Green Era Campus Aims To Provide Solution To Food Access On South Side

Erika Allen is the Founder of Urban Growers Collective, president of Green ERA Educational NFP and co-owner of Green Era Sustainability Partner. PHOTO PROVIDED BY URBAN GROWERS COLLECTIVE.
Erika Allen is the Founder of Urban Growers Collective, president of Green ERA Educational NFP and co-owner of Green Era Sustainability Partner. PHOTO PROVIDED BY URBAN GROWERS COLLECTIVE.

Green Era Campus Aims To Provide Solution To Food Access On South Side

By Tia Carol Jones

An urban agriculture campus that will help build economic development and manufacturing that will improve the quality of life for residents in Auburn Gresham and the surrounding communities launched recently.

The Green Era Campus is a nine-acre facility located at 650 West 83rd St. The campus is a partnership between Green Era Sustainability, Urban Growers Collective and Green Era Educational NFP.

Erika Allen, Founder of Urban Growers Collective, said the Green Era Campus is needed, because it is necessary to have a fully complete, local food system. Early in her career of doing urban agriculture, Allen had to bring compost down from Milwaukee from Growing Power to be able to grow her produce.

Allen explained that with urban agriculture, the difference is that the spaces are smaller, and the plants have to be grown closer together. To grow the produce, it requires lots of energetic soil, with lots of fertility. That requires a more dense compost.  There is an anaerobic digester on site that will be able to provide food and beverage waste recycling, as well as supply renewable gas. The food and beverage waste that is recycled becomes part of the material that is used for the compost to grow the produce.

“At the end of the day, we have this material that goes back out to the farm that is the same quality material that I had to bring down 20 years ago, in box trucks, to be able to grow food in the manner that we had developed,” Allen said.

Three acres of the campus will be the digester and the Urban Growers Collective will be installing the remaining aspects of the campus. There will also be about an acre and a half of nature area where demonstrations about the impact of the plants and trees on the ability to mitigate climate change and build more resiliency.

Allen said the name Green Era speaks to moving into an environmental social consciousness and economic reality that has to incorporate climate change and justice in the way that we live as people.

“It doesn’t make sense to talk about sustainability or regenerative agriculture or organics or good food, when people who have historically been left out innovation and wealth building opportunities are not part of this shift,” Allen said. She added that it is important that job creation, small business development, wealth disparities and public health outcomes are part of the conversation of when it comes to why people have the food access they have.

Allen has seen things that are challenges in society and the environment and works toward providing models that can be scaled. She does the work, while training and supporting others to also do that work. Green Era represents that, with people seeing what the Urban Growers Collective is doing, to learn what they are doing, to contribute to research and to contribute to the vitality of Auburn Gresham and the South Side.

Along with the anaerobic digester, the Green Era Campus will have a greenhouse, education center, community farmstand and retail store, a green infrastructure and climate change boardwalk and vertical farm. Funds are being raised to build and complete the remaining components of the campus. The hope is that the greenhouse will be completed by early next summer.

The Urban Growers Collective received funding from the U.S. Department of Forestry, City of Chicago and Morton Arboretum, which they will use to build capacity to grow more trees.  The Green Era Campus also has a commitment from the Pritzker Traubert Foundation as part of the Chicago Prize. The Green Era Campus will also have a nursery and a nursery training program, with the goal to grow up to 10,000 trees, focusing on edible forestry, fruit and nut bearing trees. Allen said the edible forestry, along with the canopy trees, will help with food security and help mitigate climate change.

Allen hopes that the Green Era Campus model will be replicated in other parts of the city, region and across the country.

“We’re just really grateful for all of the support and people really taking the time to understand and be educated about what we’re doing, because it’s really the future. I’m very proud that this project is situated where it is,” Allen said. She added that the young people who participate in the Urban Growers Collective are really excited about the Green Era Campus, which brings her joy and is part of the organization’s mission and purpose as a not for profit.

The Urban Growers Collective is hosting an Urban Ag Crawl on Sept. 8th. For more information about the Urban Growers Collective, visit urbangrowerscollective.org. For more information about the Green Era Campus, visit greenerachicago.org.


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