El Sol Brillante and Down to Earth Garden hosted four staff members from the Queens Botanical Garden to go deep into our bokashi composting process. Our resident expert led them through all aspects of the bokashi process from creating the bokashi to feeding worm compost bins, and even how to improve growing vegetables. Between the two gardens, we’ve diverted almost 70 tons of food waste since 2009 using the bokashi method of recycling food waste. You can learn more about our process here.
On Sunday at noon, about a dozen garden members gathered at El Sol Jr. on the north side of 12th Street to travel uptown and participate in the March to End Fossil Fuels. Earlier in the week, they had gathered in the garden to make signs and banners with messages like “There is no Planet B” and “Keep the Oil in the Soil”.
We are excited to announce that El Sol Brillante has been awarded a 2023 Community Leader Grant from CitizensNYC! The $500 of grant money will be used to support our composting efforts, which you can read about here.
For 2023, LUNGS (Loisaida United Neighborhood Gardens) was selected to receive a $7500 grant for Down to Earth Garden/El Sol Brillante. The grant is from the Manhattan Composting Initiative for fiscal year 2023, “Intergenerational Composting Program.” The grant was used to improve our composting system, including a bokashi rotator and solar-battery system to run the rotator.
Find out more about our composting system here.
