Southside Community Land Trust

10/21/2026

Thank you to commonfont for another year of showing up for SCLT.

Staff from the Providence-based company have volunteered with us for years, and several have become familiar faces at our Rare & Unusual Plant Sale and at our seasonal farm stands. A crew from CommonFont spent a soggy, steamy August afternoon with us at Manton Bend Community Garden, clearing invasive plants along 200 feet of a six foot tall fence line. In two hours, their hard work and team work tackled a project that would have taken our staff days. They filled TWENTY NINE yard waste bags! It means gardeners’ plots got more sunlight, there's more room for native plants to take root, and there's more space for pedestrians to access the area more safely.

Along the way, Education & Gardens Network Manager Chandelle taught the group about the edible and medicinal properties of some of the plants pushing up through the concrete, like buckthorn plantain and purslane.

Thank you, CommonFont, for digging in with us!

10/21/2026

Thanks for visiting our South Providence Healthy Food Hub Senator Sheldon Whitehouse! Here, more than 60,000 pounds of fresh, local produce was aggregated and distributed to dozens of food access community partners in 2026. And we loved having you at City Farm, RI's longest operating urban production and demonstration farm! The food and nutrition emergency in our state is real and we truly appreciate your partnership to build a local food system that supports all Rhode Islanders.

10/21/2026

SCLT’s Matthew Tracy is speaking at the 2026 Regional Conservation Partnership Network Gathering, a free conference on building a shared food future through conservation and collaboration.

The gathering is Thursday, November 5, at UMass Amherst. Matt, who has served as SCLT’s Land Access Manager and now our Properties & Farms Manager, joins the session “From Collaboration to Capital: Building Regional Farmland Access and Funding Partnerships,” which looks at how regional partnerships can coordinate funding for farmland access and food security, including the development of a Farmland Access Fund in Rhode Island.

Registration is free and closes Monday, October 26. Learn more and register here: https://bit.ly/RCPNG2026

10/19/2026

10/17/2026

Southside Community Land Trust’s annual Year End Celebration returns Friday, December 4, from 4 to 8pm at the South Providence Healthy Food Hub, 404 Broad Street, 2nd floor.

At its heart, this night is a potluck. Every year, gardeners, farmers, staff, and neighbors fill the table with dishes from kitchens and cultures across our community, and it’s one of the best meals of the year. If you’re able, please bring something to share. If you can’t bring something this year, come anyway. There’s always plenty to go around.

Along with the food, there will be music, karaoke, raffles, door prizes, and activities for kids. We’ll also present our Farmer of the Year and Garden Leader of the Year awards, and pay tribute to the community members we lost in 2026.

The invitation goes out to everyone: community gardeners, farmers and their field crews, staff and their families, partner organizations, members, friends, and anyone who wants to learn more about SCLT.

Please let us know you’re coming: https://bit.ly/SCLTCelebration2026

Watercolor by Jordan Ramos

10/16/2026

City Farm's third and final BioBlitz of the year wrapped up on October 4, with 121 species documented across the day, including chalcidoid wasps, Mackay's fragile fern, and even a brush-legged split wolf spider. Combined with the spring and summer sessions, this year's total sits at over 400 species logged across City Farm's three-quarter-acre plot, from insects and fungi to birds, mammals, reptiles, and trees.

This is year two of a ten-year partnership with 15 Minute Field Trips, aimed at documenting the biodiversity living across ten of SCLT's community gardens and farms, one site at a time. Peace & Plenty Community Garden hosted the project's first three sessions last year, and next year the BioBlitz series moves to Galego Community Farm in Pawtucket.

Every observation from all three sessions is logged on iNaturalist and contributes to ongoing biodiversity research.

Thank you to everyone who came out this year, whether for one session or all three, to spend a few hours looking closely at what shares City Farm with us. See you next year at Galego!

10/15/2026

Southside Community Land Trust's Healthy Food Access program has a new tool making farmer invoicing a lot smoother.

