Within the next two weeks, Jim Hourdequin '97 will present the College with a proposal that could elevate the Dartmouth Organic Garden from a marginally successful club to a self-sufficient, permanent program.
The Garden will require $50,000 of initial College funding to hire a farm manager, purchase necessary materials and build two greenhouses.
"If students are behind this, it's going to happen for sure. We're about 85 percent of the way there, and it just needs that last push," said Hourdequin.
Last week, more than 300 students signed petitions in Thayer Dining Hall and the Collis Center supporting the organic garden, which would grow food for the College.
The project also has the support of Dartmouth Recycles Director Bill Hochstin, Environmental Studies Professor Jim Hornig, Dean of Student Life Holly Sateia and Matt McManness, the executive officer of the Dean of the College Office.
Hourdequin said he will meet with representatives from the Hanover Inn, Dartmouth Dining Services and Moosilauke Ravine Lodge on Nov. 10 and if they agree to buy food grown at the Garden, he will ask Dean of the College Lee Pelton for a financial commitment.
Although the organic garden idea originated in 1991 from a group of students in an Environmental Studies 50 class, the plan was never formally carried out.
Last year, in response to student interest, the Environmental Studies Division of the Dartmouth Outing Club organized an organic gardening club and in May the club planted 14 raised beds, including 10 different crops. But its efforts were only marginally successful and Hourdequin said he would like to expand the garden to make it more productive and self-sufficient.
The Garden is located at Fullington Farm -- five acres of land three miles north of campus. In the coming year, Hourdequin plans to farm two acres of this land.
At the Dartmouth Environmental Network Symposium on Oct. 22 and 23, Hourdequin presented his proposal to a group of Dartmouth alumni, staff and students.
He said the Garden would be like a foreign study program, where a few students would live at the farm during leave terms and work with professors in the students' areas of interest.
For example, he said, an engineering student could work to harness the heat produced by the composting system to power the greenhouse at the Garden.
Hourdequin said that $50,000 is "a risk that the College will have to take," but he said the farm will eventually pay for itself.
If the College approves of the Garden's budget, students plan to build two greenhouses this winter and start planting in the spring.
