Master Gardeners recognize volunteers for 2020 work
CONWAY — In addition to Doug Harris’ award as Faulkner County Master Gardener of the Year, other Faulkner County Master Gardeners and their friends in the county have been recognized for their leadership, as well as their partnership with and promotion of Master Gardener activities, during 2020. Other awards include the following: • Stacy Boncheff of Conway was named Faulkner County Master Gardener Rookie of the Year.
“It is a great honor to be recognized as Rookie of the Year in this wonderful organization,” said Boncheff, who is retired from Entergy. “This honor is particularly important, considering that most of my focus was developing technology solutions to cope with the challenges of COVID-19 and keeping the organization’s communication and fundraising opportunities running successfully.”
Boncheff was a member of the 2019 FCMG class.
“I joined the Master Gardeners to become better at maintaining my yard and growing vegetables and flowers,” he said.
Debbie Guthrie, immediate past president of the Faulkner County Master Gardeners, said Boncheff reported volunteering 165.25 hours of service on nine sanctioned projects and 56.5 hours of education.
“Initially, Stacy joined the audiovisual committee and provided meeting support. He also took part in the proposal and implementation of the new technology committee,” Guthrie said.
“After the [Faulkner County Cooperative Extension Service] office closed in midMarch of 2019 due to the pandemic, it was clear that this newly formed committee was necessary to quickly implement some muchneeded solutions. Stacy installed FCMG Zoom for our committees to hold meetings and continue with their work,” she said.
“He patiently taught members how to host a Zoom meeting and sat in on meetings as support,” Guthrie said. “Zoom was also used to provide community outreach programming each month. Participation at these programs grew, and we had 362 attendees for our final 2020 program, far more than we ever had for in-person programming.
“Every Master Gardener program could benefit from having a Stacy.”
• Voegele Tree Service was named Faulkner County Friend of Master Gardeners in the business category.
Guthrie said Doug Harris, 2021 FCMG president, met Tom Voegele when his company was doing work in Doug’s neighborhood.
“When Doug approached Tom, he knew all about our organization and our work across Faulkner County,” Guthrie said. “Tom expressed how much he enjoyed the beauty of every Master Gardener project. Tom told Doug, ‘If Master Gardeners can use some of the mulch, I will provide it.’”
To date, Voegele Tree Service has donated approximately eight loads of mulch with a market value of $2,000. Guthrie said this donated mulch impacted many of the Master Gardeners’ projects, including the Faulkner County Cooperative Extension Service Office project and the Friends of the Library dirt projects, as well as the Faulkner County Museum and Courthouse grounds projects.
Guthrie said Voegele started his treecutting business in 1987 as a part-time job while in college. He continued with this part-time business for many years, as he was primarily an educator for both the Little Rock and Conway school districts. He has been a retired educator for six years. In addition to donations to Master Gardener dirt projects, Voegele has also donated mulch to many school gardens in the Conway School District in recent years.
The Faulkner County Master Gardeners have more than 200 members working on 40 projects, plus educational events, for the community. In 2020, volunteers worked at several projects, including five Faulkner County Library branches (Conway, Greenbrier, Mayflower, Twin Groves and Vilonia), the Legacy Gardens, the Teaching Garden, the Faulkner County Courthouse, the Faulkner County Museum and the Faulkner County Cooperative Extension Service.
For more information, call the Extension Service Office at (501) 329-8344 or visit the Faulkner County Master Gardeners Facebook page.