THE HOPE TRUST

THE H.O.P.E. TRUST GOAL

‘Healing of Planet Earth through community projects, education, research, spiritual development for community advancement.”
Develop a special botanical website that ultimately becomes a comprehensive Gardening Encyclopedia meant to educate, inform and
promote a botanically caring World that could become a beautiful, bountiful, peaceful, productive and united environment for all.

These objectives are supported through the Botanical Educational Website:
www.daleharvey.com
 

Please CLICK HERE to HELP US with YOUR KIND DONATION

H.O.P.E. Trust History

H.O.P.E. Trust was inspired in response to an essential community need and to make a positive contribution to improving our botanical environment.

Mr. Dale Harvey and Mr. John Newton solicited the assistance of the New Zealand Charities Commission, Inland Revenue, New Zealand Government, New Zealand Police, the local School System and Social Services Organizations, several creative Business Accountants and caring local Business Owners. Together they all have unite in an effort to educate, inspire and uplift the lives of as many people as possible to overcome the devastating effects of environmental misunderstanding and poverty in their communities.

Together they established The H.O.P.E. (Healing of Planet Earth) Trust. The H.O.P.E. Trust became a Registered Charitable Trust in 2000 overseen by the New Zealand Charities Commission. The H.O.P.E. Trust is authorized “to collect funds and to solicit receive enlist and accept financial and other aid subscriptions donations and bequests from individuals trust companies associations organization societies institutions local public bodies Government Departments and other organizations or authorities, and to conduct fund raising campaigns.”

The H.O.P.E. Trust is designed as a vehicle by which donations can be returned most effectively to provide assistance, education and support to promote environmental appreciation and awareness; uplift communities, private individuals, schools and special interest groups. Occasionally special grants are provided by sponsor’s donations to assist the development of Special Achievers.

This is accomplished for Global and local Communities through the botanical education gardening website www.daleharvey.com. The wonderful world of Nature embraces the entire World and all its’ People. Caring properly for the Natural World that supports and surrounds us insures a better quality of life for all People, now and for Future Generations.

www.daleharvey.com actively promotes gardening as a means to achieve that result. www.daleharvey.com provides accurate botanical, environmental and gardening information to all interested people who would like to botanically and environmentally improve and uplift their communities and personal quality of life and the world around them through gardening. A botanically caring and informed World soon becomes a beautiful, bountiful, peaceful, productive and united World.

The H.O.P.E. Trust supports community (garden) projects designed to illustrate how to make this happen; research into ways to best overcome the devastating effects of poverty in the community; and spiritual development with a ‘green’ theme meant to broaden environmental insight and understanding. All these aspirations are focused to create greater and sustained community and individual advancement which will heal and improve our local environment and ultimately our world.

The H.O.P.E. Trust works toward continuing the advancement and appreciation of botanical beautification and enhancement of a clean, green image of New Zealand.
 

Most of these objectives are achieved through the Botanical Educational Website:
www.daleharvey.com

THE H.O.P.E. TRUST SUCCESS STORY

Every good idea starts with a small thought as every great tree starts from a small seed.  Therefore the first area targeted by The H.O.P.E. Trust was the deeply disadvantaged, ethnically diverse, urban community of South Auckland, New Zealand. A number of garden projects were initiated with the schools through support from The H.O.P.E. Trust.

These innovative garden projects were directed by Mr. Dale Harvey and involved the School Administration, Children, Parents and Teachers. Colourful, fragrant and practical gardens of flowers and food were created by the Children. The Children were given “ownership” control to develop, learn and plan what they wished to create that would enhance the schools surroundings. Gentle guidance and botanical instruction taught the Children and often their Families plus their Teachers and the surrounding Community a practical appreciation and understanding of gardening, environmental studies, ‘secrets’ of Nature and their application toward uplifting the quality of life in their Families, Neighborhood, Schools and surrounding Communities.

To quickly advance essential and practical knowledge of gardening skills necessary to care-for and create their beautiful, bountiful and successful gardens, Teachers asked their Students to visit the www.daleharvey.com website and read the A-Z of Flowers and Plants; A to Z of Vegetables & Herbs; and A-Z of Fruit. Then they were asked to download, colour print and laminate all of the appropriate Flowers and Plants, Vegetables and Herbs plus Fruit information sheets from the website that they planned to grow in their gardens. These laminated information sheets were then posted on large boards either in the classroom and/or in the halls. This way everyone could learn about all the plants in their school garden by reading the informative information sheets. Those Students who wished to create their own home gardens were encouraged to show their Parents the www.daleharvey.com website and use this as a handy reference when working with together to create their successful home gardens.

