Rooted for Good: Serving the needs of the community

On a sunny, late October day, I met Karson Paris, Rooted for Good’s Associate Director, at the Northwestern Medicine Garden at 2475 Bethany Road. This 1.5-acre garden produced 4,000 pounds of food this year, with the primary goal of supplying fresh produce for the mobile food pantry.Rooted for Good, formerly known as DeKalb County Community Gardens, is a nonprofit whose mission is to empower individuals to access healthy food grown locally and sustainably to address the root causes of hunger.The organization’s 2024 name change to Rooted for Good reflects its evolving mission and expanded services. The new name helps the community understand that RFG is about much more than community gardens. Today, RFG hosts up to 10 free mobile food pantries per month with its refrigerated box truck, operates a fixed-location food pantry in Genoa, and offers gardening and nutrition programming at various locations throughout the county. To make growing food more accessible, RFG also offers three renta