Category Archives: Community

Winter Spotlight: Annual Community Coat Exchange

Can you believe how cold it is getting out there?! The Fairpark Community Council was proud to participate as a partner in the Annual Community Coat Exchange again this fall. The Annual Community Coat Exchange, a project of Blue Sky Institute, has been an ongoing event in Salt Lake City, Utah since 2005. The event is held annually at Pioneer Park from 10am to 1pm the day after Thanksgiving. “Need a coat? Come get one. Have a coat? We know someone who can use it!” the website says.

We wanted to learn more about the individuals that this event helps so we met with Glenn Baily, Executive Director of the Crossroads Urban Center. With over 50 years of service, Crossroads Urban Center is a nonprofit, grassroots organization that assists and organizes Utahans with low incomes, those with disabilities, and people of color to meet basic survival needs and to address essential issues affecting quality of life. Crossroads runs an Emergency Food Pantry and helps over 4,000 families each year. Mr. Bailey is passionate about getting individuals to participate in Community Council events. “We want to continue working with individuals in the neighborhood to discuss real issues of homelessness and affordable housing, and make sure that individuals that haven’t traditionally been involved in Community Council are able to have their voices heard.” Continue reading →

Get your Garden on with Fairpark Community’s First Annual Plant Sale!

Got Garden?

We have just what you need to fill it up!

After months of hard work by volunteers, the Fairpark Community Council’s First Annual Plant Sale is almost here! Almost 4,000 veggies and herb plants are being cared for by dedicated volunteers. The seedlings are growing like wild and will be sure to enhance any garden in our neighborhood with culinary delights.

Read more here (https://fairparkcommunity.org/?p=814) about how to pre-order your plants and pick them up as early as the end of April, and view full catalogs of the availalbe varieties of vegetables and herbs, as well as a full color listing of the vegetable seeds that will be given away at the May 14 event.

How did this all start?

The FCC Board decided to take advantage of the Salt Lake City annual Signature Event Fund application in fall of 2015. The FCC Board decided that a fun event would be a plant sale and education event. The scope of events that happened after that was amazing!

A donation of a structure that looks very much like a bus shelter was timely. Volunteers dismantled the structure over a weekend in late February and the following weekend rebuilt it at All Chay restaurant (1264 W 500 N), the proprietors of which graciously donated space for the project. The next 6 weeks were busy with fine tuning the structure with materials to make it a functioning greenhouse, planting seeds, separating seedlings, watering the plants and generating interest in our community for the project. Tom King, project lead, appeared on KRCL Radio’s Punk Rock Farmer show on April 15 to discuss and promote the project.

The next few weeks will be spent continuing the care of the plants, advertising and promoting the event, taking pre-orders with the culminating plant sale event at Northwest Community Center, Saturday, May 14 at 10am.

As a special incentive to get people to attend the May 14 event, we will be offering free seeds for lettuce, carrots, zucchini, cucumbers and more! There will fun be activities for kids of all ages.

View the full color listing of the vegetable seeds that will be given away here.

Left over plants from the May 14 event will be taken to the Get Into the River Festival from 5-7pm, at the Fairpark Amphitheater, 155 North 1000 West.

We are very excited about this community building/enhancing project. We hope residents will become more interested in growing their own food, sharing their stories about gardening, sharing samples of their edibles, and develop sustainable habits that will improve health and lifestyles for years to come.

Garden on dude!

Start Your Garden Catalog!

The long awaited Dirt2Table Start Your Garden Plant Sale Catalog is finally here! View the catalog and follow instructions for accessing the pre-order form.

Plants are $1 each, or $5 for a six pack or $25 for 6-six packs. Mix and match is ok!
(all proceeds will be used to enhance the next Annual Fairpark Community Plant Sale).
Fill out your pre-order form and submit it via any of these methods:

at the All Chay Restaurant, 1264 West 500 North
Scan and email to
dirt2tableslc@gmail.com
Text photo of order form to
8015021991

Order pick ups will be arranged using the contact info you provide on the order form. We anticipate starting to have orders picked up on May 6 th or 7th
in advance of the May 14 th event in the park.

For status on your order you can call Tom at 801-502-1991.

*** Attention! Quantities are limited! All orders will be filled on a first come first serve basis. Please get your order form to one of our partners as soon as possible to try to ensure your order can be complete. Payment will be at time of pickup, in case substitutions or subtractions apply***

To view the full catalog, click garden catalog.

