EATONTOWN — Plans for a community garden/agricultural center on a 5.6-acre tract of farmland could take root if the borough’s Green Team can acquire a $10,000 grant.
The Borough Council approved a resolution at its Jan. 22 meeting authorizing an application to the Sustainable Jersey Small Grants Program for funds that would cover the cost of proposed infrastructure improvements.
“We have had a project that we have been working on for quite a while, which is a community garden, also known as an agricultural center,” Matt Jacobs, a member of the Eatontown Green Team, said during the earlier workshop meeting.
“It touches on [several] things. One is Eatontown’s historical heritage of agriculture. Another is exercise, and the third is sustainability — you don’t need electricity or piping from other areas. You would be able to get it right from there.”
The small grants program is intended to support New Jersey municipalities participating in the Sustainable Jersey certification program for projects that would serve as practical models, according to the website.
The PSE&G Foundation is contributing $200,000 to the program, which will be split among four grants for $20,000, eight grants of $10,000, and 20 grants of $2,000.
According to Jacobs, the grant would be used to erect deer fencing around the perimeter of the property, which is located on Grant Avenue, adjacent to Husky Brook Park.
The purchase of a shed would also be funded, as well as infrastructure needed to build a hand-pump well.
Councilman Anthony Talerico Jr., liaison to the Green Team, said plans for the community garden and agricultural center have yet to be formalized.
“The council will approve what goes there and [will] not go there,” he said. “But regardless of what goes there, it’s going to grow and be eaten by deer. So having a fence would help keep the deer out.”
Talerico said the Green Team would look at programs and model guidelines used by other towns to implement the gardens.
The community garden is a project the Green Team has been working on since 2012, after it was learned that the property could lose its farmland designation and be designated as wetlands.
“The property, as it stands, is unusable for anything else,” Green Team Chairman Edward Dlugosz said. “The farm is the perfect fit for that piece of property.”
The group has been working with the Rutgers Agricultural Cooperative, the Monmouth County Master Gardeners, the county and state Department of Agriculture, and the neighboring towns of Shrewsbury and Long Branch, which also have community gardens, Jacobs said previously.
In August, the Green Team appeared before borough officials with a request to apply for a permit from the Department of Environmental of Protection (DEP) to create an access road onto the site.
“When we met with the state, we toured the land, and we showed there was a farm in the past and there was an access road,” Talerico said on Jan. 22.
“We presented those to the DEP and they said that we didn’t need a permit to do it, but we decided we wanted something in writing. We authorized [the borough engineer] to get something in writing from the DEP that will say we can have an access. This way we can’t be told that we are encroaching on wetlands. That is in the works.”