DPS orders gardeners to undergo criminal background checks - The Denver Post

DPS orders gardeners to undergo criminal background checks - The Denver Post
Community gardeners who pay a small fee to grow veggies and flowers in fenced-in plots on the grounds of public schools are being told to submit to criminal background checks or grow elsewhere.

Some of the gardeners call it another intrusion by government into private lives.

"My reaction was disbelief and anger," said Kellie Papish, who gardens with her husband, Joe, at Steele Elementary School at East Alameda Avenue and South Humboldt Street. "Community gardeners are a threat to children?

"Where did we go so wrong that if you potentially have contact with a child you have to have a background check? "

Denver Urban Gardens, a 25-year-old nonprofit organization, leases garden plots in more than 100 locations along the Front Range, including plots at 20 public schools in Denver.

Under the terms of a recent "use agreement" with DUG, DPS said all gardeners on school properties will be categorized as repeat visitors and must undergo a criminal background check with the Colorado Bureau of Investigation.

The new policy was announced last week, and all gardeners were told to stop work until the checks came back and they were approved.

Many gardeners have already started this season, including Papish, who said she planted $50 worth of garlic bulbs last fall. She said the small backyard at her nearby home doesn't have enough sunlight to garden, so she rents a 10-foot-by-20-foot plot at the school for $10 a year.

DUG coordinator Jessica Romer sent an e-mail to all gardeners last week, saying that "being a gardener on school property is a privilege" and that gardeners are "guests" who must comply with DPS policies.

Read more: http://www.denverpost.com/ci_14826300#ixzz0kKa8Cder