To print an order form, click plant order form.

To print a flyer, click flyer.

New! (April 19, 2016): Seed Giveaway Listing for anyone who attends the event on May 14 – even if you have pre-ordered and picked up your order! Click here for the listing.

Click the thumbnail images below to view one catalog page at a time.

Pages 1 and 2

Pages 3 and 4

Seed Giveaway Listing image

Pedal in the City: Take the Bicycle Safety Survey

The Salt Lake County Planning and Transportation Office of Regional Development is conducting a survey on improving bicycle safety through April 11. Through an interactive map participants can provide input about biking routes and concerns. Take the survey!

What would it take to get you bicycling in Salt Lake County?

What type of bicycling infrastructure should the county invest in?

TAKE THE SURVEY below and use our interactive mapping tool to add points, lines, & comments to let us know where you bike, where barriers exist, and where you might bike if conditions were better.http://wikimapping.com/wikimap/Salt-Lake-County-Bikes.html

Participa en la encuesta en español:

Sus comentarios nos ayudarán a mejor enfocar nuestros esfuerzos para mejorar el ciclismo a lo largo del valle de Salt Lake, y en agradecimiento por su tiempo, usted será elegible para recibir un pase UTA de $5 (sólo para los primeros 750 encuestados). Esta encuesta le llevará aproximadamente entre 8 y 10 minutos.

Para mayor información, visite www.slco.org/bikes

Dirt2Table: A Great time of year!

Don’t you love it this time of year? I certainly do. Everything from the buds swelling on the fruit trees, dandelions blooming, willows and others flowering, to the birds getting more active, it sure feels like spring.

I just hope that a late frost doesn’t get some of our fruit trees this year. As you may know if you read these columns, the Fairpark Community Council is hosting it’s First Annual Get your garden STARTED Plant Sale. We are starting dozens of varieties of peppers and tomatoes. Lots of heirlooms as well as several varieties of Basil. In fact, as of March 7th some of the Lettuce Leaf basil is already up from seeds planted 8 days ago.

Continue reading →

Marmalade Branch Library Opens

Salt Lake City celebrated the grand opening of the newest city library branch in the Marmalade neighborhood on February 27th. This is the second branch library to open on the West side of Salt Lake City in as many years.

The building provides 18,600 square feet of space in its two stories, and includes a dedicated Children’s Library, a teen / young adult area, a small café, public access computer stations, quiet reading areas, adult collection, study rooms and a large, flexible multi-purpose room with tiered seating to allow small recitals, lectures, book signings and film viewings. The building is expected to achieve LEED Silver certification.

This new branch library is a great addition to our neighborhood, and we hope our residents will become regular visitors. Any Salt Lake City resident can get a library card with proof of residence. The Marmalade Library is located on 300 West and 500 North, and is open M-Th 10AM-9PM, Fri-Sat 10AM-6PM, Closed Sunday. The contact phone is 801-594-8680. Visit http://www.slcpl.org for more information.

West Side Spotlight: Angela Brown, SLUG Magazine, Craft Lake City

“I feel like Fairpark is the Sugarhouse of tomorrow. It really reminds me of Sugarhouse from 10 years ago! There’s so much potential and so much passion, and it’s a great time to be a part of that growth. There really is momentum building on the west side. It’s so close to downtown, and I love it!” ~ Angela Brown, SLUG Magazine

Spring is almost here and as one of our favorite local alternative magazines SLUG (Salt Lake Underground) celebrates 27 years, we felt that it was fitting to sit down with artist, writer and uber-creative businesswoman Angela Brown.

A four year resident of Fairpark with 20 years of experience working on the west side, Angela is also throwing a fabulous summer event, Craft Lake City. If you’ve never been, this event (August 12-14) celebrates local crafters and artists and is a wonderful festival for families, local crafters, and shoppers alike. Angela is expecting to see 60,000 visitors from both in and out of state. Angela had this to say about Fairpark:

“I feel like Fairpark is the Sugarhouse of tomorrow. It really reminds me of Sugarhouse from 10 years ago! There’s so much potential and so much passion, and it’s a great time to be a part of that growth. There really is momentum building on the west side. It’s so close to downtown, and I love it!”

Angela has been with SLUG magazine for 17 years with the last 15 at the helm.

“SLUG magazine has become a pillar of the alternative community, and it’s important that we keep that independent spirit alive. We have a great team, and it is very important to us that we maintain our local voice, writing about local events, and local music.”

