Sheryll Durrant
Resident Garden Manager at Kelly Street Garden +
Food and Nutrition Coordinator for New Roots Community Farm
Sheryll Durrant is an urban farmer, educator, and food justice advocate. She has been the Resident Garden Manager at Kelly Street Garden since 2016, and is the Food and Nutrition Coordinator for New Roots Community Farm, managed by International Rescue Committee (IRC). Her work has included developing community-based urban agriculture projects, providing expertise and technical assistance for gardens within supportive housing developments
Sheryll currently serves as Board President for Just Food and is the USDA Farm Service Agency (FSA) Urban County Committee Chairperson for NYC. She has led workshops and spoken on issues related to urban agriculture for many key organizations, and was part of the 2019-2020 HEAL School of Political Leadership.
As a former Design Trust fellow for the Farming Concrete project, she is now responsible for communications and outreach for the data collection platform that helps urban farmers and gardeners measure their impact. Previously, Sheryll spent over 20 years in corporate and institutional marketing.
Kelly Street Garden’s focus is to use food as the entry point to healing a community. The garden functions as a vehicle for addressing generational trauma which has caused many health disparities resulting from systemic racism. Through a multi-tiered programming structure they bring art, nutrition, herbal medicine and community engagement to the members of their community.
Relevant Media Coverage
Vital Places of Refuge in the Bronx, Community Gardens Gain Recognition (NY Times article)
Community Gardener Sheryll Durrant Is Reconnecting with the Land and Herself (Community spotlight)
HOW TWO COOP MEMBERS SEEDED A BRONX COMMUNITY GARDEN (The Linewaiters’ Gazette article)
A Crown Jewel in the Bronx (Morgan Stanley feature)
HOW A GARDEN IN THE SOUTH BRONX TRANSFORMS COMMUNITIES (Design Trust feature)
How Sheryll Durrant, Urban Farmer, Spends Her Sundays (NY Times article)
The Concrete Farmer (NRDC feature)
Learn About & Support Kelly Street Farm
“Our connection to the land is about reclaiming space, repairing something, building a thread, weaving a fabric, and coming together as a South Bronx community. We seek to bring the bounty of the land to everyone. We seek to find abundance in a place of scarcity because, in fact, there is no scarcity, just greed. And as I think about my relationship to the planet, I am not interested in owning land—I am interested in stewardship and solidarity.”
Photo credit: Rabeea Barakat, International Rescue Committee
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