going on too

28 February: Planning ahead from Stages 1 to 4

Stage One (July to December 2020) of the St Lucia Community Garden project is now behind us. 

Walter Taylor Ward grants paid for two splendid permanent Terraces for our tricky site and three tonnes of mulch, a generous SLCA boost to Members' funds paid for our first 12m long row of raised beds, and generous locals gave us a 1000 litre water tank, a recycled tool shed and months of vigorous herbs, flowers, vegetables through their daily hand watering.

We now host a Community Compost Hub on the SLCG site as well.

So bring us your “vegan” kitchen waste and use the marked bins provided. No meat, fish, eggs, dairy or plastic please.And remember to layer some of the "brown" material (in the brown wheely bins) on top of your contributions . . .

Every few days the SLCG volunteers will take on the task of emptying the green-lidded "Feed Me" bins, extracting and binning what cannot be composted (hopefully almost nothing) and adding the remainder to the larger, locked SLCG compost bays behind. Our thanks to Clytie from BCC Waste for getting the project up and running, to Mark for building the bin site and to Tineke for our splendid blackboard-style Compost Bay fronts.

 Stage Two (January to August 2021) is well underway with significant funds promised by both our Councillor and our State MP for more infrastructure and more raised beds, while we have other grant applications ($3,000 or so) lodged to nudge things along, and when we receive Incorporated Association status (in progress) we will be knocking on many more doors. So, by the end of winter, SLCG Members will have 100 sq m or more of raised beds to work with, and the SLCG will be able to host teaching, gardening and an outreach programme for garden-poor St Lucia schools, aged care communities and interested locals.

By the end of 2022 (Stage Three) the plan is to complete a third, even larger Growing Terrace, construct a dozen more raised beds for it, install proper paths, surround the CG with a living, fragrant hedge, see mains water connected, build shade, social and training structures, install a bigger, better shed, and be ready to share the satisfaction of growing our own fruit, vegetables and flowers with a lot more locals.

By the end of 2023 (Stage Four) we plan to have a wider planting and revegetation campaign in place to restore to our host Park and Creek many of the nutritional, medicinal and cultural indigenous Australian species it was once well known for from Byron to Noosa.

 Our particular gratitude goes to the more than 40 people who have become financial members, to the SLCA for making it happen right from the very start, to Hillstone St Lucia for endless assistance, to BCC and Cllr Mackay for supporting new inner west Community Gardens so strongly, to Bunnings Indro for tools, timber and paint, to our team of volunteer (and often Member) workers, planters and waterers, and to the hundreds of local and visiting people who have given us so much encouragement or support so far.

Progress as the walls are coming down!

Apologies for the hiatus in posting, but, as you may have noticed, stuff has been happening that isn't about the Community Garden (no, really), the weather has been interesting and Council has been a bit busy dealing with the aftermath of the same weather. 

However:

• The vollie watering roster and the associated WhatsApp group is working a treat (thanks, Membership team), 

• the IBC water tank is what we need at this stage (as opposed to an $8k mains water connection, 

• the Community Compost Hub is cooking along well (although the Public-facing bins are stalled somewhere in the bureaucracy), 

• the 2-3 tonnes of mulch we've spread everywhere is holding the remnant on-site soil in place, building more soil up steadily and protecting the site from being rained away,

• the newly planted framing native grasses and rushes are taking well,

• the raised beds are proving to be both attractive and conversation starters for locals,

• the flowers and veggies already growing are appreciating the ideal weather,

• the wildflower seed programme is about to kick-off,

• the pineapples are starting to arrive and take up their places as indicative "fences",

And, almost most importantly, the construction fence has disappeared at last . . .

 An awesome weekend. . .

Thanks go first to Rusty Gammon for pretty much everything shed, and to Don Begbie (Prez of Cubberla-Witton Catchment Group) for water tank procurement. And then to every one of  The Sunday Crew for putting it all together . . . Their four hours of pretty hot weekend work paid off.

Next up for the CG are starting the wildflower meadow, finishing flattening the mighty mulch mountain and making proper progress with the Garden Committee…

We are now pretty much out of disposable cash at hand, so every cent raised from now on becomes doubly precious.

The Lower Terrace is still looking viable for post July. At the spend rate we have achieved to date we can fill the Terrace with our raised growing beds (yielding 80-100 sq m of growing area) if Walter Taylor Ward grants us $15k in 2021 as Clr Mackay has indicated he wants to do.

The pending BCC Community Compost Hub should be up and running by January 2021, and we expect to ask BCC Parks to remove the temporary construction fencing around the Garden site by the end of November as well. 

We may decide to add a “temporary” low fence (perhaps in bamboo or split cane) between the Hillstone car park and the Community Garden (running alongside and attached to the existing post and rail fence) to indicate where we start, and to discourage interlopers.

So much done already, the Garden Committee to get up and running (candidates, do get in touch) and all of 2021 to plan.

 Exciting. . .

This is the new water tank for the Community Garden.

Well, actually it is the base for the new 1000 litre IBC (food-grade, steam washed) water tank we will be taking delivery of tomorrow. 

Not all that cheap, but far cheaper than being connected to the mains for the moment.