Garden is a years-long community project

Gardeners are people full of hope and belief. If they weren't, they would never plant that first seed, hoping and believing that it will sprout and grow and bloom and provide more seeds for next year.

Nine years ago it took that same hope and belief, and a tremendous amount of hard work, by a group of dedicated gardeners to transform the idea of a community garden here in Sisters into a thriving Eden full of flowers and vegetables and friendship - a place of community and camaraderie.

The idea for a garden grew out of the community visioning process that occurred on October 7, 2006, when some 250 citizens gathered at the high school for a half-day and hammered out the Sisters Country Vision for the Future. It was a statement of the residents' dreams of what Sisters would be in the next five years and beyond.

There was a spirit of cooperation and excitement in the room that day as people put words to their hopes for Sisters. In one morning, working with respect for one another's ideas, the citizens crafted a vision statement that is still viable and accurate today, almost nine years later.

To breathe life into the vision, groups were formed to create projects or organizations that would actively support the tenets of the statement. They were tasked with having projects up and running in one year's time. One of those groups cultivated the idea of creating a community garden in support of our "village atmosphere with many public gathering places and venues."

The purpose behind the garden was to promote a sense of community, by gathering gardeners together in one place to grow fresh vegetables and flowers for themselves and for others in the community. Excess produce would go weekly to the Kiwanis Food Bank. Flowers could be made into cheery bouquets and shared with shut-ins and elders in Sisters. Residents would be encouraged to visit, wander through, and relax in the garden. Plans included providing space for community art and offering gardening and composting classes.

The committee consisted of about 20 volunteers who began meeting weekly in November 2006 to outline their goals, assign tasks, and report on progress. There was never any question about the success of the project - no doubters or naysayers.

The first obstacle to be overcome was to find the land for the garden - hopefully for free, in the city. Presentations were made to the Sisters Garden Club, the Lutheran church that had vacant land, Kiwanis, the City Planning Department, and Habitat for Humanity, which had several empty lots on Adams Avenue. Habitat agreed in January 2007 to let the garden use one of the vacant lots for $1 a year, with the understanding the land would eventually be put up for sale.

The next hurdle was the fact there was no money for the project. Fundraising became of paramount importance. Donations of time, materials, talent and money came from every corner of the community.

Hap Taylor (now Knife River) donated all the topsoil for the beds (a large dump truck plus trailer). Gary Tewalt and Doug Cavanaugh brought their equipment and expertise to cut trees, move huge rocks, remove an old oil tank left from the house that used to sit on the lot, dig post-holes, and smooth out the ground. Patterson Ranch provided well-rotted manure to amend the soil. The City provided compost from their recycled yard waste and a community grant.

Students at the elementary school grew vegetable and sunflower starts. Sisters Park & Recreation District carried the garden as a subcommittee, providing liability insurance and bookkeeping services. Tim Clasen installed, free of charge, a complete underground irrigation system as well as above-ground hose bibs. Hoyt's Hardware & Building Supply supplied the exterior fencing at cost. Cavanaugh Logging donated all the poles for the fence, the front and back gates, and the borders of all the beds.

Sisters Movie House and Sisters Art Works provided their venues for fundraising events. Many residents generously donated monetarily. Through the winter and spring the soon-to-be-garden was a beehive of activity - rain or shine or wind. Fortunately, there wasn't much snow that winter. Unsolicited manual labor arrived every time there was work to be done from raking rocks to clearing brush to setting fence posts. Sisters Coffee provided coffee for the work parties. The old building destined to be the garden shed was donated by Packit in Bend and remodeled by Patrick Lombardi to resemble an old Western building. Local gardeners donated perennials from their own gardens for the common areas.

The wagon that resided in the first garden and made the move to the new one came from Sisters resident Chuck Hoyt. It was originally used in the movie Paint Your Wagon, which was filmed here in Central Oregon. It is now beautifully covered with honeysuckle vines

By June 2007 the garden was completed, all 40+ plots were spoken for, things were planted and growing, and there was money in the coffers. A grand opening was held in June with a huge turnout of local residents in attendance. The children from A Joyful Noise Preschool sang garden songs, scarecrows created by local artists were auctioned off, and many, many thanks were given for helping to turn a kernel of a dream into a living, blooming community asset in eight short months.

From those humble beginnings the garden has been nurtured and improved. Three years ago, with the sale of the Adams Avenue property, the garden moved to its new larger location on East Barclay Drive on the grounds of the Sisters Eagle Airport. It is a testament to the original vision and all the people, who over nine years, have continued to hope and believe.