The City of Long Beach, located in Los Angeles County of Southern California, is home to a diverse population of about 451,000 people . Long Beach is 20 miles south of downtown Los Angeles and borders the west side of Orange County . Out of 88 cities in LA County, Long Beach is the second most populous after Los Angeles, which has 3.8 million residents . The land area of Long Beach accounts for just 1.2% of land in LA County . However, the coastal city is well-known for the Port of Long Beach , the Queen Mary , California State University, Long Beach, and the Aquarium of the Pacific . This dissertation focuses on the City of Long Beach due to its high prevalence of community gardens compared to other cities in LA County. A 2013 comprehensive report of LA County urban agriculture identified the city as having 19 community gardens, one-sixth of the county’s total . As of 2024, Long Beach has about 28 community gardens according to multiple sources . This suggests that about 22% of the county’s estimated 125 community gardens are in Long Beach . There is evidence that UA can increase communities’ access to green space and food, while also creating opportunities for socialization and the exchange of resources and knowledge . The high prevalence of community gardens in Long Beach may result from local efforts to increase access to food. Compared to LA County, Long Beach has higher rates of food insecurity, pipp horticulture meaning that residents “lack consistent access to enough food for an active, healthy, life” . The food insecurity rate in Long Beach is 10% more than that of the county .
Communities of color who live in North, Central, and West Long Beach are at highest risk of being food insecure . These areas include the 90805, 90806, 90807, 90810, 90813 ZIP Codes , where communities are disproportionately burdened by disease and health conditions, such as asthma, diabetes, and hypertension .Existing health inequities in Long Beach may be explained by housing practices enacted nearly a century ago. According to the City of Long Beach’s Historic Context Statement, neighborhoods were shaped by redlining, the restriction of housing loans based on race . Federal Housing Association and private banks implemented redlining in the 1930s, preventing people of color from purchasing or renting in certain areas. Although the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1948 that such housing restrictions could not legally be enforced, redlining continued into the 1970s. Housing discrimination even affected professors of color at Long Beach State College, presently known as California State University, Long Beach. Despite being recruited to teach at the university, they were not allowed to buy homes near the campus, located on the East side of Long Beach . Figure 2, a census tract map from 1950, shows that most African American and other non-White residents were concentrated in Central and West Long Beach. The purple tracts represent areas where both groups resided .Before Long Beach’s incorporation as a city, its demographics were impacted by colonization. Present day Long Beach was originally the traditional and ancestral territory of the Tongva/Gabrieleño and the Acjachemen/Juaneño indigenous peoples . Puvungna, once a large settlement, was located where California State University, Long Beach stands today. It continues to hold spiritual and cultural significance to several tribes .
The Tongva , consumed a variety of meats, insects, and plants . Instead of maize, which was more popular in the Colorado River region, the Tongva favored nutrient-rich acorns, high in both fiber and fat . They also consumed a meal made from ground seeds of islay , cholla cactus seeds, wild sunflower seeds, chia seeds and shoots, and clover . In 1542, Spanish explorer Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo seized land from the Tongva tribe . European colonization resulted in the spread of new diseases, death, and displacement of the Tongva and other indigenous peoples. Over time, Spanish settlers established ranchos throughout the region to raise horse, cattle, and other livestock. One of the largest ranchos in California was owned by retired soldier Manuel Nieto, who received 300,000 acres of land in 1784 as a reward for his military service . Nieto’s rancho spanned from the Los Angeles River to the Santa Ana River. After his death in 1804, Nieto’s children inherited the land. During their joint ownership of the rancho, California became part of Mexico in 1821 after the country gained independence from Spain . In the early 1830s, Nieto’s family divided their land into six parcels. The United States claimedCalifornia as a territory in 1848, and in 1950, California became the 31st state . As California assimilated into the U.S., Nieto’s rancho became further divided and sold to American ranchers. For example, the 27,000-acre Rancho Los Cerritos, Ranch of the Little Hills, was owned by Nieto’s daughter Manuela Cota, then sold after her death to Massachusetts-born John Temple in 1843 . Temple used the land to raise cattle for their hides and tallow. Although he mainly resided in Los Angeles for his mercantile business, Temple lived at Rancho Los Cerritos during the summer, and built a two-story adobe headquarters and garden. After retiring, Temple sold Rancho Los Cerritos to Flint, Bixby & Co. in 1866. The Bixby family kept 30,000 sheep to provide wool. However, the sheep industry declined during the late 1870s, and so Jotham Bixby began to lease and sell portions of the property. Over time, the cities of Long Beach, Bellflower, Paramount, Signal Hill and Lakewood were founded on Los Cerritos lands .
