Community garden in Snellville receives $1,500 grant

The Norris Lake Community Garden in Snellville recently received a $1500 Food Well Alliance Community Improvement grant, along with an in-kind donation of compost. The grant will be used to purchase additional fencing, hoses, irrigation supplies, signage, and wheelbarrows. The compost will help support growing during the 2020 growing season.

The Norris Lake community, a 900-home subdivision in South Gwinnett, began the Norris Lake Community Garden in 2018 with the help of volunteers, support from the Norris Lake Community Benefits Corporation, and a 2019 grant of $10,000 from the Community Foundation for Greater Atlanta. Their goal was to create a community park, garden and food forest to introduce residents to gardening and eating locally grown food, as well as being a community gathering space to ease social isolation and food insecurity.

Twenty raised garden beds are available to rent by Norris Lake residents, as well as a community portion of the garden and a food forest where any resident can harvest fresh vegetables, herbs, and fruit at no cost.