With each passing day, it seems the United States of America, “Land of the Free and Home of the Brave” is becoming more and more like the Communist Russia I learned about in elementary school where people weren’t allowed to grow their own food unless the State “allowed” it.
In this latest crackdown on citizens simply trying to provide for themselves using the most basic of skills – gardening – the USDA’s Rural Development Agency is forbidding Rosie, an industrious 4-year old girl in South Dakota from using a small, unused area outside her subsidized housing unit to grow green vegetables.
Rosie’s mother, Mary (names changed to protect the child’s identity), is single and severely disabled. She and her daughter live on a fixed income disability payment of $628/month. The garden vegetables growing just outside her backdoor lovingly tended by Rosie provide a fresh and healthy addition to their diet that they could not otherwise easily afford.
Rosie started the garden in May 2013, but now the property management company has ordered the garden be removed this week!
The reason?
The property management company claims that gardening goes against the rules set by the USDA’s Rural Development Agency which forbids residents to have structures of any kind within landscaped areas. It seems to me that the practice of growing vegetables by the most needy in our society would take precedence over landscaping, wouldn’t you agree?
I wonder if the USDA plans to establish “rules” about breathing air in subsidized areas too?
The Federal bureaucracy seems to think that it owns those individuals who receive any sort of government assistance and that their behavior is completely within its jurisdiction to control no matter how ridiculous or blatantly un-American the power-tripping “rules” they decide to put in place may be.
Think this is an isolated case? It’s not. I write regularly on this blog about these outrageous situations where ordinary citizens are bullied by out of control bureaucrats, the most recent being a Mother in Maine who was harassed and threatened by the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) for feeding her healthy, robust 3 month old son homemade goat milk formula instead of horribly unhealthy commercial formula from the store laced with rancid vegetable oils and GMOs!
What You Can Do Now to Help Rosie
It is truly unfathomable that our country has degenerated to the point where a person can no longer garden without permission from bureaucratic thugs who get paid with our hard earned tax dollars to think up these rules – not laws – rules that have never been voted on by the elected representatives of the citizens expected to abide by those rules.
If you recall, this is exactly the sort of authoritarian insanity that started the American Revolutionary War (tea party anyone?).
Tell the USDA where it can put its “rules” against gardening by those living in rural, subsidized areas.
Sample Email to USDA
You can copy/paste the email template below to send directly from your email provider. Template provided courtesy of Kitchen Gardeners International, the source of this story.
Cc: [email protected], [email protected]
Subject: Allow USDA-subsidized housing residents to grow vegetable gardens
Message body:
Dear Director Meeks,
I urge you to make a loud and clear statement to all the property management companies your agency contracts that USDA-subsidized residents have the right to keep their own vegetable gardens provided that these gardens are actively maintained. Vegetable gardens grow healthy and affordable foods as well as a sense of community. Rather than preventing low-income and disabled residents from providing for themselves, we should be doing everything we can to encourage them. Thank you for your attention to this matter.
Sincerely yours,
(Your name, your town, your state)
Important Updates to This Story
8/27/2013: FINAL UPDATE and details on Rosie’s Victory Garden!
8/26/2013: A detailed update to this story is provided here.
8/25/2013: Roger Doiron, Director of Kitchen Gardeners International, has provided more details on this emerging story. The USDA has claimed in email correspondence to Mr. Doiron that it has no written rules preventing Mary and Rosie from having a garden (despite the property management company’s insistence to the contrary). On the other hand, the USDA hasn’t come to Mary and Rosie’s defense either and by allowing the property management company it has a contract with to call the shots and bully Mary and Rosie it is essentially enforcing such a rule no matter what is claimed via email.
Bureaucratic rules are notoriously confusing to understand let alone interpret, but if the USDA stands behind its assertion that there are no “rules” – written OR unwritten – against gardening in subsidized housing, it should stop the property management company under the auspices of the USDA from forcing Mary and Rosie to remove their garden.
The USDA pays most of the rent for Mary and thousands of citizens like her around the United States. It should do the right thing and insist that property owners and managers of subsidized housing permit residents to grow their own food in well cared for gardens rather than look the other way when residents are bullied for their efforts at self sufficiency. After all, the stated mission of the USDA Rural Development Agency is to “improve the quality of life in rural America”. Gardening surely would be supportive of this important goal.
