Thursday Afternoon and Evening

In front of the murals at Growing Power

Today we went to Growing Power and The Plant. The group received a tour from a full time employee that started as a youth volunteer. At Growing Power, we each did different activities such as weeding, composting and sifting. They were building a chicken coop for incoming chickens, had a dog, a cat, and goats, Billy Ray and Little Debbie. They had recently started aquaponics which is a way of growing plants from the waste of fish in water. The Growing Power sells their food to restaurants that then give them their scraps to make compost making a full circle.

Immediately after we headed to The Plant for a tour of the four floored building, which was the old Peer Foods meat packing building. The tour guide was a youth educator from a nonprofit organization teaching youths about sustainability.

Kyle shows us the aquaponics system at The Plant

At the Plant there was an outside garden, mushroom growing inside and aquaponics. Additionally The Plant has multiple tenants and plans for new tenants, a bakery, a pie shop and a brewery. Not all of their plans have been accomplished because it is an ongoing product. The Plant is committed to not having any waste. They use a close loop system and they are connected to everyone in the building. The close loop system consists of a reuseable energy system powered by waste and products that the tenants offer them. They reuse all the different parts of the previous meat packing plant. One of their many goals is to create jobs for the community that the meat packing plant eliminated when they closed down.

Sofia, Sarah, and Alyssa enjoy dinner
with the RSCJs

For dinner tonight, we drove to Hyde Park to eat with the RSCJ. The RSCJ created a delicious spaghetti dinner that was planned to be in their beautiful garden, but it started to rain, so we ate inside. After dinner, we had a spirited conversation about a variety of unusual topics.