Community Garden Planted and Tended by Homeless Community Begins to Bear Fruit in West Sacramento

A farm-to-table experience by and for unhoused neighbors provided by the Downtown Streets Team

This week, Team Members at Downtown Streets Team (DST) in West Sacramento harvested their first batch of organic lettuce at the Mel Brookens Community Garden located in the backyard of the Roadway Inn. The garden was started in January of this year by Team Members of Downtown Streets Team, a nonprofit homeless advocacy organization whose mission is to build Teams that restore dignity, inspire hope, and provide a pathway to recover from homelessness. Teams are comprised of unhoused neighbors and those at risk of experiencing homelessness. Team Members receive case management and employment placement services from DST specialists as well as non-cash incentives to pay for essentials like medicine, food, and transportation. DST Team Members are known for their volunteer cleanup of city streets and abandoned encampment sites; and in West Sacramento they also cultivate a garden.

The garden was named in memory of Mel Brookens, a founding Team Member and first Team Lead of the DST West Sacramento program, which launched in 2018. The green thumb and organizing force behind the garden is current Team Member TeeJay who was recruited to DST by Brookens in 2018. Thanks to Brookens’s intervention and DST, TeeJay moved indoors and is still on her recovery journey. She often claims DST has been her salvation and the garden is her sanctuary. She now leads a team of two to four DST Team Members in caring for the garden. For TeeJay, the Brookens Community Garden is a space of comfort and her legacy to the community. The site of the garden—the Roadway Inn—was converted from a motel to a residence for people experiencing homelessness under the California Homekey program in 2020. Its 40 rooms host 65 residents and since its conversion has supported 765 residents.

The lettuce harvested this week is destined for a salad to be served as a part of a free lunch provided by The West Sacramento Mercy Coalition, a local nonprofit that provides life skills seminars along with free meals to the residents of the Roadway Inn. The four raised beds of the garden are planted with cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers, cantaloupes, and other melons. Going forward, the garden’s bounty will supplement The Roadway Inn’s walk-up food service, which provides raw and prepared foods to the homeless community.

The Mel Brookens Community Garden, like all gardens, is a work in progress. For people interested in supporting this project, the garden is in need of mulch, trellis material, grill, and picnic tables and chairs.