Jim McGrath, the city’s parks, open space and natural resource manager, said the city has been in talks with Roots Rising for several years about the project, hoping to help find the organization a permanent home. It is a complete sanctuary for Pittsfield.” “Springside is right in the heart of our city but it is 237 acres. they have that sanctuary feeling,” Piotrowski said.
“What they love when they come and work with us on the farms is that they step outside of their neighborhoods, they step outside of what feels like the city. “What we heard from our young people was that they were really looking for a sanctuary feeling,” Piotrowski told the commissioners Wednesday.Īfter talking with local teens about potential sites, staff said they heard loud and clear that teens were looking for an opportunity to get outside of their own neighborhoods. The organization has a set of criteria for their landing spot: a property within the Pittsfield city limits that would be accessible to both the community and youth farmers without feeling like an overly urban space. “It’s really important to us to invest in the city that we love and to have an opportunity like that here in Pittsfield,” Vecchia said. Vecchia said it’s time to add to that model and give the intensive program and organization a more permanent home.įor the last two years, the leadership with Roots Rising has been searching for a spot within Pittsfield to create a working farm that could serve as a community center, expand the organization’s youth programs and grow fresh produce for residents all year long. The youth farmers spend the program doing “pop-up” work at several local farms that have partnered with the organization. The market runs in tandem with the organization’s youth crews - a three-season farming intensive program that puts groups of local teenagers into the thick of growing and harvesting season. It’s a proposal that’s been years in the making.įor the last 11 years, Roots Rising has run the Pittsfield Farmers Market - the county’s only year-round and youth-run farmers market. In April 2022, Roots Rising received a $430,219 food security infrastructure grant from the state Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs toward the creation of a ”youth farm.” The organization is suggesting that it use 4 acres between the American Chestnut grove and the proposed New England Mountain Bike pump track in the park to build a 2-acre field for annual crops, a quarter-acre space for perennial crops and another quarter-acre space for the creation of a “farm hub.”ĭetailed plans are still a ways off, but Vecchia and Piotrowski said they are envisioning a high-tunnel building that would allow for year-round growing, a propagation house for plant starts and a building where produce can be washed, packed and refrigerated and equipment can be stored. Vecchia and Piotrowski are hoping at their next appearance before the commission to get approval for the creation of a 4-acre farm within Springside Park.
Roots Rising is a Pittsfield-based nonprofit organization focused on empowering youth and building community through food and farming. That conversation is set to continue at either the June 20 park commission meeting or following July 18 meeting, according to commissioners. Wednesday’s site visit is part two of a conversation Vecchia and Piotrowski began with the commissioners last month. to take things from seed to the table of our customers.”
“Our dream is to have this be a working farm that grows food for Pittsfield,” Piotrowski said. Vecchia and Piotrowski brought the park commissioners, city staff and city Councilor Karen Kalinowsky to a spot in Springside Park they say will be perfect for Roots Rising’s latest endeavor: a working year-round youth farm.
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