The volunteers keeping Balboa Park blooming
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Volunteers fan out across the park. Photo: Courtesy of Forever Balboa Park
Multiple times a week, an army of volunteers tend to the thousands of plants and trees rooted in Balboa Park.
Why it matters: Volunteers fill a gap in garden upkeep, delivering more than $1.2 million in services last year, providing relief to the city's perpetually stretched budget, officials told Axios.
Catch up quick: There are lots of ways to volunteer in the park via the nonprofit Forever Balboa Park, but the big three plant-focused jobs are tree stewards, garden stewards and rose garden stewards.
- The tree stewards started in 2017 with help from Cal Fire grant.
- Then, during COVID, the nonprofit added garden stewards.
- The Rose Garden Corps joined their ranks shortly after that.
By the numbers: Volunteers care for 16,000 trees across 400 different species throughout the 1,200 acres of the park, Jackie Higgins, Forever Balboa Park's VP of planning, told Axios.
- They also work in the 20 different park gardens.
- There are more than 400 Forever Balboa Park volunteers.
All volunteers have to complete at least 4-6 hours of training and shadowing, and there's a waiting list to get into the training, Higgins said.
- Training teaches volunteers about the type of flowers in the park, how to care for them and how to deadhead.
- That's removing dead flower heads to encourage further blooming, not deeply appreciating the Grateful Dead, though that's allowed, too.
What they're saying: Cheri Decorso was part of the original group of garden volunteers in 2021.
- "When we originally started, every garden was an absolute mess," she told Axios. "The city is always understaffed, and so it was very, very gratifying."
Friction point: Decorso said volunteers have mostly stayed out of the recent drama over new parking fees because they get to park for free.
- Volunteers now have to park in lots that are slightly farther away, but none of it bothers Decorso because she rides her bike.
What's outside: Decorso loves seeing concrete evidence of her work.
- "You go to a garden, and you have a specific job to do, and then when you step away from it and you've changed what that garden looks like," she said. "It's just like, wow, we got a lot done today."
Fun fact: Decorso knows all the types of gardens and plants in the park, from the Kate Sessions cactus garden to the succulents in the Desert Garden to the new Botanical Building.
If gardening isn't your thing, Higgins said there are 85 organizations in Balboa Park and many can use volunteers.
- Art organizations, the archery range, the plumeria society and the lawn bowling club could also use a helping hand, if not a green thumb.