Healcrest Farm has been growing food and building relationships with our community since 2005!!!! It has not always been an easy road, developing those relationships. I have met many different people, of many different walks of life – from elders who grew up in the deep south and have lived most of their lives around fresh food, to youth who would rather throw an apple at their peers than eat it.
I have seen over 60 youth at the Farm in our summer internships and worked with 3 public schools in greenhouse educational programs. I am humbled at the progress that has been made in this small site tucked away on a hilltop in Pittsburgh.
I and this Farm might not be everything to everyone and often Healcrest UF falls short of being the local food source or the community-food educators or the neighbor we strive to be, but we never give up trying. Always with empathy to our neighbors unique experiences, to racial and social tensions, to all the things that oppress and strangle our communities and hold at arm’s length those things in Jah’s great earth that are LIFE. We press on.
Here is a small photo series of our times and growth so far. Enjoy!
Land b4 the Farm, 2004
Building the garden beds
Summer Inters Building the Shed, 2008
Students at the greenhouse
Youth hard-at-work planting in the spring
Healcrest Urban Farm 