Over the course of a half century, Seattle has developed well over 100 p-patch gardens. Not all have survived. Too often, patches have suffered by being labeled “interim use.” The pressures of urban development coupled with rising property values brought down a number of gardens. Other succumbed to social conflict, both external and internal, and other factors. Today we will look at a few of the patches that were forced to close permanently and the circumstances behind the closures.
Jackson Place
In 1995 the Jackson Place
Community Council applied for and received a modest grant from the Department
of Neighborhood’s Matching Fund Program to establish a p-patch. The grant application spoke of “the
opportunity to beautify our community, take advantage of one of the numerous vacant
lots, and have a focus for developing and fostering neighborhood friendships
and pride in our community.” The street corner lot was located at 16th
Avenue S. and S. Weller Street on the western slope of the city’s Central
District. Former P-Patch Program Manager Rich Macdonald remembers it as “a little
garden with a little view. It was really pretty.” Unfortunately, only six years
later the owner of the property, a food processing company, terminated the
lease likely due to dissolution of company assets preparatory to becoming inactive.
Today the corner is a parking lot.
The loss of Jackson Place
did provide an added incentive for the build-out of the creatively designed and
named Climbing Water P-Patch, just two blocks to the south on a steep slope
adjacent to the Cedar River pipeline. Climbing Water was established in 2006 on
land leased from HomeSight, an affordable housing developer, and with the
support of the Jackson Place Community Council.
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The short-lived Jackson Place P-Patch. Courtesy Seattle Municipal Archives.
Steep and narrow Climbing Water P-Patch
Beacon Avenue P-Patch
On Central Beacon Hill, around the corner from the Beacon Avenue thoroughfare,
a small community garden sits tucked away from the street behind heavy
shrubbery on S. Graham Street. The land is owned by the adjacent Bethany (formerly
Beacon Avenue) United Church of Christ. The property had been gardened for some
time by members of the church, but -- in an effort to expand the gardening base
in 1993 -- the church agreed to turn over management of the garden to the
P-Patch Program. The relationship endured for thirteen years, but ultimately came
to an end in 2005. The garden faced obstacles that included its placement between
private properties and lack of any street frontage, making it difficult for
patchers to deliver materials to the garden. Layered on top of this were
ongoing personality conflicts between several gardeners whose disputes were
left to program staff to mediate. Ultimately the city decided these
difficulties and the resulting fall-off of interest in gardening made effective
management impossible.
Some years later, in 2016, the garden space was turned over to a
nonprofit organization, Nurturing Roots, which has created a small urban farm
complete with gardening workshops, communal meals, chickens, and a commitment
to social and environmental justice. Nurturing Roots leases the property from
Bethany Church.
Angeline
Perhaps the most heartbreaking loss was that of Angeline P-Patch,
a garden that existed for a scant 18 months. Angeline and Ferdinand were two
gardens established by the city in the summer of 1982 on vacant land under power lines on
Beacon Hill. The patches were intended to serve Southeast Asian refugees, many
of whom had settled in the area. Families from Laos and Cambodia had been
violently uprooted from their homes due to fallout from the Vietnam War. The
new patches were the city’s first effort to find land for these one-time
farmers to cultivate and grow some of the vegetables of their homeland.
Angeline was offered to ethnic Mien families.
Unfortunately, the best laid intentions ran afoul of culture
clash. A few neighbors of the Angeline patch orchestrated a campaign against
the garden, calling it a public nuisance. The Beacon Hill Community Council
became involved. Concerns ranged from children playing in the street to vermin
to newcomers washing their cars on the street and asking for favors from residents,
such as use of a telephone (in the pre-cell phone era). One neighbor complained that
the garden was messy and weedy, likely not recognizing Asian vegetables or
understanding the Mien practice of letting plants go to seed in order to preserve
the seeds for future planting. Possibly the greatest concern was the habit of
the Asians to work in their plots late into the evening, even after dark with
the help of flashlights. From the perspective of 40 years, it becomes clear
that cultural practices on both sides were in conflict. A few isolated
incidents, compounded by language barriers, likely led to an overblown reaction
from a few neighbors.
P-Patch staff spent most of 1983 struggling to address the
concerns of the neighbors while also working with the gardeners to curb some
practices. In the summer of 1983, one of the most disgruntled neighbors hired
an environmental consultant firm to test the garden for suspected vermin
infestation, harmful bacteria, and human waste. None was found. Unfortunately,
it was too late to save the garden. By autumn, the efforts were abandoned and
the garden was set for closure at the end of the year.
For the 1984 growing season, families who wished to continue
gardening were assisted to find plots at the Ferdinand patch a few blocks away
or at the more distant Thistle P-Patch in Rainier Beach.
NE 75th Street and 27th Avenue NE
In 1978 the P-Patch program was able to lease a parcel of land
downhill from Eckstein Middle School in Northeast Seattle for the low low price
of $85 per year. Sometimes known as Hillside, sometimes as Ravenna Hillside, but generally referred to now as that garden where the skinny
houses are, the 16-plot patch lasted for a decade. The land was owned by a
retired couple who lived in Okanogan County. Upon the death of the husband, the
wife made the hard decision to sell the land noting that she was “sorry to see
the Pea [sic] Patch go.”
The tale of 27th Avenue demonstrates the risk of siting
p-patches on private land. With only a short-term lease (generally one to three
years), gardeners run the risk of being uprooted at almost any time.
Some of the gardeners from 27th Avenue were able to
acquire plots at the Sand Point P-Patch approximately two miles east along Sand
Point Way. This property, too, would fall to development, in 2001 making way
for a new facility for Seattle Children’s Hospital, the owner of the land.
However, unlike some gardens mentioned here, the Sand Point P-Patch did not
die, but was moved wholesale across the street to Magnuson Park. The story of that
heroic effort is told here.
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