Dear Friends of the Living Earth Center,
It is with great joy and gratitude that I share a significant milestone in Living Earth Center’s story: we have purchased a property that will become our forever home!
Alongside this news, we are publicly launching our Capital Campaign, Growing for the Future: Rooted in Community, to transform this special place into a vibrant regional center for growing, gathering, and learning.
When we learned that Good Counsel Hill, home to our flagship garden, would be sold, we began searching for a permanent place to put down roots. That search led us to 1411 Pohl Road. For more than 50 years, Katy and Dave Wortel cared for this property with love. Formerly known locally as the Pumpkin Farm, its 11 acres in the heart of Mankato include farmland, old-growth woods, restored prairie, wetlands, and a historic 1940s barn. By choosing Living Earth Center over a developer, the Wortels have ensured this land will be protected and shared for generations to come. We are deeply honored to carry their legacy forward.
Growing for the Future
Though we will be sad to eventually leave the Hill, we see this as an amazing opportunity for Living Earth Center to become something that better serves the entire Greater Mankato Area.
Everything we’ve built together on the Hill, through our gardeners, growers, young learners, and neighbors, is ready for more room. At Pohl Road, we envision a regenerative community growing campus unlike anything else in our region: expanded gardens and larger plots, greenhouses for year-round growing, trails through prairie and woods, a children’s garden, a free food forest, a farm stand, and the historic barn alive again with workshops and community events. Because the property sits near student housing, lower-income developments, and a major bus route, it can bring fresh food and green space to everyone.
Most of all, it will be a place of belonging. In a world that can feel so divided, Pohl Road will be common ground, where people of every background come together to create and grow something good.
Thank You to Our Early Champions
This dream is already within reach because of a remarkable group of early supporters who believed in this vision before it was public. Together, they have given approximately $2.5 million toward our $3.45 million goal. To each of you: thank you. Your generosity and faith in this endeavor have made today possible.
Now we invite you to join them by making a donation today!
Your gift will help us:
• Save the historic barn by stabilizing its foundation
• Turn the farmhouse into LEC offices and meeting space
• Prepare the land and relocate the Good Counsel Hill Community Garden and our Emerging Growers’ larger plots
• Complete annexation into the City of Mankato, which is necessary for regular programming to continue
Every gift, of every size, makes a difference and helps build what is to come.
Rooted in Community
This home will be shaped by many hands. In the coming months, we’ll host community forums to hear your ideas and dreams. Watch for dates soon! Beginning in spring 2027, we’ll also post regular volunteer hours for hands-on work at Pohl Road. And please share this news with everyone you know who cares about food, land, and community.
Honoring Where We Began
We’ll remain on the Hill for the next few years as we thoughtfully plan our move. We owe so much to the School Sisters of Notre Dame, who founded Living Earth Center. Their generations of service, their deep care for the earth, and their commitment to education and justice shaped who we are. They planted the seeds of this work on Good Counsel Hill and trusted us with something still growing. We will carry their spirit with us in everything we do at Pohl Road. There, their legacy will join Katy and Dave’s years of stewardship: two legacies, growing together in a new home. We hope you, too, will help shape what comes next.
To explore our vision, plans, and giving opportunities in more detail, click here to visit our website. If you're not already, you can also follow us on social media - through the links at the bottom of this email.
We can’t wait to share this journey with you!
With gratitude and hope,
Laura Marsala Peterson
Executive Director
Living Earth Center
