Woman launches eastside Erie urban farm

Carrie Sachse hopes to plant herbs, peppers and tomatoes on four vacant lots at East 22nd and French Streets. [File Photo Christopher Millette/Erie Times-News]

We know there is a lot of vacant land in Erie and there is going to be more if the comprehensive plan is implemented. There are a lot of blighted houses and things are going to be changing if we continue to implement the comprehensive plan.

By Lisa Thompson
Burlington County Times
Mar 18, 2018

Excerpt:

What were your first steps?

My best friend owns a food truck in Pittsburgh and I also knew I wanted to work for myself eventually. So we were kind of bouncing business ideas off each other and we both separately had the idea to do a city farm on individual lots versus trying to accumulate a lot of land to have a bigger farm. It was right after we started having that conversation that Scott Henry (former Erie Redevelopment Authority director) rolled out his adopt-a-lot program and that kind of felt like kismet.

The first thing I did was show up at the Redevelopment Authority and sit down with Scott Henry. I had no idea what I was doing, but I just told him all the reasons I thought it was a great idea and he was on board right away. His thing was I would have to buy the lots — not just rent them or adopt them — for a commercial operation. I was fine with that because I have to invest so much in the infrastructure, it would not make sense to invest in land I did not own.

But first city zoning had to change. That took about two years, correct?

So that was the biggest thing — almost all the vacant land in the city is residential. Scott Henry was able to talk to (former City Councilman) Dave Brennan and Dave Brennan sponsored the urban farming resolution at City Council. No one really knew what it was going to end up looking like. We just knew we needed some kind of a framework for urban farming in Erie because there was really just a void. City Council referred it to the Planning Commission and there was a little bit of back and forth. I went to the Planning Commission meetings and got to know them.

Read the complete article here.