Re-imagining A More Sustainable Cleveland
EcoVillage gardeners sell their produce at the Gordon Square Farmers Market. They received a $10,000 grant to expand their current market garden onto an adjacent vacant lot at Ithaca Court and W. 57th Street in the Cleveland EcoVillage and pilot a new intensive growing technique.
Fifty-eight community groups, which last summer re-imagined what could be done with the vacant land in their neighborhoods, will start the actual process of re-designing them this month in preparation to break ground in the spring. This is one of the first answers to Cleveland’s shrinking population; reflecting a new mindset that vacant land is not only an opportunity but could also be the necessary engine for social, environmental and economic change in Cleveland. Re-imagining A More Sustainable Cleveland is a joint initiative by Neighborhood Progress, Inc. (NPI) and the City of Cleveland that gives birth to 58 new land reuse demonstration projects—most from city residents who are interested in urban agriculture, natural landscapes and communal green spaces.
Led by NPI and Cleveland City Planning, Re-imagining started with the nationally recognized study on Cleveland vacant land carried out in 2008 by Kent State University’s Urban Design Center. It incorporates social, environmental and economic characteristics into a framework for vacant land-use planning and decision making. The initiative recognized the realities of population loss and right sizing, while capitalizing on the opportunities that vacant lands provide for increasing environmental and social health through greenspace creation, food and energy production, stormwater management and community empowerment.
At a recent meeting of the grantees, Todd Alexander describes his new Thackeray Avenue Market Garden that will be developed on two acres of vacant land off of East 55th Street.
After the study was adopted by the Cleveland Planning Commission, NPI worked to raise more than $600,000 in funds and $100,000 of in-kind technical services from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to implement pilot projects around the city on vacant city-owned land bank lots to demonstrate and learn from the land reuse strategies. The largest funding source is the City of Cleveland Community Development Department, which is providing $500,000 of federal Neighborhood Stabilization Program funds to the project. More than 110 applications from the public were accepted through a competitive request for proposals and judged by community development, agriculture, brownfield, park and stormwater experts, as well as community stakeholders.
Lilah Zautner, Re-imagining program manager for NPI explains, “All of the applications were creative, innovative and worthy of recognition. The passion of neighbors living next to these lots was undeniable and inspirational.” Roughly half of the applications were funded, and combined they will repurpose more than 15 acres throughout the City of the 3,300 acres of current vacant land. This is merely a down payment on more sustainable land-use projects planned for the future.
Youths in the Garden Boyz Market Garden program learn new skills. This program will expand on adjacent vacant land and be able to involve more youth from the community.
Awards range from $2,800 for a phyto-remediation project on a Tremont lot with suspected high levels of lead contamination, to $6,000 for a learning garden at Watterson Lake Elementary school in Detroit Shoreway where no unpaved play or learning space exists, to $10,000 to expand Garden Boyz, “market garden” program for children in the Kinsman-Central area, to $20,000 for a new Thackeray Avenue market garden.
Some $179,000 will be spent on “greening” projects, $284,000 will support urban agriculture projects, and $73,000 will go toward experiments in ‘phytoremediation’ and stormwater management. The balance of funds will go to ParkWorks and Ohio State University Extension to provide technical assistance to the projects and function as fiscal agents for the community groups. The U.S. EPA will provide Phase I and 2 environmental testing on about a third of the projects, and will conduct a training on phytoremediation. Phytoremediation is the treatment of environmental problems (bioremediation) through the use of plants which mitigate the environmental problem without the need to excavate the contaminant material and dispose of it elsewhere.
Through Re-imagining, community groups such as Earth Day Coalition, Lutheran Metropolitan Ministry and Stockyards New Hope Garden Group will be paired with researchers to conduct on-the-ground research, using Cleveland’s urban soils to help determine if phytoremediation is a realistic solution to lead and pollution abatement. Greening projects include side yard expansions, native plant nurseries and permeable parking lots. Most of these projects will aim to capture storm water on-site through the installation of rain barrels and engineered beds known as bioswales or rain gardens.
To share the lessons and successes of the projects with the public, NPI is partnering with three departments at Cleveland State University that will document the outcomes through photography, interviews with project grantees and the development of an interactive website. The website, www.Re-imagining Cleveland.org will enable grantees to blog about their projects and communicate with one another and the public.
Additionally, with funding from the Cleveland Foundation, a Re-imagining Cleveland 2.0 study has begun with the purpose of identifying opportunities for large catalytic land reuse projects in Cleveland and Cuyahoga County and creating a business plan for a local food system. The Vacant Land ReUse Working Group that formed from Mayor Frank Jackson’s 2008 Summit on Sustainable Cleveland 2019 will participate in the study and work on engaging the broader community in this effort.
Re-imagining has put Cleveland in the national spotlight with an article in the February issue of Next American City and helped secure the National Vacant Properties Conference in Cleveland. The conference will be Oct. 13-15.
For more information on the conference visit http://reclaimingvacantproperties.org.
For more information, contact Lilah Zautner at 216-830-2770 or lcz@neighborhoodprogress.org.