The three founding directors of Earth Matter (Marisa DeDominicis, Kendall Morrison and Charlie Bayrer) have many years of experience in urban community greening. They combined efforts in the Brooklyn-Queens Land Trust (BQLT) healthy soils initiative in 2009 to create Earth Matter.

Earth Matter facilitates resource recovery and healthy soils by promoting composting of organic waste into a healthy soil amendment. Earth Matter NY is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that seeks to reduce the organic waste misdirected into the garbage stream by encouraging neighbor participation and leadership in composting.

Earth Matter evaluated soil health in 34 community gardens and promoted remediation by organic amendment. Concurrently, it was involved in organizing the Fort Greene Compost Project (2005-present), a community based, volunteer-led effort to capture residential food waste for composting in local community gardens. 
 

Earth Matter NY Inc. is dedicated to advancing the art, science, and application of composting in and around New York City. Earth Matter NY accepts and processes food waste generated by NYC residents, including through a partnership with DSNY’s NYC Compost Project. Through a partnership with The Trust for Governors Island, we process all of the landscape waste and food waste generated by island partners and visitors of Governors Island.
 

Earth Matter includes the following projects:
 

• NYC Compost Project (hosted by Earth Matter)

• Zero Waste Island Initiative

• The Lavender Field

• Soil Start Farm
  
  Marisa DeDominicis is the Manager of the Soil Start Farm and leads the 10-week Earth Matter Compost and Farm Apprenticeship Program each spring and fall since 2019. This Flip Book documents the 2022 fall program in which I was an apprentice. Marisa is co-author of Chicken Composting on Governors Island -- a fun fact-packed booklet.