Plant A Row for the Hungry held a kickoff event for the planting season on Monday, April 25, at the Port Washington Children’s Center. In addition to having more than 100 children planting their own vegetable pots, they planted a new display designed by Marvin Makofsky, chief vegetable garden executive of Plant A Row, and Matt Arnold, a member of the Plant A Row team. The planter is artfully painted by The Art Guild, who has not only painted this display, but has also painted many of the planters containing vegetables that residents see in front of stores, the library, churches and synagogues throughout Port.
“This has been an extraordinary effort by these artists to bring great beauty to the community as well as put a spotlight on the need for our residents to provide fresh vegetables to families in need,” said Makofsky.
Over the past three years, more than 10,000 pounds of fresh produce has been delivered to Port’s community outreach programs. Last year, more than 700 individual families made deliveries to the Bayles Garden Center, the drop point from which a volunteer team makes deliveries to the outreach programs. Their goal is to reach the entire communities’ children and their families and help them to appreciate homegrown vegetables as well as to take advantage of the opportunity to be generous to families in need that cannot afford store-purchased food. The program has been sponsored faithfully for all these years by the Port Jewish Center.
Many people were on hand to make the day a success, including the teachers from the Children’s Center; Town of North Hemptead Supervisor Judi Bosworth; Town Clerk Wayne Wink; Legislator Dina De Giorgio; Laura Mogul, executive director of the Landmark on Main Street; Donna Preminger, executive director of the Children’s Center; Mike Donnelley, assistant director of the Children’s Center; Shelley Holzman, Ilene Silberstain and Diane Bares, directors of The Art Council of Port Washington; and many others.
