Working for a Greener District of Columbia
D.C. URBAN GARDENERS
The D.C. Urban Gardener Association is an all-volunteer service organization whose mission is to promote sustainable gardening practices and environmental stewardship in the District of Columbia.
2007-2008 OFFICERS
President Ed Bruske, a former newspaper reporter
and personal chef, co-founded the D.C. Urban
Gardeners group after completing the D.C. Master
Gardener program in 2006. Cooking inspired Ed to
turn his front yard in the Columbia Heights
neighborhood into a kitchen garden, or what his wife
hopes will someday be an actual "edible landscape."
Last year he also built a large container garden at the
Children's Studio School in Northwest D.C. He is a
chef-in-residence at the Washington Youth Garden, National Arboretum, and lectures on composting and sustainable gardening. His daily musings on food can be found at The Slow Cook blog. His work also appears in Edible Chesapeake magazine.
Vice President Liz Falk is a co-founder and garden
director at the 7th Street Garden, an ambitious
project in the Shaw neighborhood of Northwest
Washington addressing inner-city food insecurity.
Liz completed her D.C. Master Gardener training in
the spring of 2007 but already holds a certificate in
permaculture design, as well as a master's degree
in natural resources and sustainable development.
She has spent time on farms in Australia and Costa Rica and is thoroughly engaged in integrating social justice and environmentalism.
Vice-President Grace Manubay chairs the Schoolyard Greening committee for the DC Environmental Education Consortium and has
served as education coordinator for Casey Trees. Most
recently, she has organized gardening workshops for
teachers, helped develop curriculum tools for use with
the DC Public Schools’ science standards, and launched
DC School Garden Week, a celebration of school
gardening and outdoor learning.
Grace has a master's degree in natural resource policy and behavior, with a concentration in environmental education, from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. She aspires to find the time to become a master gardener. In the meantime, she tries to garden with her husband and two-year-old son.
Vice President Mandie Yanasak is a Class of 2007 D.C. Master Gardener trainee. She is an active community gardener and
organizer in the Rosedale/Kingman Park neighborhood
in Northeast Washington, where she lives. Mandie
has been an activist since her college days in Boston,
and brings that same energy and determination to
efforts to make our city greener. She has been a
founding member of a number of social justice
organizations, and believes her experience establishing
sustainable community groups will benefit the young DC Urban Gardeners. When she is not tending her very urban tomato plants, she is the Young Workers Coordinator for the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union.
Secretary/Webmaster Susan Harris co-founded the D.C. Urban Gardeners organization after completing the D.C. Master Gardener program in 2006.
She is a gardening coach,and one of four writers of the award-winning
team blog, Garden Rant, Her own blog is the Sustainable Gardening Blog, a companion to her website Sustainable-Gardening.
Her gardening column in Maryland's Voice Newspapers
are also available on line. She's a past president of the
DC-Maryland Takoma Horticultural Club. In January of '08
she launched the Regional Garden Gurus, dedicated to
promoting good regional gardening information online.
Treasurer Robin Buck lives and gardens in the Brookland neighborhood of Northeast Washington. She operates her own interior design and Feng Shui
business. Robin is the founder of Eco-Partners
Network, an alliance of Washington-area businesses
engaged in environmentally friendly design and
construction. Should you happen to find yourself on
Robin's mailing list, you will receive valuable notices
of seminars, lectures and sometimes just casual meet-
ups involving a wide range of area environmentalists
and cutting edge concerns.
PROJECTS (so far and send us your ideas)
- Public education, on this site and through public talks and workshops on such topics as composting, growing of food, and sustainable gardening. - Exploring ways to provide free or low-cost compost and mulch to D.C. residents.- Our team of experienced School-Garden-Creators visits interested schools and helps new gardens grow. - Compiling information about all community gardens in the the District (especially contact names and numbers, and vacancies and rules) and providing free in-garden training by experts.- Working with Casey Trees, the D.C. Police Department and school and community groups to landscape the grounds of the 7th District Headquarters.- Currently planning an all-day Garden Forum at the headquarters of the Historical Society of Washington, D.C. in February of 2009. 
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