Community Garden Leaders Day

Kelly Wood is a hands-on community builder who likes to roll up her sleeves and get dirty. As a co-founder of the San Carlos Community Garden (SCCG) and serving as chair of its Board of Directors since 2024, Kelly serves alongside a dedicated team to lead the all-volunteer run joint-use non-profit community garden. Kelly brings a unique blend of leadership experience in marketing, customer engagement and strategic partnerships to the garden – strengthening SCCG’s visibility, deepening community relationships, and supporting the volunteer-powered systems that keep the garden growing—from outreach and storytelling to collaboration-building and program planning.

Katharine Leon is a Master Composter and Director of Operations for Living Coast Discovery Center, located on the San Diego Bay National Wildlife Refuge in Chula Vista. She and other staff, volunteers, wildlife ambassadors, and partners have been inspiring San Diegans to connect with and care for our coastal environment through community education for over 30 years. Katharine is an integral part of the LCDC composting course, using hands-on demonstrations and lectures to train on the art and science of composting.

Leah Taylor is the UC Master Gardener Program Coordinator in San Diego County. During her college years, she worked at the County Department of Agriculture, Weights, and Measures in the Entomology lab identifying invasive insect species, and participated in the creation of new San Diego beekeeping ordinances. After graduating college with a degree in Horticultural Science, she conducted research on pollinators and honey bees at UC Davis, as well as taught community education courses on gardening for health and wellness. In 2018, she became a Master Beekeeper and in 2022, Master Food Preserver. She is also runs the Master Food Preserver Program and Healthy Garden Healthy Home programs in San Diego County. Leah is a passionate gardener, mother of two, and enjoys spending as much time talking about insects as possible.

Barbara McFadden is a lifelong gardener whose passion for growing food and flowers has shaped both her home and her community. A graduate of the Master Gardener program, Class of 1994, Barbara has continually shared her knowledge and enthusiasm with others. She has served on the Board of Directors for the Escondido Community Garden since 1995, where she has been especially involved in supporting and nurturing the children’s garden program. Beginning in 1997, Barbara and her sister, Brenda, operated Sisters Specialty Gardens for ten years. Together, they designed, installed, and maintained high-end vegetable, flower, and landscape gardens for homes throughout North San Diego County. Several of their gardens were featured in Sunset magazine articles. In addition to her work at the community garden, Barbara is a member of the Escondido Fish and Game Rose Care Team and contributes her time to the vegetable garden at New Life Church. Through leadership, mentorship, and service, she continues to cultivate both gardens and community connections.

Beth Mercurio has been gardening since she was a little girl planting in her backyard with her dad. She taught kindergarten for 26 years and loved growing flowers and veggies with her students. Beth has managed the Escondido Community Garden for 31 years. The garden has 115 plots and is enjoyed by people of all ages and is ethnically diverse with close to a dozen different native languages spoken. Beth is proud of the diversity in the garden which also includes several special needs groups that visit on a regular basis.

Roy Wilburn (Farmer Roy) was a commercial grower in Baja for 20 years growing tomatoes, strawberries, peppers and other row crops. He moved on to become an organic culinary herb grower in Oceanside for 3 years. He most recently was the Director of Horticulture at Poway Gardens, a memory care community, for over 15 years where he oversaw their organic gardens and orchards that produced over 25,000 lbs of produce annually. He also ran and oversaw their landscaping, their Intergenerational Garden Club, the food bank gardens, and their Horticultural Therapy program that enriched the lives of their residents. Even though he is now retired, he still makes time to talk about how to grow food with many garden clubs, nurseries, and other interested groups in San Diego County.

Amy has served as the Associate Director for Bayside Community Center's Environmental Learning Center since 2013 and active in the Linda Vista Community since 2008. She holds a B.S. in Business Management from Michigan State University and is a certified horticultural therapist. Amy’s expertise in program design, garden design, horticultural therapy, and urban agriculture has advanced Bayside’s environmental education and therapeutic gardening work for youth, seniors, and individuals with disabilities. Amy also spent the last 10 years working part time as a Garden Specialist for CalFresh Healthy Living, a federally-funded SNAP program supporting the growth of numerous community and school gardens. Amy was awarded The City of San Diego's "Woman of Distinction, District 7 " in 2024, and Berry Good Foundations " Local Food Leader" in 2024 for her leadership in re-establishing Linda Vista Community Garden in The Linda Vista Community Park.

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