Our Board of Directors

Lance Cayko

Lance is a Longmont resident who led the 11th avenue garden under the guidance of Growing Gardens for over eight years before founding Longmont Community Gardens in 2020. He is originally from North Dakota and grew to love gardening while growing up between a sugar beet farm and a cattle ranch. When he is not gardening Lance is running one of his several entrepreneurial endeavors, spending time with his family, or out chasing wild Colorado Trout. Phone: 303.775.7406

Sam Schloeman

Sam is a Longmont resident who has lived in the area since 2020 after moving from New Jersey. With a deep-rooted love of nature and four years of gardening experience, Sam joined the board to help ensure the financial health of our community spaces. When not balancing the books or tending to her garden plot, Sam is often experimenting with new dinner recipes or backpacking in Colorado’s backcountry. 

Alexis Avery

Alexis grew up in rural Illinois, where she developed a passion for practical self-reliance and a deep love for nature. With interests ranging from big game hunting to baking, fly fishing to dog training, Alexis finds joy in both adventure and nurturing her community through gardening.

Stephen Chang

Stephen is a GIS analyst and landscape ecologist who has lived in Colorado since 2017, and in Longmont since 2020. He has over 8 years of experience in a community garden setting from Madison, Wisconsin to Boulder, and finally as of last year, 2021, in Longmont. In this photo, Stephen is holding his first spring harvest of spinach from his garden plot, shocked and overjoyed at how readily spinach overwinters in our climate. Stephen has been taking a dryland approach to his garden over the last few years, integrating bulk sheet mulch planting styles for water conservation. Stephen also enjoys birdwatching and mushroom hunting in his spare time.

Clara Bertness

Clara is a recently-returned resident of Longmont, having moved back after a decade of living, working, and gardening, in Rhode Island. Her first vegetable garden was a cluster of large containers on a concrete patio in Providence. This somewhat unusual intro to gardening inspired her to complete the URI Master Gardener training, where she learned about urban gardening, integrated pest management, and locally-adapted crops. She loves bugs, even the ones she has to pick off her plants. Clara and her wife, Cal, are thrilled to finally be able to grow vegetables in real soil at Longmont Community Gardens.