Virginia Communities Are Taking Food Justice Into Their Own Hands
In partnership with: Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services
When Martinsville Vice Mayor Chad Martin asked the school superintendent why he always waits until the last minute to call a snow day, he was shocked to learn that the answer was more complicated than just the weather forecast. “They knew this is where kids would get their breakfast and their lunch, because they knew how bad food issues were,” he says.
In Martinsville, 14% of residents are considered food insecure – higher than the state average of 10%. But as a recent appointee to the Virginia Food Access Investment Fund stakeholder workgroup, as well as a longtime advocate for ending hunger, Martin has dreams of seeing Martinsville take ownership of its food security with a community garden.
Every day, at least one church provides food to the public, and since the pandemic, school buses have been bringing meals to children who need it. But Martin, whose parents both grew up on farms, has dreams of a community garden, parks where people can pick fruit off trees, a compost program and shed programs to borrow gardening tools. While he has the support of city leadership, he knows that it won’t happen overnight.
“When you look at the distance between a grocery store as opposed to where they live and how far it is from access to fresh fruits and vegetables, it is a major issue,” he says. “I would love to have community gardens.”
Prioritizing Food Security, Health
These issues impact many within Virginia urban communities as well, according to Duron Chavis, the director of Happily Natural Day. Chavis founded the summer festival in 2003 while working at the Black History Museum & Cultural Center of Virginia, but since then, his work has expanded to helping neighborhoods in Richmond turn abandoned lots into urban green spaces that provide food and tree canopy. People have taken pride and ownership of their food, learned more about STEM careers, started businesses and taken on activist roles stemming from food justice.
With many poorer neighborhoods not having grocery stores or access to fresh produce, there is a concern of food access leading to chronic health problems. According to a study in Health Affairs, adults who are food insecure have higher rates of diabetes, hypertension, poor sleep, depression, poor oral health and other health issues.
Education Is Essential
Growing food to liberate oneself does not come easy. Shantell Bingham, program director at Cultivate Charlottesville’s Food Justice Network, has encountered homes where they had to rig a hose to the kitchen faucet to water their gardens because the housing authority removed the outdoor faucet handles, or their yards in public housing sites had poor soil.
“There’s a whole system that’s set up behind it that doesn’t make it easy for our neighbors to grow their own gardens,” she says.
Bingham has been helping folks access healthy food by growing gardens in their backyards, within the community and at schools for years. She started her work as a Dalai Lama Fellow working alongside the Public Housing Association of Residents to create garden spaces for families in some of the city’s historically disadvantaged neighborhoods. This work expanded to neighborhoods and the city as a whole through her job at Cultivate.
Fifty-five percent of Charlottesville schoolchildren qualify for free and reduced lunch, and in some schools, that number can be as high as 80%. But as the children work in their school garden, they’re able to take home the fruits of their labor. Their education in the soil also goes beyond science – they learn the history of the Indigenous people growing corn, or that their African ancestors braided seeds and rice into their hair. The produce is also collected for Community Garden Days events where the food is given out free of cost. And in residents’ backyards, as peppers, okra, sweet potatoes, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, kale, cucumbers, tomatoes and eggplant are cultivated, there’s a sense of pride.
“I can’t tell you how many stories I’ve heard, people calling me, ‘Shantell, I just harvested some sweet peppers out of my garden!’ The joy of being able to have something that is your own is huge,” Bingham says.
“There’s so much research that shows that everywhere across the country where you have concentrations of poverty and concentrations of Black and brown people, there’s a lack of access to healthy food,” Chavis says. “It’s plain as day if you choose to look at it.”
See more: Virginia Food Banks and Programs Help Battle Food Insecurity