We’re giving away a CobraHead Weeder, a garden fork, and a kneeling pad, our Garden Essentials Package worth $89.95 to help Austin’s Urban Roots program – see the details at the end of the post. We’re also matching donations in kind with up to $1,000 worth of our tools and other products.

Austin has an amazing youth agriculture program called Urban Roots, a program of Youth Launch.

Darriyan and Autumn at Farmers Market

Now in its fourth year, Urban Roots is a youth development program that uses sustainable agriculture as a means to transform the lives of young people and increases the access to healthy food in Austin. By growing sustainably farmed vegetables, young people work together to serve the community, cultivate farming and business skills, learn the value of meaningful work, and discover how to eat and cook in healthy ways.

Markel and Fig Tree at Urban Roots

I’ve known about Urban Roots since its inception, and I’d been out to the farm several times to donate a few CobraHead tools. This past year Urban Roots founder Max Elliot invited me to be on the Farm Advisory Council.

Getting to know the program better I found out some important things. This year the young people at Urban Roots harvested 32,191 lbs. of produce grown on just 3.5 acres. They donated 10,929 lbs. of that to hunger relief organizations in Austin. The rest they sold at farmers markets, through their CSA and to local restaurants. Learn about Urban Roots from the young people themselves by checking out this video.

The program has thirty youth Farm Interns, a small dedicated staff, and over 1,000 volunteers who have given over 3500 hours of their time on the farm this year. For a great majority of these interns, this farm is the first farm they’ve ever visited. It’s a completely new environment and not like any park in town or like any green space in their neighborhood.

It takes money to run a program like this. We at CobraHead want to help Urban Roots raise $1,000 over the next two weeks. To do that, we are matching any cash donations between now and October 1st with an in-kind donation of CobraHead tools and other garden products up to $1,000. Click here to make a donation.

Your support in any amount, however large or small, is welcome.

$40 sponsors one youth Farm Intern for a full day on the farm.

$160 allows a crew of eight youth to volunteer at the food bank for a half day.

$1,600 sponsors one youth Farm Intern to work for the entire Program-Spring-Summer.

To encourage donations, we’ve added a contest to the fundraiser. Help us get the word out about Urban Roots and the fundraiser by sharing on Facebook, re-Tweeting, posting on your own blog or just sending an email to a friend. Then leave a comment here on our blog about how you have spread the word.

Whoever does the best job promoting this fundraiser (judged by our very subjective standards) will receive a Garden Essentials package. That’s an $89.95 value.

I look forward to continuing to work with Urban Roots and with your support the program will only get stronger.

Laughing Group Game at Urban Roots Farm

Please click here to make a donation.