{"id":19730,"date":"2023-07-22T18:30:00","date_gmt":"2023-07-22T18:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=19730"},"modified":"2023-07-23T06:48:11","modified_gmt":"2023-07-23T06:48:11","slug":"fighting-veteran-food-insecurity-with-community-garden","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=19730","title":{"rendered":"Fighting Veteran food insecurity with community garden"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>It\u2019s a little community garden that\u2019s growing into a new lifeline for area Veterans.<\/p>\n<p>Since May, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.va.gov\/hines-health-care\/locations\/lasalle-va-clinic\/\">La Salle VA Clinic<\/a> staff have planted, watered and harvested a 500-square-foot vegetable patch for food-insecure Veterans who receive treatment at the Peru, Illinois, clinic.<\/p>\n<p>Nurse Donna Whitley says the LaSalle Veteran Community Garden will not only provide fresh vegetables to promote healthy eating but also serve as a place for Veterans to spend time in the sunshine, get physical exercise and give them a sense of accomplishment.<\/p>\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"alignright size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/3-La-Salle-garden-volunteers_r1-2.jpg\"><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">VA employees preparing garden<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<p>The La Salle clinic maintains a micro food pantry for Veterans in need, but staff wanted to add a community garden to supplement the mostly nonperishable items with fresh produce, explained Sally Washkowiak, nurse clinic manager.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Didn\u2019t take long for the project to take root<\/h2>\n<p>Within 24 hours of the request from Washkowiak, landlord Joe Welte was digging the 20\u00d725\u2032 garden, thrilled that the La Salle clinic would be at the frontlines in the fight against Veteran food insecurity.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe have Veterans who serve this country that don\u2019t have food,\u201d said Welte. \u201cThe community garden is the least we can do to care for them.\u201d \u00a0<\/p>\n<p>La Salle clinic social worker and garden enthusiast Laura McNally echoes Welte\u2019s sentiment. \u201cAs someone who gardens at home, I take pride in wanting this garden to succeed.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>One of seven employees caring for the garden until the clinic secures Veteran volunteers, McNally coordinates the securing of garden supplies, ensures the water schedule is in place and assists in planting vegetables for the garden.<\/p>\n<p>The garden currently consists of two cherry tomatoes, two slicing tomatoes, one sweet pepper and one cucumber, as well as radishes, onions and carrots. Fruit trees are expected to be planted soon.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI hope the garden will provide food security for our Veterans and give them purposeful volunteer opportunities,\u201d McNally said. \u201cThis garden is a physical representation of the camaraderie between VA staff and our Veterans we proudly serve.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>The La Salle VA Clinic provides primary care and specialty health services to 2,518 Veterans. It is one of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.va.gov\/hines-health-care\/\">Edward Hines Jr. VA<\/a> hospital\u2019s six outpatient clinics. All clinics maintain micro food pantries for Veterans in need. Hines VA hosts a food pantry every Thursday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It\u2019s a little community garden that\u2019s growing into a new lifeline for area Veterans. Since May, La Salle VA Clinic staff have planted, watered and harvested a 500-square-foot vegetable patch for food-insecure Veterans who receive treatment at the Peru, Illinois, clinic. Nurse Donna Whitley says the LaSalle Veteran Community Garden will not only provide fresh [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":19732,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[555,480,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19730","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community-garden","category-food-insecurity","category-health"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19730","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19730"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19730\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19736,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19730\/revisions\/19736"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/19732"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}