Community Garden May Be Uprooted for Cash Crop

Nestled among asphalt grids, acrid smog and one of the busiest airports of its kind in the nation is a three-acre oasis.

For 22 years, the Van Nuys Airport Garden Club has cultivated a verdant repudiation of urban living. Here, in the shadow of propeller planes and private jets, more than 60 families raise sugar cane and corn, sunflowers and okra.

But a proposal by the Los Angeles Department of Airports to uproot the garden has threatened to change all that.

The plan was to lease the land, across the street from the airport, to Galpin Motors, owned by Bert Boeckmann. Galpin would pave the plot and park 1,600 cars there.

Boeckmann, a political power broker, leading GOP contributor and member of the Board of Police Commissioners, said he expects the city to accept his offer of $200,000 a year for eight acres, including the garden. Boeckmann is unmoved by the protests of gardeners and homeowners.

“We’re ready to move in right now, the sooner the better,” he said. “Sure, they will be inconvenienced, they might have to do a little work, but we’re talking about a sizable income for the city.”

When an airport official told gardeners in August that they would have to leave, the protest began in earnest. The gardeners’ first ally: the citizen advisory committee to the airport, which had approved the idea last year.

“We were hoodwinked,” said committee President George Jerome. “We were led to believe that there was no impact by the Galpin lease. I am outraged. This is an example of a city turning on its own people.”

Jack Driscoll, executive director of the Department of Airports, said the episode is the result of a mistake by one of his staff. Driscoll said the airport official who asked the gardeners when they would be able to move “had no authority to do that.”

“He is not working on Van Nuys issues anymore,” Driscoll said of the official. “As far as I’m concerned that was off the wall. I can really appreciate the gardeners’ concern--this was totally mishandled by staff. We created an alarm that didn’t have to be as loud as it was.”

Driscoll said the proposal to pave the garden is being reviewed and emphasized that no decision has been made.

The garden club has a month-to-month lease on the property for the cost of water and portable toilet rental.

One possibility is to move the garden to another part of the property. But gardeners said that it could take years before the pesticides used on grass there are washed away and for the land to become fertile enough for produce.

In addition, homeowners are worried that the value of their property will drop.

Renee Eastman’s home faces the garden. She and her husband bought the residence two years ago with the understanding that the garden would always be there.

“That’s why we can deal with the noise,” she said, referring to the constant airplane takeoffs and landings. “The noise is not so nice, but [the garden] looks beautiful--that’s the payoff.”