Quick Take
Homeless Garden Project is one step closer to owning its longtime Natural Bridges Farm after years of regulatory hurdles, with a key zoning decision this week that, if approved, would clear the way for the nonprofit to purchase the 4-acre property and begin construction on a permanent home as early as 2027.
“There’s a fundamental irony that the Homeless Garden Project is, itself, homeless,” said Doug Engfer, the vice president of the Santa Cruz County nonprofit’s board.
That could change at a zoning meeting on Wednesday.
Homeless Garden Project, which provides job training and placement for local unhoused individuals, is working to purchase 4 acres of land that it currently leases on Shaffer Road at the edge of Santa Cruz’s Westside, known as the Natural Bridges Farm. It’s part of a 10.3-acre parcel owned by engineer Ron Swenson, who has agreed to sell the farm to Homeless Garden Project for an undisclosed amount.
Over the past several years, the nonprofit navigated several bureaucratic hurdles to make the sale possible, including rezoning the area from residential to agricultural use, and gaining approval from the California Coastal Commission. On Wednesday, the city zoning administrator is slated to vote on whether to separate the 4-acre parcel from the original 10 acres, and approve the design permit and a coastal development permit, among other details.
If approved, it would be a milestone for the project, paving a clear path forward to purchase the lot.
Engfer says he is optimistic the zoning administration will approve the application. “What comes after that are a series of relatively mechanical bureaucratic steps to finalize the lot split, and then we move on to building,” said Engfer. “It’s moving from the entitlements that we will have secured and the design permit that we will have obtained to developing buildable drawings, selecting partners to work with us in building the project, and then getting busy on it.” If all goes well, the project could break ground in 2027.
The organization plans to build several structures: a barn workshop, a permanent farm stand with an attached office, improved greenhouses and a commercial kitchen.
It has enough money to complete at least the first phase of construction, said Engfer.
The organization retained almost $3.5 million that it raised in 2019 and originally planned to invest in a site in the city’s Pogonip open space. That move, planned since 1998, was permanently suspended in 2022 after soil testing revealed that the ground was contaminated with lead and other chemicals due to formerly being used as a skeet shooting range, making it unsuitable for an organic farm.
Homeless Garden Project invested the capital, and aims to draw from it to complete the first significant buildings at the Natural Bridges location.
“We’ve always imagined that we would build at least the barn workshop and hopefully the commercial kitchen and show it to our donors before we run another campaign,” said Executive Director Darrie Ganzhorn. “Our donors have been very supportive and patient in all these years between 2019 and now, and we’re excited to deliver on those funds that were given to us by generous community members.”
In April, Homeless Garden Project received a $1 million grant from the California State Coastal Conservancy to acquire the Natural Bridges Farm. Ganzhorn and Engfer declined to share the price the nonprofit and Swenson agreed upon for the land, but said the grant would cover two-thirds of the cost of purchasing the property. That would place the total price at around $1.5 million.
According to Ganzhorn, the impact of having a permanent home for the first time in the organization’s 36-year history cannot be overstated. When it was founded in 1990, the nonprofit had a temporary agreement with the city to farm a piece of land on Pelton Avenue, and moved to Shaffer Road in 1998 when the lease ended. The Natural Bridges Farm wasn’t meant to be its forever home, but when it was forced to suspend efforts to move to Pogonip after more than 20 years, plans changed.
“We understand in a very embodied way what it means to work a piece of land, do the work that we’re doing to support the community transformation and help people get jobs and housing, and then to lose that land,” said Ganzhorn. “So we have always known the importance of having a secure site.”
Having all of its outbuildings in the same place will streamline many of its operations and facilitate production of its farm products, especially during the rainy season. Currently, program trainees work at a separate workshop in Depot Park. When the barn workshop is complete, that work will be naturally integrated with farming, said Ganzhorn.
Establishing a commercial kitchen would also enable the nonprofit to certify its workshop products, like baking mixes, spices, soap and lotions, as organic. The organization typically rents a commercial kitchen space one day a week; it could use an on-site kitchen daily.
With more consolidated resources, the nonprofit hopes to create more opportunities that will support its trainees, like an upcoming pilot program approved by the city called Pathways to Work. “It’s combining Homeless Garden best practices with the Downtown Streets Team model,” said Ganzhorn.
Each pilot will consist of three 16-week sessions, each with 16 participants volunteering four days a week on street cleanup in the downtown river levee area and Midtown, plus one day of job training and community building. The goal is to help participants cultivate skills that will help them secure jobs in the community after graduating.
Homeless Garden Project boasts a success rate greater than 90% of graduates obtaining employment and housing. “We hope that we can continue to be an organization that the community is proud to support, and that the community feels is an innovative and effective way to address homelessness,” said Ganzhorn.
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