Plans for the Cal State Long Beach community garden have been underway for several months now, but there is one big factor delaying its progress: no one has assumed responsibility for it.
Associated Students Inc. Vice President Jonathon Bolin and the project’s founder, senior engineering major Vincent Holguin, said the Grow Beach! University Garden is facing delays because of a misunderstanding with administration.
Holguin and Bolin met with students involved in the project along with a few CSULB administrators Thursday to further discuss the project.
“After meeting with [CSULB] administration last year, we were introduced to the idea of creating a student organization to facilitate and manage the university garden,” Holguin said. “As of March 2014, administration explained that the university garden couldn’t be facilitated and managed by a student organization.”
Jeff Klaus, associate vice president for student services and dean of students, explained that a student organization couldn’t oversee the garden because it is not an independent, legal entity.
“If a student group is responsible for that plot of land and the liability associated with that, who has the oversight?” Klaus said. “If something goes wrong, it could be a significant amount of money.”
Klaus said that ASI, which operates several facilities on campus including the recycling center and the Soroptimist House, or one of the colleges would be better suited to run the garden.
“In terms of Student Life and Development, they’re not in the business of running a garden,” he said. “It could also be housed with one of our academic units, due to the great opportunities for connecting in class lessons with hands-on learning experiences at the garden.
Bolin said he thinks a better idea is to place responsibility for the garden under the university.
“The project has grown outside of Associated Students Inc.,” Bolin said. “Not only students will be using the garden, but faculty would like to use the space for class, 49er Shops has shown interest to grow food for the Chartroom, and engineering classes [could use the space as well].”
The committee explained the progress it has made thus far in the project.
“We have a funding model to generate up to $8,000 a year,” Bolin said.
Junior political science major and ASI Vice President-elect Nayiri Baghdassarian is also involved with the project.
“We have a plan for how [the garden] is going to be run, we have money, and we have manpower,” Baghdassarian said.
Klaus said Physical Planning and Facilities Management agreed to cover the start-up costs of the garden, which was originally planned to sit adjacent to the Housing and Residential Life office, west of Parking Lot 14.
Regardless of the garden’s location, Klaus said he is very confident that it is going to happen.
“[This project] is some of the best work I have seen by students on this campus in my 17 years,” Klaus said. “It really shows how committed the students are to making this happen.”
The team will meet again in the following weeks to try to clarify some details about the project.