Canada: Ottawa’s community garden program needs formal mandate, centralized operations – city staff

The city has 120 food-producing community gardens as of 2025, and there are community gardens in every ward in the city. Of the 120, 27 are on city land, including 16 on park land, but only one is city-operated.
By Paula Tran
Ottawa Citizen
April 20, 2025
Excerpt:
The City of Ottawa’s Community Services Committee is to discuss several recommendations on Tuesday to improve community-led gardens and green initiatives, including a recommendation to formalize the program through a city-wide mandate.
According to a report to committee members, city staff contracted an external consulting firm, Hoffman Hayes, to lead an internal review to develop best practices for community-led initiatives on city land. The firm specializes in design consultations for urban agriculture and gardens and community development, according to its website.
The review found that decision-making authority, long-term strategy and program oversight for community-led garden and green initiatives are decentralized across several departments. This means the program relied heavily on external community partners to advocate for municipal garden development with limited influence over internal processes, program coordination and equitable land access.
This is especially a problem because demand for community-led initiatives is growing throughout the city.
Read the complete article here.
Source: https://cityfarmer.info/canada-ottawas-community-garden-program-needs-formal-mandate-centralized-operations-city-staff/
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