Source
Kitchen Gardeners International (KGI). Rosie and Mary’s real names and exact location in South Dakota have not been revealed in order to protect the identity of a minor child. Please contact KGI Director Roger Doiron, [email protected] if you wish to further verify the validity of this story.
pitikuss
“where people weren’t allowed to grow their own food unless the State “allowed” it”
…this is just lie … you are no less ignorant than any other American… no wonder your so called “freedom” is getting taken away …
Steven
Petitioning the federal government isn’t going to do jack spit. Save your energy and put it toward parenting your children better so that they don’t grow up to become assholes in suits who shut down the gardens of little girls.
Deanna
Interesting that one of the things you’re supposed to be able to buy with welfare money is bedding plants. =o/
Maria C.
Having been an Assistant Property Manager at an apartment complex for 12 years, I know that the reason sounds a bit harsh, but Rosie and her mother should have asked permission before planting. I think that a reasonable solution should be that the owners give permission to set aside a small area for a ‘community garden’ and any residents who wish to plant there may by simply registering themselves and their section and receiving a free garden pass. If a resident does not tend properly to maintain a clean and organized garden, then they will simply lose their community garden pass. I had trouble with a tenant who dug down in between the walkway railings and the hedges of the front of the building and planted potatoes. This actually resulted in the hedges in only that one area to turn yellow and die. We also had trouble with them planting mango trees in the back of the property which we ended up having to remove because the roots began to break up the parking lot since they were planted too close to the spaces. Remember these are professional companies there to make money in exchange for services provided. If the permission is not in the contract, renters are not allowed to do whatever they please. I hope this CAN be worked out with the community. Having just harvested our first crop of corn, beans and tomatoes this year on our own property, it is a great tool for children (and adults alike) to have. I wish the best to all parties involved.
Sandy
I would just like to point out that in the former Soviet Union (Communist Russia, as you called it), almost every household had kitchen gardens in their yards to supplement their food rations that were provided by the government, and not only was this legal, it was encouraged. This included apartment buildings. And all housing was owned by the government and assigned to citizens. If they had not already had a thriving garden culture, half the population would have starved to death in the first few years after the fall of communism. (source: Dmitry Orlov’s book, Reinventing Collapse)
EC
You need to clarify that this book is written about events in the 1980s and 90s and Communist Russia’s history begins much earlier. Absolutely from the beginnings of communism to near the collapse it was ILLEGAL to grow your own food. Anything grown belonged to the state. The people themselves belonged to the state! Your children were not your own but belonged to the state! People were forced off their own property and then ordered to cultivate a small share to provide for the collective. Many people held back their harvest and kept some for themselves, a dangerous practice should anyone notice and report you.
Then there were the mass starvations, as seen with the Ukrainians where millions of people starved to death. There was inflation that made foods expensive and careful rationing by the government where store shelves were often empty. (source: numerous eyewitness accounts from fortunate people who survived and escaped.)
Eric
I want the names of EVERYONE involved in this. The housing Development, The Government officials, and the such, I want to SUE the hell out of them. There is no rhyme or reason this little girl or anyone else in the development using the land outside of the home they live in to grow food. These bureaucratic gangbusters want to do everything to make life hard one EVERYONE! I would ask the little girl to Dare them to take it down and refuse to take it down herself. The garden is only helping not harming and gives her something to do during the summer months. These are obvious people that are jealous and have nothing more to do with their lives but to pick on a little girl and her disabled mother. The Fed has GONE WAY WAY over board, and the housing authority has crossed that same line. This is a FREE Country and we dont need all these stupid rules. In this case I see this as just wrong! Totally Wrong and I want to sue these people for their evil ways!
R Keith Beal
YOUR LETTER IS FAR TOO KIND – HAVE A LOOK AT MINE!
Dear Director Meeks,
It is draconian “rules” decreed by bureaucrats, unelected political cronies who think they own the citizens they work for give the government agencies a bad name.
Others have asked, implored for reason but they do not understand “The Nature of the Beast”.
I will be contacting my Senators asking they to cut your budget.
In this time of sequestration this should be an easy sell; perhaps they can eliminate your entire division.
