Baby, it's cold outside! The winter, though mild when comparing the season with the rest of the country, further complicates life for those facing hunger, food scarcity, and food insecurity.

For our community, the St. Joseph's-Jerry Roek Memorial Garden addresses hunger and food insecurity. The Roek garden developed in 2011 with the sole purpose of reducing hunger by growing and providing its harvests of fruits and vegetables to St. Mary's Dining Room ( https://stmarysdiningroom.org/ ). Signage at the garden states, Jerry “always gave back to the community.” As part of Jerry's legacy, his son, Jeff, as well as Jeff's son, Chris, also gave back to the community with their contributions and projects involving the garden.

The garden is located behind the St. Joseph's Dignity Health Behavioral Center in Stockton. Corinne Bachle is St. Joseph's recognized volunteer coordinator for the garden and is also a Master Gardener volunteer. Bachle coordinates volunteers from throughout the community including other Master Gardeners, students from Lincoln High School, employees of St. Joseph's and their retirees, and other diverse volunteer groups which contribute to the garden's successful production of fresh food for St. Mary's Dining Room.

The 25,000+ square foot garden was originally designed by Registered Landscape Architect and Certified Arborist Jeff Gamboni. The original planting area of 16 raised beds was 768 square feet. The raised bed wheels are separated by a round gazebo which provides shade and park bench seating for garden workers and BHC employees. During the summer of 2019, each wheel received an additional eight raised beds increasing the total planting area to 1,728 square feet. The raised beds are watered via a drip system controlled by a new programable Raintree controller.

A Roek Memorial Garden workday organized by Bachle last year brought out Master Gardener volunteers, half a dozen Lincoln High Commitment to Community Awards students, as well as a couple of CTC alumni that just happened to hear the workday was taking place. Winter vegetables such as cabbage, kale, broccoli, parsley, and chives donated by Bonnie Plants were planted. Red onions, yellow onions, and garlic were also added to the mix. The beds containing earlier plantings of eggplant, carrots, squash, peppers, and cauliflower were weeded. Beds of kale and broccoli were weeded, and some of the kale and broccoli harvested. The workday was complete a little after twelve noon with St. Mary's Dining Room receiving the day's harvest of over 50 pounds of fresh kale and broccoli.

Depending on the time of year, the Roek Memorial Garden provides tomatoes, beets, chard, celery, zucchini, melons, and various other vegetables to St. Mary's Dining Room. The charge is in providing fresh food to St. Mary's year-round; the Roek Memorial Garden, under Bachle's direction and volunteer tutelage, has met the challenge year after year.
St. Mary's Dining Room continues feeding anyone coming through its doors. Food is only one of St. Mary's relationship builders. A meal at St. Mary's Dining Room may lead someone experiencing homelessness to the possibility of living in a shelter. Once a family or individual is in a shelter, recognition of other opportunities for services are within reach. However, without shelter those opportunities to get assisted services are harder to grasp. In any case, St. Mary's Dining Room puts meals on plates providing breakfast, lunch, and supper every day of the year to everyone seeking a meal in the dining room. St. Mary's feeds the hungry and has been doing so for 65 years. Statistics from 2018 have St. Mary's providing over 315,000 meals for the year; that's over 800 meals served per day. Volunteer opportunities are available for St. Mary's Dining Room ( see https://stmarysdiningroom.org/volunteer/ ).
Volunteer opportunities are also available for the St. Joseph's-Jerry Roek Memorial Garden by contacting Corinne Bachle at cbachlet@yahoo.com.