Most notable successful gardens came from Te Reo Maori Sutton Park Primary School. Sutton Park School is located in one of the most disadvantaged communities in South Auckland. With several hundred Children, an active Handy Man and Janitor, a few Parents and several Teachers actively involved in their garden project, it took only a short time for the 15-acre campus to became transformed into a spectacular ‘garden paradise’ of colour, fragrance and bountiful harvests. The gardens were almost entirely planned, planted and maintained by the young Students with Teacher and Parental supervision. Soon flowers adorned the classrooms, hanging baskets appeared to decorate long covered walkways and abundant fresh organic produce began feeding the children and their families.

Teachers and helpful Parents organized a cooking class to show the Children how to cook delicious meals from what they had grown. They learned how to bottle and preserve their food; how to dry fruits, herbs and vegetables; many created special flower arrangements and made beautiful art with dried petals and jewellery from seeds. They wrote stories about their garden experiences: what flowers they loved; their favourite vegetables; different types of food crops they grew successfully; why they loved certain colours and fragrances. Many drew pictures of favourite flowers, plants, vegetables and scenes of their own home gardens they created with their Families. Some Children designed special gardens on paper and even worked out the mathematics of what they required to create their own unique gardens.

The Children organized themselves to patrol and protect their treasured gardens from vandalism. Some classrooms organized themselves to sell what they grew to raise funds to buy more computers and special programs. Several groups organized themselves to create their own ‘Garden Club’. One group of very talented Girls became the ‘Girls Garden Gang’. They not only patrolled and protected the gardens at School, but also around their homes and community. They also planted their own special plots and sold the produce, plus seedlings that helped them earn money to create a better quality of life for themselves. One clever Boy first learned to raise enough food from the home garden he grew to feed his large Family. Then he started his own gardening business. He began accepting garden jobs throughout his neighborhood. His success soon allowed him to employ several of the other Boys at school and eventually at a very early age began earning enough money to support himself and his Family!

Strong Business and Community support soon increased as these remarkable school gardens began producing results. Community and Parental Volunteers came forward that allowed the botanical efforts of The H.O.P.E Trust to grow and the existing school projects to flourish. New Zealand’s largest wholesale seedling producer allowed Mr. Harvey to collect dumped punnets and trays of mature seedlings from their compost pile and recycle them to the school project. Over several years they donated more than 25,000 boxes: 1,500,000 seedlings! This allowed the garden projects to expand to several other schools and also to caring Parents who started hundreds of home gardens that spread throughout surrounding streets.

A noticeable change soon occurred within the neighbourhoods due to the collective impact of all these home and school gardens and dedicated Gardeners. Instead of remaining indoors, Children and Parents spent much more time outdoors caring for their gardens. They began to meet their neighbors and made strong alliances and friendships as they talked about their gardens and shared information. Soon Neighborhood Watch Crime Prevention projects developed to protect their improving communities and a Neighborhood Ratepayers Association developed to further uplift and support their communities.

Criminal activity diminished! This was especially true of burglary and home invasion. It is said that “Crime hates to be seen”. Now anytime a resident heard a suspicious noise or witnessed unwanted criminal activity, they became actively involved and went outdoors to see what was happening because they wanted to protect their treasured gardens. And because they now identified and united with, their neighbours, they found the motivation to protect and support their homes and properties, too. So almost always, without the need for any confrontation, the criminal activity moved on and left the improving neighborhood alone.

Graffiti and tagging was markedly reduced and almost disappeared! Juvenile crime often connected with the local schools, soon diminished. Children in the school garden projects often had older siblings involved in this sort of crime. Now these Children and often their Parents found the necessary motivation to confront this problem within their Families. They wanted to protect their gardens, homes and improved neighborhood against this juvenile crime and stopped tolerating this sort of behaviour. 

Home ownership increased as crime subsided and community pride, neighborhood beautification, support and unity increased. Long-term residents help create a stable neighbourhood with a sense of unity. This is a strongly positive force against the adverse effects of poverty. This creates a more stable and welcoming urban environment where people don’t just survive, they thrive!

