A Gardener in South Central LA Wants You to Grow Your Own Food
Had Ron Finley's garden not been cited for obstructing parkways and growing the wrong kinds of plants, his message of self-sufficiency and the wonders of soil might never have made it as far as it has.
One of inner city Los Angeles's most pressing concerns is the lack of access to affordable, healthy food. The Community Health Council reported in 2008 that the 60 grocery stores in South Central Los Angeles serve an average of 22,156 residents, compared with affluent West LA, whose 57 grocery stores serve an average of 11,150 residents. This led the CHC to refer to South Central as a "food desert," or more specifically, a neighborhood bereft of the kinds of dining options most Angelinos take for granted. If no grocery store exists near one's home, but a fast-food restaurant is just a quick drive away, the fast food will win more often than not. That reliance on low-quality food has been shown to push residents of the inner city to crippling health problems. The same study showed that 35.4 percent of adults in South Central suffer from obesity, whereas the number is only 10 percent in West LA and 22.2 percent countywide.
South Central resident Ron Finley found a solution: grow your own food in your neighborhood, and forget the cheeseburgers. But in May 2011, his garden was cited by the Bureau of Street Services for obstructing parkways, not having a permit, and growing the wrong kinds of plants. Upon finding out about the citation, locals became outraged, helping Ron successfully petition to keep his garden. The press surrounding the petition earned Finley an invitation to give a TED talk last February. Recently, I met Finley in his garden where we talked about what he plans to do with his newfound influence as a botanical celebrity.
VICE: Do you think your message would have spread so far if the city hadn't tried to make you remove your garden?
Ron Finley: No. That's why I say, "Embrace your haters." 'Cause they're gonna make you famous. It was timing. It wouldn't have happened if Steve Lopez didn't do his column in the Los Angeles Times. It wouldn't have happened if Jesse Dylan at Wondros Media didn't do a film of me and TED hadn't found the film. They wrote me this scary-ass email that says, "Ron, we've been watching you." Scared the shit out of me. I thought it was a joke. Thought it was somebody playing around. Come to find out it's true. And I had never done a PowerPoint. I had never been on stage like that. But I killed it! And I wound up with a big hit.
What made you start gardening?
It was basically to beautify, but also I wanted people to be assaulted with smells. I wanted jasmine and lavender and different flowers. Vegetable gardens, to me, are not that sexy. One single crop, usually. I want pretty. I want colors. I want different heights. I want different structures. I want to take your eye all over the place. I want your senses to go somewhere. Your vision, your sense of smell, your sense of taste, your sense of touch is all in the garden. The garden is nothing more than a metaphor for life, because everything happens there. Every living function happens in the garden, and that's real.
Not anyone can just plant a garden like this.
Anyone can. Anyone. We're all gardeners. Truly, we are soil. Ashes to ashes. We decompose, and what's left there? We share 50 percent of our DNA with bananas. Get some healthy soil. Get some seeds. Put some starter plants in there. Water it. Take care of it. And it grows. Plants are just like us. They're just like children. You give them healthy food and what happens? You get a healthy child. You give them unhealthy food, you put them in an unhealthy environment, what do you get? Unhealthy child. Unhealthy plant. It doesn't grow. It doesn't mature. The brain function's not the same. There's a disconnect there. These schools should change that, and flip it so that the school is in the garden. Not the garden in the school.