Agriculture was an important part of Long Beach’s early economy that drew long-term settlers. 19th century farmers raised cattle and sheep, and grew flowers, fruits, and vegetables such as corn, beans, barley, and alfalfa . During the 20th century, the city placed a stronger focus on tourism and industry, advertising Long Beach as a seaside resort town. This attracted seasonal tourists but marked an overall decline in agriculture. The city’s population increased due to national and regional immigration and the discovery of oil. Landowners sold large tracts of real estate for industrial, commercial, and residential expansion . Many of Long Beach’s UA sites from the last century were developed from vacant land, either by city officials or local organizations. One example, Rancho Esperanza, was originally created to extract labor from Long Beach’s jail population, which overflowed with a “staggering number of drunks” . The idea was initially proposed in 1949 by city prosecutor Kenneth Sutherland and endorsed by court judge Charles Wallace police chief William Dovey. Rancho Esperanza became known as the “Honor Farm.” In 1954, “42 alcoholics and assorted vagrants and traffic law violators” were sent to the Honor Farm, and after eight months, grew enough food to feed themselves and the inmates back at the city jail . Though the farm was abandoned in the 1970s, it was later converted into a community garden. In 1974, the Long Beach Parks Department was requested by the city council to study how vacant city properties could be converted into private vegetable plots . In January of 1976, the City Council approved the Honor Farm community garden, which was described as “heaven to a gardener,” featuring 218 garden plots, compost bins, rustic building, and a small orchard. The Long Beach Community Garden Association was organized in May of that year to supervise operations and maintenance. In 1997, drying curing weed cityofficials relocated LBCGA’s garden to be adjacent to El Dorado Park, on 8.5 acres of land. LBCGA currently has a food bank which donates fresh produce to local charities, and its tree orchard “provides a visual and sound buffer between the gardens and the 605 Freeway” .Ban et al. and Tijerina both studied The Growing Experience, a joint collaboration between the Housing Authority of Los Angeles County and the University of California Cooperative Extension, which transformed a neglected lot into a community resource. Ban et al. , who studied the impact of a Community Service Agriculture program, found that The Growing Experience offered organic produce at a more affordable cost than supermarkets, and made a conscious effort to include ethnicallyappropriate crops targeted to the local primarily Latino and African-American populationof the Carmelitos Housing Project. CSA subscribers and Carmelitos residents who used The Growing Experience’s Farmer’s Market ate more fruits and vegetables than residents who did not participate in The Growing Experience. However, the CSA boxes were more expensive than the majority of non-organic produce from local supermarkets, so some residents were unwilling to participate due to financial and time restraints. One resident described that it was difficult to buy fresh produce then cook it after working all day .
The Carmelitos Housing Project was originally designed for low-income families, specifically serving soldiers who had just returned home from World War II. Unfortunately, Carmelitos became notorious for violence, drug, and gang culture . Tijerina , who focused on types of environmental justice offered by The Growing Experience, found that the area surrounding Carmelitos was a food desert located near 309 hazardous waste sites, 48 sites that released toxic chemicals, and 15 sites that reported air emissions to the Environmental Protection Agency. The Growing Experience resisted environmental injustices and aimed to uplift locals from poverty by offering a CSA program, farmer’s market, community garden, community kitchen, business and job training, and other educational and economic opportunities . However, nearly a decade after Ban et al. and Tijerina’s case studies were published, the Los Angeles County Development Authority nearly shut down The Growing Experience due to budget constraints. In 2021, they laid off all but one staff member . As of 2022, The Growing Experience is managed in partnership with the MAYE Center, a nonprofit that helps Cambodian residents cope with trauma from the Cambodian Genocide .This document listed a total of 22 UA sites, suggesting that attempts to map UA in Long Beach may be inconsistent. More recent sources from 2017 to 2023 indicate that there are potentially 66 UA sites in Long Beach, including 28 community gardens, and 30 public school garden sites, and 10 urban farms . Some UA sites are managed by one entity. For example, as of 2024, nine community gardens are managed by the nonprofit organization, Long Beach Organic . As of March 2024, the nonprofit Ground Education manages 24 school gardens in the Long Beach Unified School District . Additionally, Ground Education provides gardening activities to other UA sites, including Adventures to Dreams Enrichment, Farm Lot 59, and Sowing Seeds of Change . An undated webpage from the City of Long Beach claimed there are 30 LBUSD gardens. In a 2021 article from the local newspaper The Grunion, assistant public information director Evelyn Somoza reported that LBUSD has 20 district-approved gardens that receive mulch and weed pickup . Murray elaborated that while 20 school gardens completed the district’s application process, there may be additional self-maintained gardens. Information on Long Beach school gardens was limited to those within Long Beach Unified School District and did not include private or charter schools. In general, there is a lack of research on Long Beach school gardens . This dissertation will contribute to scholarly knowledge on gardens and urban farms in LongBeach, by investigating community engagement in UA through field observations and interviews.This study was guided by the social determinants of health framework and the community cultural wealth model, which relate to the dissertation’s focus on communities uniting to improve their health and environment through UA. UA can positively impact SDOH, which are socioeconomic and environmental factors that influence individual or community health . The Healthy People 2030 initiative, developed by the Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, groups SDOH into five domains . These domains provide context for why health inequities occur, as well as how they can be addressed . By targeting SDOH, UA can potentially improve physical and mental health outcomes . For example, many studies reported that UA fosters social capital . Social capital is part of Yosso’s CCW model, which highlights communities’ cultural knowledge, skills, and abilities. Additionally, social capital connects to the “social and community context” domain of SDOH.In this section, I will disclose my background to provide context for qualitative data collection and analysis. Self-reflexivity is an important consideration of qualitative methods, as researchers’ experiences affect their interpretation of data.