National recognition was awarded to The H.O.P.E. Trust when Dale Harvey and the Sutton Park School Project received two prestigious Environmental Initiatives Fund grants from the Auckland Regional Council/New Zealand Government in 2001-2003. This brought great excitement and pride to everyone involved in the community and the school. That excitement generated greater interest and involvement with these community and school garden efforts. Thus the school garden projects and neighborhood gardens noticeably improved and spread plus became much more permanent. Now Community Supporters became prominent and offered considerably greater help. The Neighborhood Ratepayers Association became much more empowered and began holding large and regular, fully sponsored community events in their local park. This same group then united ever more strongly when the Council attempted to give their park away so it could be turned into a liquor store, and they won their petition and saved their park!

Spectacular results generated from the Environmental Initiative Grant funding produced such beautiful and productive gardens that Sutton Park School was invited to feature in the Trinity Garden Festival, the largest and most prestigious in the country. This was the first and only time a school garden ever participated in this Festival, which raised enough funds to complete the building of the Auckland Cathedral. Sutton Park School decided to hold their own Garden Festival within the school to coincide with this special honour. Every classroom was involved creating special classroom gardens; floral art; school-grown flower and vegetable exhibits; and a wide range of botanical and garden-related projects. Prizes were awarded accordingly for the best flower, herb, mixed and vegetable garden; for the best cooked garden food; finest container and hanging basket display; awards for the best written flower, garden and vegetable essay; also there was a “secret’ ballot vote for the best class; best garden students and top school leaders. Of special interest is that the younger the students were, the more likely they were to excel in almost every aspect of gardening. For example, the overall winning class were the First Year Tongan Students!

Then they became famous and “legendary”! Because of their exposure and great success within the Trinity Garden Festival, the Children, their Community and their School gardens featured nationally on TVNZ (Television New Zealand).  Plus they attracted the attention of the most sophisticated director from NHK (Japanese National Television). She then brought down a film crew from Tokyo and spent several days filming their gardens and interviewed participating Children, Parents and Teachers. Later they all appeared in a special documentary that screened to a massive Asian audience. They were applauded for their botanical efforts and praised as leaders of the “Green Revolution” a new green Generation that could lead the way toward a brighter botanical future.

“New green technology” was also featured during this Japanese documentary about the school gardens. Ironically, while New Zealanders take for-granted the common system of growing seedlings in cell punnets which makes for efficient and easy transplanting. But for the Japanese, being quite new to western styles of botanics, they had never been introduced to cell punnets. Now they realized that this would be a botanical and commercial revolutionary step forward that would transform growing flowers, herbs and vegetables in Japan. These young Kiwi school Gardeners had inspired a green national movement in another country!    

The effects of this exposure were positively profound. A variety of community and creative garden projects, festivals and special botanical events sprung up throughout New Zealand. The Japanese Government introduced “green studies” certification for teachers starting from Kindergarten. Their logic was to “grow a green Generation” as quickly as possible to save their country. The Japanese public who witnessed this NZ school garden documentary were inspired and soon created a variety of similar garden/community projects using the “new green technology” discovered in a far-away New Zealand school garden. The resultant impact on Japan’s “green revolution” has been astounding.

Today the Sutton Park School Projects are permanently supported by the New Zealand Police and receive a substantial grant to maintain them from Pacific Steel, a Fletcher Challenge Company.

A clever Sutton Park School Leader summed it up when he proudly announced before everyone in his class, “We are going to be Heroes. We are going the Green the Planet.” I am sure that they will.

Please CLICK HERE to HELP US with YOUR KIND DONATION

CLICK on LINKS BELOW to SEE ARTICLES and PICTURES about THE H.O.P.E. TRUST PROJECTS:

  Pacific Steel / Sutton Park Day 2

  Successful School Garden Results!

Documentation needed to create a School Gardening Project 
(Based on the Award Winning Grant Proposal used to Fund the Sutton Park School Project)
On the Beat (Police Article supporting HOPE TRUST School Projects)
Gardening Helps Reduce Crime (Newspaper article supporting THE HOPE TRUST Projects ability to overcome crime & poverty)

Charities Commission Certificate (Verificatiion of HOPE TRUST OFFICIAL STATUS as an HONOURABLE CHARITY)

Police Managers' Guild Trust (AWARD CERTIFICATE as HONOURARY MEMBER POLICE MANAGEMENT GUILD)

Environmental Initiatives Fund - Auckland Regional Council
 (AWARD CERTIFICATE FOR ENVIRONMENTAL EXCELLENCE  for THE HOPE TRUST)
 

PLEASE CLICK HERE TO MAKE YOUR KIND DONATION TO HELP THE HOPE TRUST
 

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