WATERVILLE — Ground has been broken for a 42-foot diameter biodome at the Alfond Youth Center as part of the organization’s Sustainable Gardening Program.
The youth center, which includes the Boys and Girls Clubs and YMCA of Greater Waterville, will be a solar powered ecosphere with hydroponics and aquaponics learning labs, and a state-of-the-art greenhouse that will provide fresh, nutritious produce and herbs to the Kids’ Kitchen and Weekend Backpack programs year-round, said a news release from the youth center. Kids will work on STEM activities, start their own produce stand business at the Waterville Farmer’s Market, and hold community garden days for local enthusiasts, the release said.
The biosphere was supported by donations from Hannaford supermarkets, John and Mark Beaupre, and a $50,000 grant from the Lowe’s Renovation Across the Nation program.
More than $70,000 was also raised for the project through the Maine Celebrity Classic annual fundraiser. The golf tournament’s founder, John Beaupre, lost his mother in 2015, “I needed to find a way to memorialize mom’s love for kids and gardening at the Boys & Girls Club in which I grew up.” The biodome will be named the Mary Nash Beaupre Greenhouse, and is slated to open October.
During the growing season, the center’s four raised beds and 15 in-ground beds, which were managed and monitored by children at the center, produced produce that was used in the Kids’ Kitchen to feed the more than 200 at-risk youth who attend daily. It was also used to fill the backpacks that go to homes of more than 75 families in need every weekend. More than 23 percent of the youths in Maine, and 90 percent of those who are part of the center’s after-school program, are food insecure and eligible for free lunches, the release said. The biosphere will help address the nine months of non-growing season.
PHOTO CAPTION: Work begins on the greenhouse biodome at the Alfond Youth Center in Waterville. (Submitted photo)
