The Good Table At Home: Interview with Gavin Raders, Co-Founder of Planting Justice & Co-Manager of The Good Table

By Kelly Knight, Marketing Manager for The Good Table

Gavin Raders

I sat down with Gavin Raders, Co-Founder of Planting Justice and Co-Manager of The Good Table, to discuss how the pandemic has affected his organization, what he’s looking forward to at the new Planting Justice Organic Nursery at The Good Table site, and his hopes for the community in the future.

Hey Gavin, thanks for meeting up with me.  So, can you tell me how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted Planting Justice?

Yeah, it’s been interesting: in many ways, I feel like this is something Planting Justice has been preparing for.  We’ve been able to respond in a really strong way as an organization: we got a small business loan that allowed us to keep everyone on staff, for one thing, and we were also able to actually expand our staff with seven new hires!

That’s incredible!  How did that come about?

Well, in part, it happened because the pandemic got everyone refocused on gardening, food security, and creating sustainable food systems in local communities.  We saw how the pandemic impacted the food supply chain, with lots of items being unavailable, so everyone turned back to gardens as a way of creating that food security for themselves and their neighbors.  

The sales in our nursery more than doubled, and sales of our edible starts have been the highest ever.  That speaks to a real need in the community for gardens and accessible food.

So when it comes to the organic plant nursery at the new Good Table site, what will that space provide for the community?

We’ll have certified organic heirloom crops at the new site, including 1,200 varietals of fruit trees and perennial plants.  We’ll be able to offer things that other nurseries don’t have, which will contribute to the overall food diversity in the El Sobrante community.  

Another thing I’m excited about is the commercial kitchen on-site.  This will provide additional culinary value, with an offering of locally made foods.  We’ll have collaborative workshops on how to plant and care for edible starts, which will allow us to leverage the knowledge already in the El Sobrante community—we’ll encourage everyone to participate in community group sharing to all learn together.  

And lastly, but also important: we’ll be creating jobs, since this will be a brick and mortar location.  

What are your hopes for The Good Table and Planting Justice Organic Nursery site?  What will make this space so special?

I feel like the community really needs a place like this.  There are so few community gathering spaces in El Sobrante that don’t require a purchase or admission fee to get in.  The pay-as-you-can model is not widespread, and pretty unique for this area.  That allows folks to just come hang out, which is really valuable from a social isolation perspective.

Absolutely.  I’ve been reading a lot about the diminishing amount of “third space” in the United States — places you can go hang out that aren’t work or home.  America doesn’t have a lot of civic spaces for people to congregate that are free.

Yes, and that’s a huge issue!  You’re likely to get ticketed for trespassing or loitering, which is a social justice issue.  The Good Table and Planting Justice Organic Nursery can be that third space for the community; a place to gather and collaborate for communal sharing, knowledge and celebration.

We all hope that too—and that we’ll be able to open in 2021.  Thanks Gavin!

Note: if you’d like to help us open in 2021, please consider donating to our Go Fund Me campaign: Donate

About Gavin: Gavin Raders is a co-founder and co-director of Planting Justice, a father to two amazing daughters, a social justice activist, and a permaculture demonstrator/teacher. Rather than fighting against the things that we don't want and continuously reacting against the onslaught of oppressive systems, Gavin decided at a young age to build solutions that bring healing, health, peace, opportunity, and justice to those around him, using his privileges strategically for reparations and redistribution, and creating space for those most impacted by structural violence to live out their own dreams and enact the solutions they know to be necessary, while simultaneously supporting themselves and their families.