The Alliance launched The Community Green Access (CGA) grant in 2024 to offer financial and technical support to five local groups seeking to connect their community members to nature. In addition to supporting their projects, we offered resources, networking, peer learning, and technical skills training. Organizations leveraged these tools to make the biggest impact in their local project, ultimately leading to sustained environmental stewardship in places of greatest need across the watershed. With over 52 years of experience cultivating community partnerships, the Alliance was excited to apply our knowledge and administer results-oriented grants to support local groups and build organizational capacity where it is needed most.

Baltimore Green Space is a land trust located in Baltimore City that helps preserve community gardens, pocket parks, and urban forests for generations to come. When they asked their site leaders what motivates them to care for green spaces, the common response was “community-building.” Baltimore Green Space believes green spaces are essential to engaging residents and strengthening the vital web of community in Baltimore City.

Baltimore has a relatively low life expectancy of 73.6 years, compared to 77.3 years nationally. Many of these same communities are also healthy food priority areas, where residents lack access to affordable, healthy, locally grown food or dependable transportation. Green spaces in low-resourced communities improve quality of life (reducing rates of asthma, diabetes, and obesity) and well-being, but are drastically under-resourced. Through the CGA grant, Baltimore Green Space supported and sustained local green spaces in overburdened Baltimore City neighborhoods. They leveraged funding to purchase needed maintenance supplies. They provided educational and technical resources to better engage residents caring for their community green spaces, bolstering residents’ physical and civic wellbeing.

a fenced garden

Victorine Q. Adams Memorial Garden, a community green space, flourishes with the support of Baltimore Green Space.

orange flowers and a person showing another what is growing in a garden

Johnny Shaw, a site leader at Victorine Q. Adams Memorial Garden, shares with Katie Lautar, Baltimore Green Space’s Executive Director, what’s growing in the garden.

a person carries wooden beams through a garden

Johnny Shaw, a site leader at Victorine Q. Adams Memorial Garden, maintains the green space.

a close up of small plants in a garden

Vegetables growing in the Victorine Q. Adams Memorial Garden

a person speaks to three other people listening intently

Sarah D’Adamo, Baltimore Green Space’s Preservation Manager, speaks with community members at Bruce St. preservation site.

a group of people sit under a garden canopy

Sarah D’Adamo, Baltimore Green Space’s Preservation Manager, leads a farming workshop for community members at Bruce St. preservation site.

a large group of people holding plants pose for a picture

Sarah D’Adamo hosts a stewardship meeting in August 2025.

Learn more below.

This project accomplished so much, including:

  • 3 transition plans
  • 14 preservation meetings
  • 11 startup consultations
  • 57 sites supported.

Additionally, Baltimore Green Space planted 2,800 plants and provided seed donations.

The success of their conserved green spaces is due to their committed, passionate site leaders. Through this project, Baltimore Green Space provided 6 site leader stipends to compensate community members for their time in learning and maintaining their conserved spaces.

“I just got through telling my boss, Genevieve, about the Friday events and she was so impressed! I told her it was 100% due to this amazing partnership. I’m very grateful for you all and your hard work on Friday… I hope this program is something we can continue doing at least once a year (maybe even twice a year- it seems to be a high-demand activity).” – Ela-Sita Carpenter, PhD (she/her), Urban Wildlife Biologist

At the close of the Community Green Access Grant, Baltimore Green Space will continue to offer educational and technical resources to bolster green spaces!

Support the Alliance’s Efforts