Cutting your budget and uncontrolled, unchecked arbitrary power is the only think megalomaniacs in office understand.
Sincerely,
R Keith Beal
Eric
MR Beal! You have my permission to submit my name on that same level! I too agree with you and will write the senator and congressman as well. I think these Bureaucrats need to learn a good lesson and hitting them where their wallet is is a good idea. I am going to write it as soon as I finish with this post. I hope they are happy they picked on a disabled mother and a four year old trying to subsidize their own level of living. This is shame a real shame that we have to even have to go though this process. Thank you Mr. Beal and good luck!
Elena
The only reason I can think of to limit gardening in a landscaped area is a concern for the safety of the vegetables if there are harmful pesticides and the like used in the maintenance in the area. Could that be the rationale?
Jonathan Gal
Well, there could also be an issue with water usage.
I would think that housing projects probably don’t spend any money on pesticides.
If they do, then we should alter the budget. Instead of pesticides, they should spend money on water for vegetables, instead.
Jean Coutu
Definitely need to get SWAT in there quick!
Jonathan Gal
SWAT, these days, are part of the instrument of federal tyranny. They are training to take away guns.
This is a job for the U.S. Army, the greatest liberators of all time!
How about the 10th Mountain Division?!
Jonathan Gal
Prior comment was “tounge and cheek”, not meant to be taken literally!
Actually, the only resources that may need to be dedicated to this are:
(1) re-allocation of spending on pesticides/herbicides (if any) to spending on water for vegetable gardening.
(2) a phone call from the top to clarify that vegetable gardening is allowed on these lands, as long as they are well maintained.
Gerri
How much more has to happen before people open their eyes & sees what is going on in this country. We are methodically becoming a “communist” country. Not “socialist”, but communist. For those who don’t believe that, then go back & study your history how communism first started. Soooo many things that is going on in this country right now is exactly what went on in Russia. The denial of growing your food, high prices to buy it, our leaders telling us what we can eat & how much, i.e. size of sodas is only 1 example. Michelle Obama wanting to force restaurants to serve less portions of food, etc. You can even “google” it. The ONLY thing I can agree with is removing the junk food machines in the schools. THAT should NEVER have happened. If the schools wanted to raise a little extra cash, they could have used healthier snacks that are appealing such as fruit.
It pains me to say that Obama IS the worst President we’ve ever had because of the way he’s destroying our country. He has never hidden his agenda. He has always be truthful about that, but people only want to interpret his statements as good things. One of his key statements that he has used since he began campaigning is that he wants to “fundamentally change” America. For me, that has always meant just 1 thing. Abolishing the Constitution just for a start. He has mentioned several times that he believes in a One World Order. He also talks about “spreading the wealth”. That’s communism.
Anyway, I could go on, but I won’t. I urge everyone to really pay attention to what he’s saying. Research the history & beginnings of “communism”. Think about, make note of and research those he associates with, has appointed to his staff etc.
One last thought. I’m not blaming Obama alone. Yes, he’s the strongest & “pushiest” President we’ve ever had. The door was already opened for him. I can probably say that all of our Presidents in the past several years, both democrat & republican have done this country harm in some way. Maybe in their own mind they felt they were doing the right thing, but they didn’t. There is so much that “we the people” have no idea what has been going on.
SophieCT
Oh please. Step away from the Faux News and Rush. You are clearly affected by their delusions. If anything, Obama is a loser because there’s a D after his name and he keeps capitulating to Republicans. I’ll bet you like his drones.
Simeil Coran
I don’t understand why those of you crying about the government turning communist are also taking the side of this girl and her garden. This property doesn’t belong to this mother and child and yet you want to take it away from the rightful (the one who paid for it) owner and give it to this family to use. If she doesn’t like it she should MOVE.
CC
Exactly.
I think the problem here is in the way the article was constructed. The headline and first paragraph do not mention that the garden was created by a renter in the “common area” of an apartment complex, and points to the USDA as the rule creator/enforcer rather than the owner of the complex.
The exact same story would get the exact same people upset if the headline were “HUD Recipients Mis-using Common Area in Subsidized Housing Complex”, and the first paragraph pointed out “believing you can do what you want, on land that belongs to a hard-working American, is akin to Communism”