Oak Park Art Garden
Community food forest, park, public art space, and gathering place
Current Project Status
- In January and February, members of AmeriCorps NCCC Team Red 3 started the first round of site clearing in preparation for construction. Thanks to them and our partners at GreenWaste for helping us with our organics removal!
- Bailey Tree Company completed a formal arborists report for the site in January. Their team will be coming out to remove volunteer, sick, and dead trees and roots in February.
- Major thank you’s to our landscape architects, Atlas Lab, Inc. for their leadership and inspiration on the new garden design. They have us on track to submit for permits by the end of February!
- We’ve been working with our friends from SABA on the bike library and tool library operations and hours. We can’t wait to bring these resources to the community!
- Our team presented our full plan for the Oak Park Art Garden at the April 3rd Oak Park Neighborhood Association meeting. The presentation is available to be shared from the OPNA team.
- May 2025 Update: Everyone at Alchemist is excited to be moving into the construction phase on this project! We’ve received our first round of plan check comments from the City of Sacramento Building Department. Our consultant team, led by Atlas Lab, Inc., is actively working on corrections and plans to resubmit for round two by the end of the month. Manufacturing has begun on the pre-cast concrete restroom and plans are moving along on the modified shipping containers which will house the SABA Bicycle Library and Repair and the Oak Park Tool Library. Most importantly, a HUGE thank you to Habitat for Humanity of Greater Sacramento and their annual Rock the Block event which brought over 40 volunteers out on May 9th and 10th to remove and replace the entire 200 ft. stretch of fence along the north side of the property!
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History
The Oak Park Art Garden is located at 3834 Martin Luther King Jr Blvd, Sacramento, CA, 95820. Activation of this space by Alchemist CDC started in 2017, utilizing a zero-cost land lease agreement (with an option to purchase) between Alchemist CDC and the former, private owner.
Since 2017, the Art Garden has been cultivated and designed through intensive community input and volunteer work, as well as contributions from local organizations such as The Sacramento Kings Foundation, Green Acres Nursery, the California Native Plant Society, and Sacramento Natural Foods Co-Op. In its present condition, the Oak Park Art Garden includes Sacramento’s first public fruit orchard, a native plant garden, and community-created public art.
While the Art Garden has served as a wonderful resource for community engagement through volunteer landscaping and art projects, it is not conducive to other kinds of community engagement or gathering, lacking some of the critical infrastructure needed to support that kind of activity.
Development
In 2021, the Alchemist CDC team put a plan into action to reinvigorate the Oak Park Art Garden by transforming it into a reimagined shared community space aligned with years of community input. In the Spring of 2022, Alchemist CDC was awarded $694,295 in Prop 68 funding, also known as the 2018 Parks Bond Act Statewide Park Development and Community Revitalization Grant to invest in the development of Oak Park Art Garden as a Small Public Place. The Oak Park Art Garden was the first project proposed by a non-profit rather than a municipal government entity to be selected for this grant award. Prop 68 funds projects which aim to protect, restore, and enhance California’s cultural, community, and natural resources.
The primary objectives of this grant funding are as follows:
- Acquire the approximately .39 acre parcel. Purchase of the property was completed in June 2023, using funds from the aforementioned grant.
- Construction of ADA accessible bathroom with drinking fountain and lighting. This requires connecting the lot to local utilities (water, sewage, and possibly electricity) and/or the installation of solar and on site battery storage.
- Construction/installation of new landscaping, ADA accessible walkways, and lighting throughout the parcel.
- Installation of permanent furnishings such as solar light poles, benches, etc.
- Upgrading mulch and woodchip paths to permanent ADA-compliant pathways.
- Installation of pollinator garden, edible plants, and native plants and grasses maintained with a smart irrigation system.
- Implementation of onsite stormwater management resources.
- Construction of Community Gathering Spaces, including shade, storage, and multiple community art installations.
- Installation of two 20’ shipping containers to be used to house community resource organizations’ operations. One shipping container will house the Sacramento Area Bicycle Advocate (SABA) Oak Park Bike Library and bike repair station. The other shipping container will house the Oak Park Tool Library, a lending resource for household tools.
- ADA accessible patio area with shade structure.
- Construction of decorative perimeter fence and creation of an iconic “Art Gate” entry serving as a fixture welcoming people into the Oak Park neighborhood.
- Flexible post system intended to support overhead and gateway art features, such as on a seasonal or revolving basis
- Rehabilitation of existing decorative perimeter fence
In addition to the funding received from the Statewide Parks grant, thanks to the advocacy of Asm. Kevin McCarty, Alchemist was also awarded $300,000 in Community Redevelopment Block Grant funding for this project. These funds are intended to close any gap in development funding due to the swiftly rising costs of construction. Additional funds were allocated to SABA to, in part, equip the bike library at Oak Park Art Garden as well.
While both grants allow for some flexibility in the date of project completion and some elements of the project will extend into 2026, we expect the Oak Park Art Garden will be open to general community use in 2025.
Frequently Asked Questions:
When do you expect Oak Park Art Garden construction to be complete?
Some elements of the project will likely extend into 2026 (such as the opening of the Oak Park Tool Library and SABA Bike Library), but we expect the Oak Park Art Garden will be open to general community use in 2025.
Why is there a fence around the Art Garden?
The construction fence was installed in September 2024. This fence was needed to allow for the next steps as we move toward active construction and because the site was consistently treated as a dumping ground by contractors, arborists, and others. The pattern of illegal dumping at the site meant tha all of our volunteer capacity with Oak Park Art Garden was being eaten up just dealing with piles of junk and massive woodchip loads we could not use.
We look forward to the project’s completion and the removal of the fence as the Art Garden finally becomes the community asset it was meant to be!
How can I get involved with the Art Garden?
We always need volunteers! You can take a look at our volunteer calendar and plan to join us for any listed garden workdays or you can contact us directly with your interest in volunteering.
