PHOTOS BY TODD COOPER
A MOVEABLE FEAST?
Redevelopment may swallow the Courthouse Garden
K
nee-deep in rows of leafy tomato and
potato plants at the Courthouse Garden,
Tom Ruck knows that the ground upon
which he stands may soon host condo-
miniums. From beneath his cap and
bushy white brow, Ruck squints at the midday sun reflect-
ing off the stainless-steel panels of the Wayne L. Morse
United States Courthouse. December will mark the three-
year anniversary of the garden and the expiration of the
University of Oregon’s lease on the property. “It’s upsetting
to think about all the work that has gone into this and just
to stop like that ... ” he says, scanning the urban bounty. “It
was just a hole in the ground. Look at it now; it looks like
a little piece of paradise.”
Ruck is right. The site is unrecognizable as the mud hole
it was three years ago when Judge Ann Aiken spearheaded
the collaboration — between the City of Eugene, the UO
and the Federal Re-entry program that helps former prison-
ers transition back into society — that created a community
garden. It was designed by Ann Bettman, who supervised
the UO’s famed urban farm for 30 years.
Today, 7-foot-high artichoke stalks tower above rows of
garlic, peppers and beans. Strawberry plants spill onto the
sidewalks. The 2-acre site hosts the “Courthouse Garden”
course, taught by UO adjunct landscape architecture instruc-
tors Lorri Nelson and Robin Seloover, as well as re-entry
participants like Ruck. The 40-some students learn about
everything from ideal composting conditions to regional
planting and harvesting to healthy cooking.
The harvest from the Courthouse Garden is also spread
6 CHOW! Summer 2012
BY ALEXANDRA NOTMAN
across the community to organizations like the Eugene
Mission, HIV Alliance, Relief Nursery and Looking Glass.
“The whole goal is to bring these diverse groups of people
together,” says Nelson. “We are all here to garden and grow
food and send it back into the community.”
Standing in the rain with a plastic flat of ruby-red straw-
berries, UO senior Robbie McNulty says the Courthouse
Garden changed his life. The end of the term has come and
students are scattered around the 8th Avenue and Ferry
Street plot, picking bouquets of bachelor buttons, gathering
greens, tilling black soil for incoming blue corn and collect-
ing strawberries to bring to the Looking Glass New Roads
center. “Science can be detached,” says McNulty, who
recalls a day when he and Ruck discussed permaculture
until it was time to go home. “Working with Tom made me
realize how dynamic community is.”
By the end of class, 22 pounds each of lettuce greens and
strawberries have been collected. Students pack the produce
into the bed of a pickup truck, with bunches of parsley and
the season’s first head of broccoli thrown in for good mea-
sure. Seloover then zips over to Looking Glass New Roads
center, where Chris Mirabel, the center’s program manager,
is waiting. Mirabel and Seloover bring the food to outreach
worker August Sabini (see Happening People, 6/7) in the
kitchen. New Roads serves about 70 meals a day to home-
less and at-risk youth between the ages 16-21.
“We wanted to connect homeless youth to the commu-
nity, and they wanted to connect the garden to the commu-
nity,” Sabini says. “The food they bring to us sticks to their
bones. Especially if they can’t eat the next day.”
In 2011, the youth used strawberries donated from the
garden to prepare strawberry shortcake to share with elder-
ly residents at the Avamere Rehabilitation Center.
The garden’s keepers realize their piece of paradise may
soon be lost, at least at its current location. Nelson recently
met with Assistant City Manager Sarah Medary and
Community Development Division Manager Mike Sullivan
to discuss the site’s future. “They love what we’re doing,”
Nelson says. “It’s a great mission, but they’re reluctant,”
she says. “We can move, but we all know that’s not an easy
thing to do. It took a lot of effort to build this garden.”
Sullivan points out that the plan was always for the gar-
den to be temporary, since the site would eventually be
commercially or residentially developed. “We expect to
discuss future redevelopment options for the site with the
City Council sometime in the next few months,” says
Sullivan. “While it is not likely we will extend the lease for
a significant period of time, this has been a great partner-
ship and we’d be happy to help them find a new location.”
Ruck splits open a plump fava pod — the beans are
ready to eat. He speaks excitedly about the day’s harvest.
“The salad greens are just fantastic. I picked a bunch of
snow peas and peas in the pod that are going to be fresh in
the salad.” He points to garden beds he helped build and the
relationships that have grown; Ruck and McNulty are going
fishing next week.
Ruck says he will volunteer in the garden as long as it’s
there, which he doesn’t expect to be long unless a “big-
hearted donor” comes along. “It would be a shame, but you
can’t stop progress,” Ruck adds. ■
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