In a time when community mailboxes are often targetted by vandals a Williams Lake man is developing a garden area around the ones in his neighbourhood.
Austin Tate, a forester home on paternity leave, sought and received permission from the City to transform a boulevard and put in a garden for his daughter Riel, who will be turning four soon.
He has support from his Fourth Avenue North neighbours, with many of them pitching in to help.
“We wanted to put in a bee garden for our daughter Riel. She’s really into flowers and painting,” Tate told the Tribune as he and neighbour Imran Zulfigar were removing sod and Riel was helping with her own garden utensil. “Why not put in a flower mixture so Riel can learn about the birds and the bees and a little bit about photosynthesis and things like that. We thought it was a great opportunity.”
Earlier Monday neighbour Graham McCoubrey who lives three doors up from Tate, brought over his mini backhoe and lent a hand.
“We started at 7:30 a.m. and I’m just cleaning up the odds and ends he couldn’t get to,” Tate said.
Their problem isn’t vandalism of mailboxes, but garbage, he added.
Read more: Williams Lake Fox Mountain mailboxes broken into
“People throw garbage here so obviously we thought we could curb that by planting something nice and maybe people would feel like they don’t want to throw their garbage in the front area here.”
Tate and Zulfigar are part of the Fourth Avenue Dinner Club and Tate said they are lucky to have a neighbourhood that works together.
“Our block is really a great community that helps each other out,” he added, noting his mother-in-law Sonja Vernon-Wood also lives nearby and she was inside babysitting their one-year-old son.
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