local growing project in Phoenix

Local Growing Project In Phoenix

Darren Chapman, CEO of TigerMountain Foundation, welcomes visitors to the Garden of Tomorrow in South Phoenix in Arizona. TigerMountain Foundation is a local growing project in Phoenix, AZ. 

The TigerMountain Foundation reverses the problems of food insecurity, workforce, and economic development through our community gardens and landscaping initiatives. These initiatives also teach practical life skills to youth, adults and seniors, keeping them out of jail, away from negative influences in the neighborhood, and engaging them as productive citizens of their community.

TigerMountain Foundation empowers people by building flourishing community gardens and through our multi-ethnic and multi-generational Garden and Agri-Landscape Initiatives, we mentor participants through an active and healthy eating lifestyle, completion of goals and a Personal Strategy Roadmap. Their lives are transformed enabling them to secure living-wage jobs.

Our Mission

Our mission is simple: To empower communities to better themselves from within. In South Phoenix, and other challenged communities where we work, there are high rates of incarceration, food choices leading to health issues, and a low ranking education system. So how do we combat these challenges? Asset-Based Community Development (ABCD). That just means we don’t give a handout, we give the community a hand up by empowering participants with skills to transform their lives to a healthy eating and living lifestyle.

How We Empower Communities to Help Themselves

  • Restore pride in a community through beautification of vacant lots.
  • Inspire people to volunteer and engage in their community.
  • Provide youth the skills they need to prepare them for employment—and a better life.
  • Provide people on-the-job opportunities through landscaping, planting in community gardens, and selling and marketing what they grow at farmers’ markets.