Dozens still waiting for public plots
CITY HALL — Gardeners using public property won’t have to worry about sharing the soil, at least for another year.
The Santa Monica City Council on Tuesday approved new rules for operation of the city’s community gardens, located at Main Street and Park Drive. The new rules will not include term limits for how long gardeners can use the city’s 70 public gardening plots.
Instead, the City Council asked staff to attempt to find additional community garden space throughout Santa Monica. Ideas included setting up a half dozen plots at the city’s 17 parks, installing gardens on building rooftops, as well as working more closely with the school district to create more top soil.
It’s hoped that such efforts — combined with the enforcement of the new rules — will reduce a 115-person waiting list to use the gardens.
City Council members asked staff to come back next year and let them know if tweaking the program has been successful.
For the 80,000 citizens of Santa Monica, approximately half an acre of open land is reserved for community gardens. That space is divided into 70 plots on public property at 2200 Main St. The plots vary in size — some are 120 square feet, while others are 360 square feet.
The average wait for a plot is five to six years.
Voting in favor of the rules without term limits were Mayor Bob Holbrook and City Councilmen Herb Katz, Ken Genser and Kevin McKeown.
Voting against the rules without term limits were City Councilwoman Pam O’Connor and City Councilmen Richard Bloom and Bobby Shriver.
According to City Attorney Marsha Moutrie, at issue is how Santa Monica will continue to tackle regulating public space that’s being personally used without necessarily providing a public benefit. If it did provide a public benefit, it would be easier to justify not having the term limits, she said.
Currently, gardeners can make indefinite use of public plots as long as they follow the city’s guidelines. On Tuesday, many of the gardeners said they have used the plots for decades.
Moutrie explained to the City Council that Santa Monica was unique in that it’s one of few communities that has a gardening program in place where the demand outweighs the amount of land available for gardening.
Because the city has no term limits on how long gardeners may use the public plots, a community garden program in Santa Monica without terms limits can expose the city to lawsuits, she said.
“If there were no waiting list, it would reduce my legal concerns.” — Moutrie said
“Giving someone a life estate is a problem,”
On Tuesday, 11 residents spoke on the issue. Many of them were gardeners advocating for no term limits.
No one came to speak who was on the waiting list.
Many of those advocating for no term limits said that gardening was part of a community. Gardeners who have been practicing for decades are “good stewards of the land” and help bridge a culture between generations.
Gardening advocates pointed out that skilled gardeners are often seniors who would be especially vulnerable to term limits. The work those master gardeners perform tie them to the greater gardening community and “pulling the rug from beneath them” could be devastating to their well being, they said.
“It’s so important to the older gardeners, I don’t know what they would do if it were taken away,” said Linda Sullivan, a gardener.
Some gardening advocates compared the rights of gardeners to the rights of residents who live in public housing.
“You have people who have permanent use of public housing,” said Hugh Browning, a gardener. “(By that logic), they would also (need) to have term limits.”
However, some at the meeting considered Browning’s remark an inappropriate comparison.
“I want to make this clear,” Bloom said. “Gardening is not the same as housing. People have a need and a right to have a roof over their head.”
McKeown said he was concerned about the issue of whether gardeners provide the community with a public benefit, and therefore whether or not term limits should be sought for their use of public property. He decided gardening did, in fact, provide a community benefit and therefore term limits may not be necessary.
“What do gardeners have in common?” McKeown said. “Rootedness. Gardeners are making roots in Santa Monica.”
While gardeners said being on the waiting list “came with the territory,” Bloom, O’Connor and Shriver expressed concerns that the community garden plots weren’t being doled out properly.
Some of them also didn’t seem to be too convinced about the public benefit that gardeners say their practice provides.
“I voted ‘no’ on the issue of fairness,” Shriver said. “I don’t believe we adequately acknowledged those on the waiting list.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on January 16, 2006. Read the original PDF.