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Vent: Snagged public garden trimmings for my planters, feeling conflicted
Our community garden had a big prune day and left piles of cuttings on the curb. I grabbed a few handfuls of leafy bits to use as mulch in my window boxes. Now I'm wondering if that was stealing, since it was meant for city compost. Does anyone have a rule for using shared green waste? I'd like to hear what others do.
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gonzalez.vera7mo ago
Read a local news piece last year about this exact thing. Our city's parks department said if it's on the curb in bags, it's trash collection, but loose piles from their own pruning are fair game for compost. They actually encouraged people to take it so it didn't fill up the trucks. Your leafy bits were probably fine. I knew a neighbor who used to get all her mulch that way from the park across the street. Never heard of anyone getting in trouble for it.
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the_mason7mo ago
You mentioned they encouraged it, was that a written rule or just something they said?
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jesseblack7mo ago
That point about encouragement is interesting. If the parks department said it was okay, then why would anyone make a fuss? Like @the_mason asked, if it's not a written rule, it might just be common practice. I doubt anyone is getting in trouble for taking some leaves or branches. It's probably one of those things where if you're not causing a problem, no one cares. We should focus on the bigger picture of keeping parks clean.
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