SEED MONEY PROJECTS

 

2026 SEED MONEY PROJECTS

In this, our eighth year, we are supporting thirteen projects in SW Wisconsin. We thank the Sinsinawa Dominicans, Wisconsin Farmers Union, Don and Nancy Tubesing, and our individual donors, for funding our Seed Money Initiative. 

        

 

Descriptions of this year’s projects in Southwestern Wisconsin and those from last year are listed in the first column. Descriptions of the 2023 and 2024 projects in Southeastern Wisconsin are listed in the second column.

 

2026 SOUTHWESTERN WISCONSIN PROJECTS

Our goal is to help build vibrant rural communities in Southwest Wisconsin with a focus on local foods, sustainable farming, and food security.

2026 Food and Faith Summit

Despite differences in theological and spiritual imperatives, the mandate for compassion towards those in need—especially the hungry—is deeply ingrained across belief systems. REAP Food Group is organizing faith communities to support the comprehensive development and implementation of a food system for Dane County that can ensure that equitable power and inclusive voices shape access to good food. This organization is centered in the Dane County Food Action Plan, a community-centered initiative developing a comprehensive strategy for our regional food system through collaborative, inclusive processes that ensure all stakeholder voices are heard and integrated. The Second Food and Faith Summit will gather religious leaders for multi-faith networking and strategic brainstorming about food insecurity in Dane County. Seed Money funds will support the hosting of the event and provide inclusive support like translation services, meals and childcare providers for participants. The fall event will be free and open to everyone.

Community Work-Share CSA Program on Community Farm

This project aims to improve accessibility towards community participation in the work of tending the land at the Little Platte Catholic Worker Farm. After completing a successful first growing season, LPCWF has spent time reflecting on how to expand volunteer opportunities and “get more people out here”. An obstacle encountered in leading community work days is finding appropriate tasks that are accessible to participants of all backgrounds, experience levels, and physical abilities. Funds for this project will go towards purchasing a suite of approachable, functional hand tools that will be used by volunteers, future interns, and work-share CSA members and used in weeding tasks and garden bed preparation tasks. Little Platte envisions being a place where anyone can come, receive nourishment, and participate in meaningful work. The addition of easy-to-use, easy-to-teach hand tools will greatly expand the capabilities in hosting volunteer groups. This project is an important bridge in helping the community “get their hands dirty” and learn more about their local food systems.

Crawford Farmers Market Revitalization and Local Food Access

Crawford County Farmers Markets Grow strives to revitalize the Crawford County farmers markets and address the county’s limited access to fresh, local foods for local eaters. Currently, the markets are too small to attract professional growers, underutilized by residents, and insufficiently robust to draw tourist traffic—resulting in lost economic opportunity and reduced availability of healthy, local food. To address this, they will produce an aggregation pilot that builds partnerships with small-scale community growers through networks like the Crawford County Master Gardeners, Vernon-Crawford Farmers Union and Community Gardens. Aggregated produce will be sold by CCFMG as a vendor at one or more Crawford County markets (Prairie Du Chien, Gays Mills, Soldiers Grove). Proceeds from sales will be reinvested into the project and market operations, along with donation of excess produce post-markets to the local food pantries. CCFMG will also support any growers interested in operating their own booth (rather than donating to the aggregation pool). Expected results include increased availability of fresh, local food, development of a local market for growers, gardeners and food entrepreneurs, stronger community engagement with the markets, and a foundation for longer-term market growth.

Expanded Cold Storage at Forward Garden

The Madison Area Food Pantry Gardens (MAFPG) has been supporting the emergency food system in Dane County by growing and gleaning local produce since 2001. To address the increased demand for food in Dane County, MAFPG intends to build more cold storage space at  Forward Garden to serve as an aggregation point for produce that is both grown by community members and MAFPG gardens and gleaned from local farms. This will allow them to achieve more equitable distribution of fresh produce throughout the local emergency food system and enhance the quality of produce available to their pantry partners. Having energy- efficient storage space will allow them to hold gaylords at Forward Garden and distribute produce in smaller quantities to all the outlets that are served on a weekly basis. To accommodate the pantries they serve, while acknowledging their own storage, refrigeration, and/ or staffing limitations, MAFPG must have adequate on-site produce storage capacity to optimize equitable distribution logistics. Goals for this project are to increase food safety storage practices, prolong produce storage life, and become a more adaptable partner for pantries to work with. Through these improvements, higher quality and more desirable produce will reach even more pantry users.

