In booming North Texas, where big grocery chains compete hard for customers, the nearest grocery store is still many miles away from some heavily populated areas.
Dallas city leaders have tried for years to get new grocery stores in those areas.
Now they are also considering a new plan to encourage more community gardens in food desert areas to help bring fresh food closer.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture labels "food deserts" as neighborhoods at least a mile from a grocery store in the city or 10 miles in rural areas.
The Dallas City Council Economic Development Committee endorsed the plan Monday.
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Committee Chairman Tennell Atkins said the city is seeking input on now to rearrange rules to encourage more new gardens by spring planting season.
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“How do you get it from the garden to the kids and to the family? How do transfer that? How do you make sure when you plant that garden the food is inspected, you can sell it?”
Neighborhood convenient stores could sell the locally grown products or they could be sold in new neighborhood farmers markets or at the Farmers Market downtown, Atkins said.
Large sections of the Dallas area qualify.
One is the neighborhood around Paul Quinn College on Simpson Stuart Road near Bonnie View Road in Dallas.
To help combat the problem, the college has transformed the former football field into a community garden.
Paul Quinn sophomore Nathaniel Scott helps run the farm as part of a work study program.
“We give back to some of those communities and we've even had the Dallas Cowboys themselves buy food from us,” Scott said. “The more farms we have around the city of Dallas, the more places people can go buy fruits and vegetables.”
Atkins said officials plan to receive input on possible changes in city codes for action by the City Council in January.
