9.20.2011

Memphis Math Teacher Ordered to Destroy His Thriving Urban Garden

Student Beekeepers Awaiting Adam's Supervision
As if the insane war on relocalization and self-sufficiency couldn't get more overt, another debacle is unfolding in Memphis, Tennessee.

Just weeks after a SWAT Team raided RAWESOME Food Coop in Los Angeles, and a Michigan woman faced 93 days in jail for gardening, now a Memphis math teacher has been ordered to dismantle his personal garden.

The teachers name is Adam Guerrero, and the tidy garden is located in the yard of his own home.  He works the land with a team of student volunteers.  They practice vermiculture gardening and keep bees.

Guerrero has been fined under ordinances related to "public health, safety or welfare" for using his spare time to tend a garden and keep bees (beekeeping is legal in Memphis) with the help of volunteer students he has taken under his wing.

As you can see in the photo below, most of Adam's Garden is in the back yard and the small plot in the front where he's growing vegetables looks about like any small urban home.  If there's any safety hazard, it's that trash can sitting near the sidewalk.  I'd say if Adam wheels that unsightly thing around back the front yard no longer constitutes a threat to "public health, safety, or welfare."

What do you think?


Lots of other info about this situation is available in the Treehugger article.

If you'd like to support Adam Guerrero and his students, get to know him better via the Save Adam Guererro's Garden! Facebook Page.

More About the War on Gardens:
Michigan Woman Faces 93 Days in Jail for Gardening
B.C. Man Faces 6 Months in Jail for Growing Food
Toronto to Change Ordinance; Allow Front Yard Vegetable Gardens