A team of Brown University engineering students, led by Tabatha Hirsch, built Agrigate, a farmer-first invoicing and inventory platform, in collaboration with Kakeena, our Healthy Food Access Program Manager. The tool supports the produce aggregation work at our South Providence Healthy Food Hub, which connects 40+ small-scale producers with 1,000+ residents and food-insecure families across the area.

Kakeena reports the system saves her about 5 hours a week in tracking and accounting work. That time now goes toward more direct farmer support, deeper partnership development with community stakeholders, and stronger relationships with funders, instead of manual tracking and invoicing.

Thank you to Tabatha, Michael Corso, Zijie Cai, and Mohammad Alterkait, and to Brown University's School of Engineering, for building this with us.

10/09/2026

Kevin, Program Manager with Bloom Rhode Island and Chandelle, SCLT’s Education & Community Gardens Programs Manager, led a well-attended walk through Galego Community Farm recently, talking honestly about what the site is and what it could become.

There are big challenges: it sits on a steep hillside, pest and w**d pressure are relentless, and community engagement has been limited. There are big possibilities too! Thanks to our decade-long partnership with Pawtucket Housing Authority, this is the home base for SCLT’s Pawtucket Workforce Development Program, sitting right on the Galego Court housing development. And because of our Bloom Violet grant, there are plans in motion for seating, signage, and open garden events that will turn it into the community green space it’s meant to be.

Attendees came from across the field, including environmental protection, composting, agriculture, and planning. The afternoon wrapped with a picnic on a perfect late summer day.

Catch the Bloom RI crew at our Peace & Plenty Community Garden on October 24. Check out their profile for more info!

10/06/2026

Southside Community Land Trust has received a multi-year grant from Point32Health Foundation, the philanthropic arm of Harvard Pilgrim Health Care and Tufts Health Plan, continuing a partnership that has supported our work for several years. This funding will fuel delivery of food access programming to older adults.

This grant is one of 21 new investments totaling more than $3.5 million from the Foundation this year, aimed at nonprofits working to improve conditions for older adults and build thriving, healthier communities for people of all ages.

"As a not-for-profit health plan, we know that healthier communities ensure better outcomes and more affordable care for everyone," said Kristin Lewis, president of the Point32Health Foundation and executive vice president of Point32Health. "Through these investments we are working with community organizations to create environments where individuals can live with dignity, connection and opportunity as they age."

Thank you, Point32Health Foundation, for supporting our mission and improving health outcomes here in Rhode Island.

10/05/2026

Southside Community Land Trust is pleased to welcome Diane Pelletier to our Board of Directors!

Diane is no stranger to SCLT. She has volunteered at our Rare & Unusual Plant Sale for years and currently serves on its planning committee, helping shape our biggest annual event from the inside.

Prior to her recent retirement, Diane, MSW, was a healthcare regulatory leader with over two decades of experience in long-term care oversight and social work. She most recently served as Chief of the Center for Health Facilities Regulation at the Rhode Island Department of Health, where she supervised a staff of 28 and oversaw regulatory compliance for 35 federal and state-licensed health care facilities. She also represented the Department as a board member on the Long Term Care Coordinating Council, chaired by the Lieutenant Governor.

Diane's career at the Department of Health spanned nearly two decades, progressing from Health Facility Surveyor to Deputy Chief before stepping into her most recent role. Her background also includes hands-on clinical social work experience as a per diem social worker at Kent Regency in Warwick, where she supported resident-directed care and cognition-related assessments. Earlier in her career, she worked as a Long Term Care Ombudsman in Larimer County, Colorado, advocating for residents in assisted living and nursing facilities, and gained clinical experience as a Care Coordinator at The Children's Hospital in Denver, working with child and adolescent psychiatric patients.

Diane holds a Master of Social Work from Colorado State University and a B.A. in Psychology from the University of Colorado at Denver.

Welcome, Diane!