She also sits on the Business Advisory Board representing District 1, which advises the Mayor and City Council on issues affecting Salt Lake City’s business community.

“We get together once a month and talk about problems small businesses face. Mayor Jackie Biskupski is really paying attention to that. When we meet, we think, ‘How can we make it easier for small business to get the process started?’”

A true original, Angela’s goal is to empower our community to share our voice through our art.

“I think creation is a form of meditation. It’s a way for us to express ourselves, relieve stress, connect with others and show something beautiful, or maybe not so beautiful,”

she laughs,

“but art helps build our community culture.”

Let’s use this inspiration to make Fairpark beautiful again! Submit your applications to be a vendor in Craft Lake City by April 15th.

Dirt2Table: Save the Date – Fairpark Community’s First Start Your Garden Plant Sale!

Announcing ¡Viva los Vegetales por Comida!

The Fabulous First Annual Fairpark Community Start Your Garden Plant Sale, May 14, 2016

That’s right, this year will mark the first in a long succession of annual plant sales that will help enrich and grow our community with the shared experience of successful gardening. The plan is to make it both easier and more fun for folks who are already growing some of their own food as well as to encourage and support those of our neighbors that aren’t yet growing delicious food right in their own yards.

Details about the event and how volunteers can help will be available in a future Gazette and on the Fairpark Community website.

Join the event at our Facebook page
This event is made possible through a grant from Salt Lake City’s Signature Event Fund, which provides funding to support community events in Salt Lake City.

West Side Spotlight: Jorge Fierro, owner of Frida Bistro and Rico Brands

“We all have a story, and America loves stories — stories of success, humbleness, working hard. I am the epitome of the American dream. It doesn’t mean I’m a rich guy, on the contrary, it means that the more I have, the more humble I become.”

As a 30 year resident of Utah, Jorge Fierro has become a respected leader in both the Latino and business communities and is a proud homeowner in Fairpark. We were able to sit down with him for our February edition of West Side Spotlight. Jorge serves our community on several non-profit boards including Locals First, the River District Business Alliance, and the Burrito Project. He is very proud of the fact that volunteer members of the Burrito Project have been delivering hand rolled burritos to the homeless for over four years. Jorge is also on the board of the Lowell Bennion Community Center for the University of Utah, the Utah Microenterprise Note Fund, and American Heart Association Go Red Por Tu Corazón. “This is a cause that I’m very concerned about. Latinas are dying and we need to do something to raise awareness,” he said.

“One of the things I love about living on the Westside is the diversity. I LOVE how diverse it is. It makes me feel comfortable, like home,” he said. Jorge is very passionate about ensuring that the Latino population on the west side is involved.

“I would like to specifically tell the Latino community that the main reason why I’m so involved in non-profit organizations and volunteering projects is because we Latinos need to be MORE involved in our community. This is OUR community. Even though we may not have been born here, this is where we live; this is where our kids go to school. We NEED to take care of our community. In the morning when we wake up, we wake up here; and at night when we go home, we come home here. This is our home and we need to take care of it. I’m always looking for a place where I, Jorge Fierro, can make a difference. There is always more to be done. America has offered and given me so much. What I do, I do it because I have to share the success and I feel very strongly about making sure there are no injustices that happen and that everyone has a fair shot to a good life and a good education.”

We couldn’t agree more!
Continue reading →

Utah State Fairpark Gets Legislative Support

Up to $10 million in state money may be coming to the Utah State Fairpark. The Fairpark Board was able to participate in a meeting at the Utah State Capital this month and speak to a panel of lawmakers about how important the heritage of the Fairpark is to our community. This legislative panel will be opening the issue of funding and renewing the lease for debate when the Legislature reconvenes in January.

“The time for studies and discussions should be over,” said Bryce Garner, chairman of the Fairpark Community Council. “Anything that brings sustainability to the Fair and keeps the Fairgrounds where they are, intact, is something we wholeheartedly support.”

Discussions during the meeting involved bringing the Salt Lake County Fair and the Days of ’47 Rodeo to the fairgrounds, as well as major structural improvements to the grounds including renovating the rodeo arena, or adding an Expo style building for conferences. More business to the State Fairpark means more positive growth for our area and the possibility of better restaurants, shopping and retail to support the growth.

Read the Salt Lake Tribune article here.