Field to Frock Festival

Field to Frock festival is presented by Midwest Linen Revival, which is working to establish flax for fiber as an agricultural crop in the Midwest. The goals of the second Field to Frock festival are to create opportunities for community education and engagement while building collective energy and spark cultural change in our relationship with our clothing - and the people and places who have grown and sewn our clothes - with an emphasis on our region's agricultural and manufacturing textile potential for linen. This festival is one piece of shifting Midwestern culture towards renewed regional natural fiber textile systems. More education is needed, for producers & consumers. By creating and educating the public about natural textile alternatives,
Field to Frock events create opportunities for rural and urban relationship-building and foster collective action toward shared goals of land stewardship - through sustainable agriculture and by lessening the harm done to our water and land by current petroleum-plastic heavy textiles. 

Golden Roost Community Farm Stop Initiative

Golden Roost Brunch & Bakery, working in partnership with the Southern Wisconsin Meat Cooperative, DBA Meatsmith Co-op, is creating a community farm stop and local food hub in Mt. Horeb, Wisconsin. Farmers in the region often lack consistent, fair places to sell their products, while rural communities have limited access to locally grown, ethically produced food. This project brings those needs together by creating a shared space where local meats and vegetables are sold alongside a values-driven restaurant, helping reconnect people to the land and the farmers who care for it. Grant funding will be used to support the behind-the-scenes work that makes this possible—coordinating with producers, creating clear and welcoming signage that shares their stories, and engaging the community in conversations about food, faith, and stewardship. The result will be stronger sales for local farmers, deeper community understanding of where food comes from, and a practical, replicable model for strengthening rural food systems.

Growing Hope for Women to Thrive

EXPO of Wisconsin’s S.A.F.E. (Sisterhood Alliance for Freedom & Equality) House supports women returning from incarceration as they rebuild stability, health, and hope. Women leaving prison often face significant barriers to food security and nutrition knowledge. These challenges are compounded by the prison food environment, which relies heavily on ultra-processed foods and provides little opportunity for individuals to learn healthy meal preparation or food cultivation skills. S.A.F.E. residents collectively maintain an on-site garden that produces fresh herbs and vegetables for use in shared meals. The garden serves practical and therapeutic purposes: it increases access to fresh, healthy food while offering a structured, restorative activity that promotes patience, responsibility, and self-worth. Seed Money funds will be used to purchase seeds, plant starts, soil, compost, updated gardening tools and more. This investment will allow an increase in the amount of fresh produce incorporated into weekly meals, deepen residents’ knowledge of basic food production, and strengthen a core component of S.A.F.E.’s healing-centered reentry model. By supporting this project, the grant will advance healthy eating, local food cultivation, and the reconnection of justice-impacted women to land, nourishment, and community—key foundations for long-term stability and thriving after incarceration.

Hubbard Hills Rural Legacy Project

Hubbard Hills is a 41-acre Hubbard family property on the south edge of Viroqua that features a working grazing/hay production farm and a shared public use, natural surface trail system throughout 22 acres of the forest and meadow areas. The Hubbard Hills Rural Legacy Project is planning a new rural development/generational land transfer project that would create a unique model for long-term, community-supported land protection, while maintaining private ownership. This model would preserve agricultural productivity and ecosystem conservation by fostering cooperation among landowners to sustain regenerative farming practices, and formalize stewardship of the property’s land, water, wildlife resources, and recreational trails through local partner organizations supported by community funding. This project will establish a framework for long-term land protection that enables the next Hubbard generation to assume leadership, clarifies operating roles for conservation resource managing organizations, and defines meaningful ways for community supporters to contribute. The project will result in an innovative, community-supported approach to stewardship, management, and generational land transfer that responds to the family’s and community’s shared goal of protecting Hubbard Hills’ agricultural, environmental, and recreational resources for the long term.

Old Sauk Garden Food Scrap Collection

The Old Sauk Community Garden plans to improve their composting process and increase awareness of the benefits of the process. They will be a beta site for food scrap and garden waste collection. Community gardens serve as an excellent environment to raise awareness of the importance of keeping food out of landfills. Last year, Dane County Waste & Recycling provided 6 collection bins to the garden. Food scraps and yard waste were collected and sent to Purple Cow in exchange for rich compost for the garden. Community Garden plans to continue to engage gardeners and neighborhood members by also providing educational sessions on the importance of diverting food waste into landfills. The project will involve community and food pantry gardeners as well as church members. There are presently 52 households gardening at Old Sauk gardens. In 2025, more than 50 households participated in the project. Purple Cow is planning an educational event in the spring of 2026 with Dane County W&R. They will bring their “Trash Lab” which is an interactive venue aimed at educating children on the importance of composting. Composting food scraps and garden waste will continue to be an important environmental issue. Who best to learn about it but the children? Funds will be used to collect food scraps and provide educational opportunities for the neighbors and gardeners.

