Garden of Eden Urban Farming's mission is to provide the highest quality organic, nutritional, and flavorful herbs, greens, tomatoes and strawberries, with the best price for consumers. Providing lower transportation time and costs, less spoilage and meeting market demand efficiently all year round, Garden of Eden supplies local grown garden produce to both large scale and small-scale retailers and wholesalers.
In addition, we will provide full time state-of-the-art urban farming job training, offering a transformative skills development model for under-performing young adults, veterans, and unemployed. We will take unskilled young adults and low-skilled workers and give them high tech, 100% green agriculture skills training required for 21st Century food production. This creates local jobs for local residents.
Our strategy is to train young people for adulthood, and to train adult workers for new careers ready to go to work. This year-round job creation process engages us in building the skills, attitudes, knowledge, and experiences that prepare them for both the present and the future.
GOE began as an educational project originated by founder Michael Twiggs and co-sponsored by Maxine Mimms Academy (MMA) and civic groups in Tacoma, WA. We are currently working with non-profits in central Puget Sound, with special emphasis on communities of color. We also work with commercial entities to develop nutritional, fresh, local food options.
Our Team
Michael Twiggs Founder, President Chief Gardening Consultant
Michael Twiggs
Michael Twiggs is a technology professional with both technical and management experience in the manufacturing, telecommunications, banking and education industries. He is the founder and President/CEO of Twiggs & Associates.
His passion is growing fresh fruits and vegetables indoors all year-round. He uses his knowledge of systems design and integration to develop new sustainable business models for food production.
His work history includes
Founder, Garden of Eden Urban Farming - goefarming.com
Technology Director - Maxine Mimms Academies
Founder, President & CEO, Twiggs & Associates, Inc.
Technology Consultant - Bank of America Corporation
Computer Operations Manager - Rainier Bank
Systems Manager - Pacific Northwest Bell
Tool & Machine Designer - Western Electric Company
He studied engineering at the University of Missouri in the 1960s. He is a graduate of Evergreen State College, earning a B.A. in Environmental Studies with an emphasis in hydroponics.
Other activities include
Evergreen State College, Environment Club - Founder
Research Project - Food Deserts in the Pacific Northwest
Hydroponics Research Project - Garden of Eden
Curriculum Development - Indoor Urban Farming
Central Area Urban Gardeners - City of Seattle Dept. of Neighborhoods
Clean Greens Farm - Collaboration for year-round food production organic
First Place Scholars - Elementary school hydroponic lab and science curriculum
Dr. Rees Clark Vice-president, Treasurer Planning and Systems Consultant
Rees Clark
Dr. Clark is a former urban planner and university professor, with academic degrees in geography, political science and government.
He has worked in local government in Southern California and Pennsylvania and has taught at Penn State, Villanova, University of Maryland and Colgate University. Since 1980 he has worked full time in computing and data services management. He is a co-founder of Clark Internet Publishing, a developer of web applications for small businesses and non-profits.
He oversees our web-based services and consults with our partners about cooperative online services and hydroponic project development, curriculum and finance.
His professional history includes
Co-founder, Garden of Eden Urban Farming, 2013
Co-founder, President, Clark Internet - clarkinternet.com - 1994
Co-founder, President, BG Information Systems - 1990
Computer Resource Management Consultant - SCT Corp. 1981
Asst. Professor, Colgate University 1975
City Planner, County of Los Angeles
Education
Ph.D., Geography, The Pennslvania State University - 1979
M.A., Geography, Los Angeles State University, Los Angeles - 1972
B.A., Political Science, University of California, Los Angeles - 1965
Languages, English, Spanish, French, German by decreasing fluency
Other Interests
Vice-president and board member, Latino Educational Training Institute (LETI), 2002-present
Founding director, LETI Vocational School - 2019
Communications Consultant - Maxine Mimms Academies - 2004
Web design, cloud applications
Eric Stark Business Development Officer
Mr. Stark is a seasoned executive in the design and operation of nonprofit and for profit enterprises. He served as Financial Advisor with The World Bank, Vice President at Washington Mutual, Consultant to Capital Food Brokers, Tri-State Hydroponics and the Dept of Agriculture, Government of Jamaica. Eric has been an organic vegetable gardener for 13 years.
Dr. Lawrence Adeyemi Sustainable Development Director
Larry Adeyemi
Dr. Adeyemi has over 20 years of combined academic and practical experience in sustainable development, project design and implementation. He is well known for delivering projects on time and under budget.
He has served as Project Engineer and manager for large-scale agriculture and water supply projects, most recently with Benico Technical Services. His professional work includes water and wastewater industry project management work at Metro/King County.
He has extensive experience with organic farming of large volume vegetables and fruits in Nigeria, West Africa. He is founder of Clean Water for Humanity, which promotes safe water for sustainable agriculture and drinking.
Cecil Stewman Urban Agriculture Teacher
Cecil Stewman
Mr. Stewman has a Masters in Teaching, over 37 years of teaching in Tacoma public schools. He has a trade and industry certification. He has academic and practical experience in K-12 instruction, sustainable development, project design and implementation. He has extensive experience with organic gardening and gardening systems.
The academy has been working with youth in Tacoma since 2004. Originally working with at-risk secondary schoolchildren to create a path to reengagement with education, the academy has branced into many additional fields of service.
LETI serves hispanic familiies with a variety of educational assistance programs and instruction in family finance, health and career development. Servimos a familias hispanas con programas en finanzas, salud, liderazgo y desarrollo profesional.
"Garden of Eden Urban Farming™" and "Evergarden Farms™" are trademarks of Garden of Eden Urban Farming, Inc., a Washington State corporation registered 2017.