Houston Farm Corps creator wins cash prize

Houston Farm Corps creator wins cash prize
Rice filmmaker one of three finalists in Houston’s ‘Recycle Ike’ contest

BY JADE BOYD
Rice News staff

Houston Mayor Bill White this week awarded a $2,500 cash prize to Rice University alumnus and employee Ian Ragsdale ’08 for his suggestion about how to recycle more than 5 million cubic yards of Hurricane Ike wood debris. Ragsdale, an avid urban gardener, suggested the city create the Houston Farm Corps, a youth-oriented volunteer gardening initiative that would both get rid of the debris and teach kids the value of growing their own food.

	JEFF FITLOW
	Houston Mayor Bill White, right, this week awarded a $2,500 cash prize to Rice University alumnus and employee Ian Ragsdale ’08 for his suggestion about how to recycle more than 5 million cubic yards of Hurricane Ike wood debris.

White recognized Ragsdale at City Hall Wednesday along with two other top finishers in the city’s “Recycle Ike” contest. A team of Rice faculty, staff and students also took home the $10,000 grand prize for their suggestion to reduce greenhouse gases by converting the debris into “biochar” fertilizer. (See related story.)

Ragsdale, an audio/video technician in Rice’s Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Management, said, “The idea behind ‘Recycle Ike’ was to find ways where there would be zero environmental impact from the debris. I think we can actually have a positive impact.”

Ragsdale’s idea is to have students and volunteers convert Ike debris into compost, mulch and other materials that are then used to grow healthy, nutritious food. The centerpiece of the Houston Farm Corps would be an “urban learning farm,” a working farm set up at or near one of the city’s high schools. In addition, gardening clubs and programs would be set up in other schools across the city.

Though the farm corps would focus heavily on getting teens involved in gardening, Ragsdale envisions a larger citywide, volunteer effort that would be open to anyone who wants to volunteer. Ragsdale said he believes the Houston Farm Corps could be run with minimal paid staff who coordinate the efforts of school-based student groups and clubs, Boy Scout troops, church groups, gardening clubs and others.

“If you change the way people relate to food, both individually and as a community, you also change the way they relate to one another and to the land,” Ragsdale said.

An aspiring filmmaker, Ragsdale said he wrote the proposal for Houston Farm Corps during a recent trip to Tuscon, Ariz., where he is filming a documentary about Desert Harvesters, a volunteer group that promotes urban gardening with food crops that are native to the Sonoran Desert.

Ragsdale said he’s seen firsthand the positive impact that community gardening brings, both in his own experiences and in his filmmaking. He said the Houston Farm Corps could tap that on a grand scale and change many lives.

“People may think this project is outlandish. It’s definitely a big idea,” Ragsdale said. “But as my wife said when I explained it to her, ‘Big change is “in” right now.'”

Ragsdale traced the intellectual roots of the Houston Farm Corps to a course he took as an undergraduate at Rice — English lecturer Lisa Slappey’s Literature and the Environment.

“I was interested in the environment before, but that class had a tremendous effect on me,” Ragsdale said. “After that, I became involved in urban gardening, discovered the ‘slow food’ movement and decided that’s what my documentary would focus on.”