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Meet Lauren Towe – Program Manager for our Athens branch of Concrete Jungle. With the University at its center, Athens can be a bit of a transitory town. But Lauren is one of those rare lifelong Athens natives, and her roots go deep in this community. 

As Program Manager, Lauren really does it all. She manages volunteers on the ground, scouts local fruit trees, maintains relationships with our partners at UGArden and Campus Kitchen, and coordinates farmers market and grocery collections (amongst a thousand other things). She’s A++ at juggling all the fruity things! 

We sat down with a current client of Mercy Community Church – Herman. Herman is on a journey of rehab and recovery, and Mercy is there for him through the process. Herman laughed as he told us, “You know, you can’t have recovery your way. You can’t. It’s not going to work. But I’m blessed to be in a community church who loves me. They help me through the process.”

Herman added, “And I’ve got food! I see you guys, and I get veggies and stuff, fruits to take home.” We asked Herman what he liked to take from Concrete Jungle, and he said, “Potatoes, carrots. I’ll go back and make a salad. I’m a fan of salads. See, I worked in a restaurant before this. I learned how to do prep and how to make a meal stretch. Concrete Jungle helps you stretch a meal. Whoever came up with the idea, came up with a pretty good idea. Because it serves the community.” 

As we look back at the history of Concrete Jungle’s fruit tree map, who better to talk to than the creator of CJ’s fruit map? Meet Craig Durkin. Craig and his friend Aubrey Daniels started Concrete Jungle back in 2009. But the map existed even before that. 

Craig first set up the map to help himself and his friends find free food. It was a simple Google map with markers on it that showed where fruit trees were, but it also had other ways to recover food too – like dumpsters where you could get bags of bagels and donuts. In the beginning, Craig says that it was pretty basic: “There wasn’t a whole lot of community around it. I’m not sure how many people even knew about it.” Today, the map has grown beyond Craig’s initial vision for the project. 

Meet Pastor Chad of Mercy Community Church. Pastor Chad started Mercy over 17 years ago, with service as its core mission. Mercy was one of the first sites to receive Concrete Jungle’s produce when we began 12 years ago. 

Pastor Chad explains, “Waking up in the morning, coming in, preparing breakfast, and serving it to people who are hungry seems very direct. And it’s not one group of people doing something for another group of people. It’s us, working together to do something. It’s really about building community. We’re all working together to try to care for one another, respect one another, carve out spaces of justice and dignity and peace and wellbeing.”

Meet Shelley Rose, a dedicated Concrete Jungle volunteer. Shelley worked extensively with Concrete Jungle on our food delivery programs during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Shelley moved around growing up, but her family eventually came to Atlanta during her senior year of high school. After some time away pursuing her own education, she returned to make Atlanta her home and has never looked back. It was her connection to her synagogue that put her in touch with Concrete Jungle. 

Meet Scott! He lives in a unique neighborhood in Norcross called Adams Vineyard – a neighborhood with an amazing history and TWO HUNDRED muscadine vines.

“I believe there’s about 15 different varieties of muscadines. They were planted by Colonel John Adams. After serving in three wars, when he came home, his wife had polio. And so he wanted to be close to her. He started putting some shoots in over the years…. it turned into this with 200 vines. Now, there’s about 60 homes that form a loop road around this green space and conservation area, and there’s vines in the neighborhood that have been here over 80 years. It’s quite unique and we’re very fortunate to live with this beautiful space.”

Meet Tulsi TenEyck, one of Concrete Jungle Athens’ dedicated volunteers. Tulsi is passionate about the Athens community, as this town has been her home for 15 years.  She loves to learn about plants in the area and to create a greater sense of community and connection with her surroundings.  

Tulsi first found Concrete Jungle through CJ’s Edible Landscape Walk in May 2022 that highlighted fruit trees on the University of Georgia campus. As she explains, “We got to meet all kinds of fruit and nut trees. And it just rocked my world. It opened up my eyes to some information that I’ve been really yearning for and looking for – to learn what is growing around us. And I was just like, ‘oh my gosh, these are my people. This is how I’d like to spend my time.’ So it was after that campus walk, I was hooked.”

We managed to snag some time with Concrete Jungle’s Field Manager, Adam Hicks, to chat about all things fruit and community. As Field Manager, Adam leads our weekly in-town fruit picks as well as our monthly adventure picks. 

Adam is also responsible for figuring out where the food we harvest will be donated. He also leads our Produce Education and Enjoyment Loop (PEEL) program. Adam explains, “PEEL is our educational programming so that the people we’re serving have a better understanding of the value of the food, whether it’s nutritional value or how to prepare it. That way, they’re more likely to take it and use it once they receive it.” 

Adam’s role is unique in that he’s truly involved in the whole Concrete Jungle (CJ) process, from tree to table. He organizes volunteers to harvest the produce, figures out where the produce is going to go, and then coordinates or leads cooking demos.