Community gardeners worry maintenance is falling behind amid ongoing closures

HONOLULU, Hawaii (HawaiiNewsNow) - After outcry from community gardeners over park closures, the City Parks Department is now making a promise to those gardeners.

They say city workers would water their plants once a week. But still, some gardeners claim that it isn’t being done, and their plants are suffering.

According to Nathan Serota, spokesperson for the Department of Parks and Recreation, they initially would water at least once a week, but now they are watering the gardens twice a week.

During the first city-wide closure, community gardens were given an exemption and farmers and gardeners were allowed onto the public lots to tend to the plants.

But during the latest closure, they weren’t granted an exemption, essentially cutting them off from their gardens, which some people use as a vital food source.

“Its such a shame,” said Diamond Head resident Tiffany Matthews. “No one is using this food right now because you can’t go in there, you can’t grow it, you can’t eat it, you can’t harvest it."

“It’s unfortunate, it’s wasteful — especially at a time like this where it;s a crisis for everyone and some people are having food shortages and money problems,” Matthews added.

Serota said an exemption was not issued in this second round of park closures because of cases averaging in the triple digits.

Copyright 2020 Hawaii News Now. All rights reserved.