Urban agriculture update: Rec and Park outlines GROW Center plan, seeks funding to expand services
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Summary
Urban Agriculture Director Mei Ling Wei told the commission the department now manages 39 community gardens and two urban farms and proposed a San Francisco Garden Resource Outreach and Workshop (GROW) Center in McLaren Park with an estimated total cost of $4.6 million; the department has $600,000 on hand and is actively fundraising for remaining design and construction costs.
San Francisco — The Recreation and Park Commission received an update Nov. 20 on the department’s urban agriculture and community‑garden programs and heard details of a proposed Garden Resource Outreach and Workshop (GROW) Center intended to expand services, workshops and weekly compost giveaways.
Mei Ling Wei, urban agriculture director, said the program now oversees 39 community gardens, two urban farms and a garden resource program that recorded more than 51,000 volunteer hours in 2025 (up from about 2,800 in 2017). She reported production gains at Alameda Farm (from roughly 23,000 pounds to an estimated 33,000 pounds this year) and said the farms serve “several hundred families” weekly.
Wei described the GROW Center, sited in a currently unused building at McLaren Park near Lewes Sutter Playground, as a one‑stop facility for community gardening resources — including demonstration gardens, greenhouses, tool storage, space for Master Gardener and Master Food Preserver trainings, and an on‑site compost yard to enable weekly giveaways. She said schematic drawings are complete and estimated full project costs at $4,600,000: $600,000 is identified from saved program budgets, with about $500,000 needed to finish design and roughly $4,000,000 to complete construction.
Wei noted the program’s small staff (three full‑time staff in the Urban Agriculture Division) and said the GROW Center would dramatically increase capacity, from servicing a program maximum of about 4,000 residents per year to an estimated 9,000.
Commissioners thanked Wei for the report and for bringing back Master Gardener and Cooperative Extension programming to San Francisco; staff said they are pursuing grants and partnerships to fund the remaining costs. There was no formal vote on funding during the meeting.
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