SPRING 2024
Bringing the garden to the community…
…and the community to the garden
EARLY GARLIC HARVEST
Our Mission
Our New Way Garden is a non-profit, 501c3 organization created to educate the public about locally and naturally grown food, increase community access to healthy organic produce, support small local businesses, and provide productive activities and positive sources of income for youth at a time when opportunities are limited
ONGOING GOALS
equitable food production and distribution
environmental stewardship
environmental education
Our Gardens
We currently work in five large food-producing gardens on two corporate campuses, a town park, and a public housing facility. We also offer classes at one college, three high schools, two middle schools, and two elementary schools in the greater Westchester area
Volunteer
Watch our founder and our wonderful volunteers in action! We are an organization run by volunteers, and would love to see you in our gardens.
Become a partner
Our corporate partners keep us running! If you are interested in company-based volunteering at ONWG or would like to make a corporate donation, feel free to contact us.
SEEDLING DONATION
Farmer’s Conference
Are you interested in agriculture and farming? Do you want to connect with like-minded individuals in your field? You’re in the right place! Sign up for our monthly Farmer’s Conference (held over zoom) where we discuss topics ranging from sustainability to racism and misogyny in the food and agriculture system. We will get back to you soon with more information about our next meeting.
Farmer’s Conference Sign-Up Form
Sustainability
Our New Way garden is committed to operating in a sustainable manner
While the phrase “sustainable farming” is often thought of as synonymous with “farming in a way that doesn’t harm the environment,” Amy Benerofe, Our New Way Garden’s founder, recognizes the multi-faceted implications of this phrase.
“There is a huge social justice and economic component to sustainability,” she notes. “Your business can be in the green, but it isn’t sustainable if your lowest-paid employees aren’t making minimum wage. You are standing on the bottom tier to run your organization.” She credits the impactful Education for Sustainability course she took at Manhattanville for this expanded worldview.
Amy personally makes sure to pay her interns at least $15 to $20 an hour.
“I know I could be paying them less, but I don’t want to stretch out their time by paying them unfairly for my own benefit,” she says.
In addition, Our New Way Garden is committed to growing organic, pesticide-free food that nurtures the environment, and donates its fresh, nutritious food to underserved communities to help break the barriers keeping them from a middle-class lifestyle.
Amy believes that mother nature follows the laws of abundance. “If you plant one seed and nurture it, you get many seeds,” she notes. “We live in a society where this paradigm is reversed. We are disconnected from sustainability, but the beauty within people gives me hope for the future.”
Planting Boxes
Our New Way Garden has partnered with a young local carpenter to build raised beds and other custom planting projects on private properties. If you are interested in starting one of these projects in your home, business or school, feel free to contact us and we will get back to you with an estimate.
Project 1
Project 2
Our Food
We donate the majority of our harvest to locally-based organizations that feed the greater Westchester community. Our gardens are on commercial private and public lands, and our produce is grown without the use of herbicides, pesticides, and chemical fertilizers
GIVE BACK
CSA
Your tax deductible contribution to our community supported agriculture (CSA) program will provide you and your family up to 16 weeks of chemical & pesticide free, local produce!
DONATE
Help us expand access to high quality organic produce, educate children, teens and adults on sustainable organic farming, and maintain our gardens