ForestR: Getting CV Green for Earth Day
An Earth Day celebration this Saturday at the Castro Valley Library owes a big thanks to a Castro Valley couple dedicated to planting trees and gardens as well as creating green jobs.
The “Come Out to Play for Earth Day” event this weekend will focus on how to clean, green, and feed Eden Area communities. The celebration is a collaboration between the library, VeggiePalooza, Friends of the Castro Valley Library, GreenThumbWorks Native Landscapes, FMG+Company, CLIFBar, and Forestr.org, a three-year-old company founded by Yon Hardisty and Nimone Li-Hardisty of Castro Valley.
The outdoor event will include the official opening of Sage Park, a permaculture pocket park near the library to model environmentally friendly landscapes. The small plot extends along the east side of the driveway entrance into the Library on Norbridge Avenue. The Park includes drought-resistant plants such as sages, large decorative logs for local wildlife, and a fig tree.
“We focus on cleaning, greening, and gleaning in cities like Castro Valley,” said ForestR CEO Li-Hardisty. “Pocket parks fall under our greening category. They are a new push to put trees and other permaculture and gardens in urban spaces. These types of parks are popular in Los Angeles. They could be a few feet or as much as an acre.”
It’s not the first time ForestR has been involved in Earth Day events at the library. Li-Hardisty had previously worked on the construction team for the Castro Valley Library and volunteered her new company to help out with Earth Day events last year. Her team gave out plants to encourage planting during the pandemic. ForestR was also instrumental in creating the new Castro Valley Seed Bank, which includes 1,500 packets of seeds. ForestR’s gleaning (also known as harvesting extra fruit or vegetables) is donated to local food bank programs such as Tiny Homes at First Presbyterian Church, and the Farm-acy Program at Dig Deep Farms Food Hub in San Leandro.
And the company all started with the question of where to plant a redwood tree.
“I love my garden and my fruit trees and one day, Yon asks me if he can plant a redwood tree in the garden,” Li-Hardisty said. “I wasn’t too wild about it, so I asked him to plant it somewhere else. He looked around and found that CalTrans had sections along the highway that would allow tree planting, but they asked him to start with adopting a section of 580 first.”
After a year, the Hardistys got permits, submitted a planting plan, and got trees planted on the north side of Interstate 580 in Castro Valley. In the process, they founded ForestR and began discussing other locations to plant trees.
Hardisty, a software developer, and entrepreneur says he gets about 10-15 students volunteering every weekend to either help with cleaning the adopted highway sections, planting trees or with other ForestR projects.
“Some had come to me asking about how to produce video games. Now several are looking at majoring in forestry in college,” Hardisty said.
ForestR is about to launch a membership campaign with yearly dues but currently relies on donations and sponsorships to keep the business flourishing. The company has gotten small grants from the Castro Valley Rotary Club as well as Oakland-based FMG+Company Architects and Emeryville-based CLIFBar.
The Earth Day event will also include harvest exchanges, an earthworm adoption, environmentally-themed craft activities for children, and a Friends of the Castro Valley Library pop-up environmental book sale.
For more information, visit Forestr.org