Earth Day is approaching in April, coinciding with the season of Spring – a time for planting and tidying up. As you embark on cleaning out your garage or backyard shed and inspect your trusty garden tools, consider taking part in a unique initiative known as a “Reverse Garage Sale.”
Mark Mesarch, a member of First Lutheran Church, oversees the East Campus Community Gardens (ECCG) located at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s East Campus. While resembling the familiar Community Crops gardens scattered across Lincoln, ECCG exclusively serves the university’s faculty, staff and students. The ECCG community comprises more than fifty families hailing from diverse corners of the globe, including Bangladesh, China, Mexico, Afghanistan and Colombia. These families cultivate crops for personal consumption, with surplus harvests generously donated to the Husker Pantry, a campus-wide food bank. Although the gardens offer water, compost and select tools, such as wheelbarrows, essential hand tools like hoes, shovels and turning forks are lacking. Many of these families reside in nearby apartments near East Campus, lacking adequate storage space for gardening implements.
We are planning to gather gently used hand tools for donation to these families who would greatly benefit from them in their gardening pursuits. If you possess tools you are willing to contribute, kindly photograph them and forward the images to Mark, along with your name and contact details. Mark will reach out to you regarding the tool collection process. A designated tool pick-up event is scheduled at the church on April 21, 2024.
