Hospital uproots garden in Utah

**Don Boekelheide d*@yahoo.com**

Salt Lake Tribune, Utah
August 12, 2006

Logan cancer center will uproot garden
Gardeners hope this isn't the end of their beloved
project
The Associated Press

LOGAN - After the fall harvest, a Logan community
garden will be ploughed under to make way for a new
8,000-square-foot cancer center. 

   The 100-plot garden has been planted annually over
the past six years on land owned by Logan Regional
Hospital. Administrators told gardeners in June they'd
have to relocate after September. 

   ''We feel bad that the change is going to occur,
but there isn't an alternative for us,'' said hospital
spokesman Paul Norton. 

   Before being used for the garden, the 1-acre plot
on 600 East was vacant. Gardening space is shared
about equally between community residents and students
from Utah State University, said Theresa Christensen,
a USU extension services employee who helps run the
garden. 

   Hospital officials always planned to use the land,
but it wasn't clear when, USU Extension Horticultural
Agent Loralie Cox said. 

   Planners spent a year evaluating where best to
build the new cancer center, finally determining the
garden site was the best fit, Norton said. The garden
is so popular, even hospital administrators hoped to
find an alternative location for the center, he added.

   Now, Christensen, Cox and others are hoping to find
the garden a new home, either on the USU campus or
within Logan's city limits. They've already pitched
the idea to Logan's Park and Recreation Advisory Board
with mixed results. 

   Some on the board advise waiting to see what USU
officials might offer, while others say a garden could
enhance the city's open space or parks. 

   ''This would be a great use for some of those
vacant lots,'' Logan Municipal councilwoman and board
member Tami Pyfer said. 

   ''I think it's a great project and I would hate to
see it go away.'' 

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