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For almost a third of her 24 years, Erika Rumbley has been, in her words, “celebrating local food systems,” as a gardener, community garden organizer, youth educator, and former coordinator for the Green Edge Supper Clubs.
Erika's zeal for community food organizing is a hybrid of two passions: arts and environmentalism. At Vassar College, she worked as a playwright and majored in Environmental Studies, with a focus on urban food systems. “There’s a fine line between the two,” she reflects. “I admire artists like Suzanne Lacey, whose work combines performance with social themes and urban issues. I feel that organizing urban growers is the most vital work I could be doing.”
Beginning a Super Club.
For Erika, this commitment has taken shape in work on small and large scales. Original Green Edge-ers might remember Erika as coordinator of Neighborhood Supper Clubs. She recalls one of the first, and certainly the smallest Supper Club event – one that brought together 4 or 5 people who shared an arcane interest in cultivating solid masses of maroscopic organisms to create a healthy tea called Kombucha . “After we tasted everyone’s Kombucha, we had a potluck dinner that ended up sharing recipes and talking about fermenting.”
Brewing Kombucha may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but it does illustrate the agility of the Green Edge Supper Club, which can focus on special interests (eg, kombucha or worm composting see Leaflet June Issue), or purely to share food and conversation. The only screen, says Erika, “is being interested enough in the event to ask for an address. The most incredible thing about that the Supper Club program is that people feel comfortable inviting strangers into their houses!”
According to Erika, “In the beginning, we extended invitations through word-of-mouth between neighbors, fliers on community bulletin boards, and neighborhood groups.” She saw the fledgling group through to its online launch last fall. Today, thanks in large part to Erika’s organizing abilities, seeds have been planted for over 40 self-sustaining Supper Clubs in Manhattan and Brooklyn. Through the online site, people can hook into an existing Supper Club, or start their own.
Working in Community Gardens
These small, intimate events contrast sharply with most of Erika’s work with broadscale programs for larger communities. Just after she graduated, she worked in Poughkeepsie with the Green Community Teen Garden. “It was a youth-driven garden that provides free produce for volunteers and neighbors,” Erika explains. “After a year of interviews and gardening, we hosted The Poughkeepsie Community Feast, which was a free, locally-sourced meal in the garden.” Nearly 100 people gathered for lunch, music, and teen-led garden tours.
Erika now lives in Providence, RI working as the Community Garden Network Coordinator for Southside Community Land Trust. The Land Trust runs a ¾ acre urban farm, provides educational programs in schools, organizes community gardens, and leases a farm incubator (Urban Edge Farm) just outside the city.
As Erika describes it, a “farm incubator,” a piece of land where beginning farmers can lease land very cheaply and share resources, such as green house space and equipment. The farm is managed collaboratively, and for many, it’s the first step toward ownership.
Whether organizing four people to talk about fermented tea, hosting a community-wide city garden-grown meal, or linking people with resources for community gardens and farms, Erika sees growing food as crucial to the health of our cities. “I’m trying to make that work a bit easier by encouraging sharing resources, and giving people the momentum to continue.”
Interested in meeting more people like Erika? Check out other profiles on our website!
About the Author
Marietta Abrams Brill is a mother, writer, and green advocate who lives with her family in Park Slope, Brooklyn..
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