Every Wednesday, volunteers and young people gather in a community garden just behind Westside Ministries in Turlock to harvest a bounty of fresh fruits, vegetables and flowers.
Behind this weekly harvest is the Ghetto Gardeners, a youth program operated through Westside Ministries, a faith-based nonprofit organization in Turlock. The ministry aims to connect young people with agriculture and education by providing programs and leadership opportunities to steer them away from other at-risk activities. The produce boxes are then sold to local families in the region.
“We have a lot of kids who come here, and if it wasn’t for them coming here and working with us, they would be on the streets, maybe in jail or even dead,” Ghetto Gardeners Youth Leader Xavier Mason said.
The program is led by JoLynn DiGrazia, founder and director of both Westside Ministries and the Ghetto Gardeners, alongside her husband Joe DiGrazia. Founded by JoLynn at age 23, Westside Ministries has served the community for the past 43 years.
Westside Ministries has grown from a small handful of children to 600 young people participating in the different programs and initiatives they offer, with one of the most visible being the weekly produce boxes.
For $25, each produce box includes a variety of seasonal produce, including eggplant, zucchini, squash, crookneck squash, tomatoes, two types of peppers (sweet and spicy), peaches, figs and a hand-picked flower arrangement.
For an additional $5, the organization offers delivery to local families within the Turlock area. Information about weekly produce boxes and availability is posted on the Ghetto Gardeners’ Facebook and Instagram pages, where interested community members can reserve a box in advance through the Westside Ministries Venmo. Boxes are available on a first-come, first-served basis.
DiGrazia said the kids who helped at the ministry were the same ones who helped launch Ghetto Gardeners six years ago, and they also came up with the name themselves.
The idea for the produce boxes came during the COVID-19 pandemic, DiGrazia said, when the Stanislaus County Fair was shut down. The gardeners normally sold and displayed their harvest at the annual event, so they were left with an abundance of fruits and vegetables. So instead, the students came up with the idea to create affordable boxes for local families with the extra produce.
“This is an underserved community, and many children come from single-parent homes or families impacted by poverty,” DiGrazia said. “The money they would have made at the fair was needed for those families, so the kids came up with the boxes. We loaded the car, drove around the county (with the boxes), and it was beautiful to see what it did for the kids.”
That includes kids like Mason, who came to Westside Ministries after experiencing food insecurity growing up. He recalled how he and his siblings searched dumpsters for leftover pizza because there wasn’t enough to eat at home. After his mother could no longer care for him, Mason moved in with DiGrazia.
Ever since, he has called her “grandma.” His life is forever changed because of DiGrazia and the support he’s received from this program, he said.
The garden offers much more than just a gardening experience for youth, Mason said.
“Being here gives you another perspective of life,” he said. “Most people wouldn’t want to go the garden route, but it teaches you a great deal of responsibility.”
Today, Mason serves as an active leader in Ghetto Gardeners and is also on track to graduate from college this year.
For one 16-year-old participant, whose name is being withheld for privacy reasons, the Ghetto Gardeners program became a turning point after he found himself involved in gangs and drugs.
About two years ago, he said he started going down the wrong path with gangs, beginning to sell and use drugs. He was even incarcerated, which made him realize this wasn’t the life he wanted. So he turned to DiGrazia, who he knew since he was a child and, like Mason, called “grandma.”
“I looked at myself in the mirror and said, ‘It’s not my life,’” he said. “I came to my grandma and told her, ‘I can’t. You gotta help me get out of this.’”
He said Ghetto Gardeners has given him a second chance at life
“I got baptized, I’ve been clean for a year now, we’re just coming up,” he said. “That’s the whole thing about being ghetto.”
While the garden provides fresh fruits and vegetables to families around the county each week, DiGrazia said it provides something entirely different for the youth who volunteer there – a sense of belonging.
“Many of the kids here are looking for family. That’s why kids join gangs to gain acceptance somewhere,” she said. “I want to teach them to be self-sufficient and realize they can do anything they put their minds to.”
The Ghetto Gardeners are open every Wednesday to sell produce boxes from 12 pm to 5 pm.
Natalie Mejia is a recent graduate from Stanislaus State and a summer intern with The Modesto Focus.