US: Texas - Personal Growth As Well As Leafy Greens Thrive in San Antonio Nonprofit’s New Hydroponic Farm
March 7, 2020
A group of people crowded around a shipping container in the parking lot of the San Antonio Clubhouse, a community and resource center for adults with mental illness.
Inside the 40-foot long container is a hydroponic farm, which produces as many crops as a three-acre farm, simply with water and lights.
But the best part of Clubhouse Grows — the new indoor water-based, high-tech farm — isn’t that it sprouts an abundance of leafy greens. It’s that it also serves as a recovery-oriented volunteer opportunity for the people the nonprofit serves.
“We are working together as a Clubhouse community on this farm,” said Mark Stoeltje, the executive director of San Antonio Clubhouse. “It is providing meaningful work for our members, but it is also providing a product.”
Clubhouse Grows, which was unveiled Friday, was made possible with a $100,000 grant from Impact San Antonio, a women’s philanthropic non-profit that awards grants to local organizations.
Jennifer Bennett, president of Impact SA, said one of the reasons the group chose to award Clubhouse a grant was “because of the multilayered benefits that it delivers to the community.”
“A lot of our citizens who have mental health challenges do not get the degree of support that they need to help them live lives that feel good to them,” Bennett said. “Clubhouse is really unique to doing that in our community.”
The plants in the 320-square-foot freight container do not rely on soil. Instead, they grow on 88 black foam and metal panels, which have water pumped through them. Powerful LED red and blue lights that emulate the sun are on 18 hours a day. And the climate-controlled space remains stable between 65 and 68 degrees.
“The extra sunlight, combined with the fact that it’s never cloudy and we don’t have to worry about different seasons, really helps accelerate the plants’ growth,” said Brandon Wagner, a staff member and project lead for Clubhouse Grows.
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Crops planted include five types of lettuce, kale, beets, arugula, basil, oregano, and even some flowers.
Wagner, who has been prepping the new farm and working with it for around a month, said he has found it to be very therapeutic.
“You zone out and just concentrate on the work,” he said. “You are planting 300, 400 or up to 500 seeds at a time, so there is a very meditative workflow.”
While the farm only uses about 25 gallons of water a month, Wagner said, it can grow 550 small and crisp heads of lettuce alone each week.
“I love lettuce, but that is more lettuce than we can eat,” Stoeltje said.
So, in addition to using the produce at the Clubhouse facility, the organization plans to donate some to local non-profits.
Stoeltje said while healthy eating is important, the farming process — seeding, maintaining, relocating and harvesting crops — is also a chance for Clubhouse members to work hard, work together, hone new skills, reach goals and ultimately feel a sense of accomplishment.
San Antonio Clubhouse, which was founded in 2003, operates under a national model that's based on the belief that everyone deserves to be part of a caring community and has talents to share.
The non-profit helps its more than 2,000 members gain work experience through volunteering at the center, job training, résumé building, job-search assistance and advocating to potential employers.
“This is the perfect project for us because we are founded on two principles,” Stoeltje said, “meaningful relationships and rewarding work.”
sara.cline@express-news.net
Sara Cline
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Sara Cline is a staff writer for the San Antonio Express-News through the Hearst Fellowship Program.
She previously worked at the Times Union under the program. She also worked at the Brockton Enterprise, in Massachusetts, as a general assignment reporter. She has also contributed to newspapers and magazines in Arizona, Massachusetts and Rhode Island.
Sara graduated from the University of Arizona in 2016 with a B.A. in journalism.