Community Corner

Master Gardeners Remain Hopeful Over Recent Elimination

Members of the local non-profit have asked the Board of Supervisors to reconsider their recent 5-4 vote regarding the elimination of the urban horticulturist position.

The Loudoun County Master Gardeners are hopeful that the board of supervisors will reconsider their recent decision on eliminating the urban horticulturist position, which was made earlier last week. The position is the coordinator, trainer and advisor to the Master Gardener’s program including additional duties.  

“We are fighting it tooth and nail,” said Master Gardener Barb Bailey, adding that everyone who is a part of the nonprofit is taking Scott York’s comment to heart.

“You have a month to educate some of these board members who haven’t dealt with the rural area of the county,” he said, during last week's meeting.

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“It is incredibly demotivating to know that something you give your time to freely is about to be thrown away and is not considered a value worth keeping for the community,” Bailey said.

Association President Alta Jones said Tuesday that she doesn’t feel that some board members fully understand the importance of the position or the implications of losing it.

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“Debbie Dillion, the Urban Horticulturist is instrumental in developing this skill set in volunteers with hands on practice under her oversight. This is the lynchpin to our program,” Jones said. “We would, at a minimum, have to drastically reduce the amount of services that we offer. Particularly, in areas that are of the most value.”

The mission of the Master Gardeners is to educate county residents about safe, effective and sustainable landscape management practices in their community.  

Each of the 200 plus volunteers have extensive training under the auspices of Virginia Tech and the Loudoun County Cooperative Extension office, Jones said, in order to provide unbiased research-based horticultural information to the community. 

Other services include garden demonstrations, children workshops, the farmer’s market, clinics and monthly lectures and workshops. There is also a 1/3 acre demonstration garden at Ida Lee where all produce is donated to Interfaith Relief each year.

“These all contribute to increase the quality of life here in Loudoun County,” Bailey said. “All of this would go away without the expertise of our Urban Horticulturalist. 

According to Jones, at least 14,000 volunteer hours are put in each year. At least 10,000 contacts were made with Loudoun County residents last year.

“The issue is that doing programs like this, with the public, we’re actually out visiting people’s properties,” Jones said. “In order to do that we have to have liability insurance and the program has to be overseen by someone that works for Virginia Cooperative Extension Service.”

Jones said the program requires very high standards and that it would be difficult to meet them without a full time employee in place. A number of programs would have to be cut, she said.  

The Board of Supervisors will meet on Monday, March 26, where Jones hopes to see a new vote taken in order to reinstate the position.

“We have representatives that are meeting with several supervisors who voted not to fund it,” Jones said. “We’ve built the program over twenty years. It’s not like we can have funding one year and then go without it. It takes a long time to build up.

“It’s a very robust program here in Loudoun County and it would be lost.”

"The UH is the scientist necessary for us to operate and as volunteers, we cannot fulfill that management mandate,” Bailey said. “We are the extension of the UH and therefore, if that position is eliminated, there is nothing to extend.”

Check out this week's Five Things to read more about the 3rd Annual Garden Symposium, which will be hosted by the Master Gardeners this Saturday. 


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