Skinner City Farm: To the west of the Park, lies the Skinner Community Farm where you can grow your own vegetables
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**. Formerly the Ropp azalea nursery in the 1940s, the modern garden had its impetus in 1997 when a mound of fill dirt showed up. Neighbors desired a garden instead, and the Skinner City Farm organization was founded in 2000 to oversee it.
The goals of the Garden include:
- To create and operate a public agricultural site which will involve the Eugene community in the process of designing and operating community gardening areas;
- To create agriculturally based youth programs that will involve and assist young people, with an emphasis on programs for at-risk youth, troubled youth, and youth whose needs are not adequately met in public schools or other standard educational institutions;
- To demonstrate and educate the general public about sustainable and ecologically-sound agriculture, agricultural ecosystems, and socially and ecologically appropriate agricultural techniques and technologies;
- To work with local public and private schools to increase the educational opportunities available in the Lane County region by providing hands-on agricultural educational programs which students from all of the region’s schools can visit and become involved;
- To offer programs and opportunities for people from diverse ethnic backgrounds and disadvantaged sectors of the population including homeless people, people of color, and disabled people; and
- To educate the general public about the historical role and importance of small farms and agriculture in this region, and to operate a historically accurate demonstration of the “Skinner Farm” as operated by Eugene Skinner and his family.