Our Community Garden of Green County 2026 Planting

Our Community Garden of Green County started with three passionate Green County community members committed to changing the landscape of local, fresh food availability to our community as well as the hope to influence and teach current and future generations how to grow, nourish, harvest, and prepare local produce. Our Community Garden of Green County has been in operation for one year, starting its mission in 2025. In the first year, they were able to obtain donations of plants and seeds from local FFA groups, local farms (i.e. Green Haven Gardens in Brooklyn, WI; Mythic Farm in Mount Horeb, WI; and Sunflower Hill Farm in New Glarus, WI) as well as community members. Moving forward, they would like to develop a more intentional strategy be determining what works best for the garden and the community and purchasing specific seeds that address those needs. The funds from the Food, Faith, and Farming Network would allow the community garden to select seeds that thrive in the garden and meet the needs of the community.

Teaching Land Regeneration in a Living Classroom

This project seeks to restore and increase land biodiversity and to educate others in organic and regenerative farming practices. A portion of the land has already been transformed from conventional corn fields into a thriving small forest ecosystem that now supports 37 species of trees, along with berries and other food-producing plants which are sold to restaurants. More work is required on another section of the land which still shows evidence of historically poor farming practices, including erosion, invasive species pressure, and degraded soils. The plan is to continue removing invasive species, transplant volunteer native cedar trees along the fence line for wind protection and road noise reduction, develop keyline swales for water retention to curb erosion, and plant perennial tree crops on the swales. For many years, Maggie’s Farm has hosted and worked side-by-side with farm interns through WWOOF (Worldwide Opportunities on Organic Farms), providing immersive, hands-on education in sustainable agriculture, land stewardship, and regenerative practices. Interns live, eat, and work on the farm, learning how to grow, sell and preserve food, how to improve wildlife habitat, soil systems, and, with this new project, watershed capture and erosion control. This project helps integrate ecological restoration, food production, and education into a living model of regenerative land use.

Urban Triage Agriculture Intern

Urban Triage has advanced food security in Madison since 2020 through community-based agriculture and food access programs. To date, they have distributed over 10,000 pounds of fresh produce to households experiencing food insecurity and trained more than 250 youth and adults in organic gardening and small-scale food production. Working from one acre of certified organic land at the Farley Center, they are providing fresh, locally grown food to families while building practical skills that reduce reliance on emergency food systems and strengthen local food networks. Their agricultural training for young people and families aims to address longstanding racial disparities in farming and land access. With support from the Food Faith and Farming Network, Urban Triage will launch a paid 10-week agriculture internship that provides hands-on experience on our vegetable farm and community garden sites. The intern will also receive weekly access to fresh produce to take home, a certificate of completion, and a letter of recommendation, with an opportunity for continued seasonal employment on Urban Triage farms. This project will result in one trained emerging grower with practical agricultural skills, increased understanding of local food systems, and hands-on experience in environmental stewardship—while also strengthening community access to fresh, locally produced food.

Wisconsin Women in Conservation

Wisconsin Women in Conservation (WiWiC), initiated in 2020, has built a strong network of women who learn from each other in a peer-led model. According to the USDA NASS Census, there are now 1.2 million female farmers, accounting for 36.3% of all U.S. producers. This growing demographic represents a tremendous opportunity for conservation gains to be made, as women have been underserved by USDA farm programs and educational outreach on conservation. WiWiC has a strong history of bringing women mentors to guide other women in a peer-to-peer learning model, through women-only events that provide a safe space to question and learn. While there is evidence the WiWiC model is effective, this approach no longer meets the objectives of the federal government and funding was cut. WiWiC will conduct at least two Field Day events in SW Wisconsin in 2026. Each on-farm Field Day will provide an opportunity to network, learn, and observe conservation practices on the ground for at least 60 women. These events, and the state-wide WiWiC peer network, empower women to implement practices that protect, conserve and restore land and water for future generations. WiWiC staff will also carry out a Regional Needs Assessment to learn what women committed to conservation need to implement more, and to understand their most pressing topics of interest.

2025 SOUTHWESTERN WISCONSIN PROJECTS

Our goal is to help build vibrant rural communities in Southwest Wisconsin with a focus on local foods, sustainable farming, and food security.

Driftless Curiosity Learning Center

Since its inception in 2021, Driftless Curiosity (DC) has been working hard to build community around organic farming, local food systems, healthy outdoor activities and meaningful connection with nature, culture, art and wellness. In 2025, the board of directors for DC, a 501c3 nonprofit organization, gave the green light for construction of a building to house DC’s numerous classes and events. Utilizing existing donated materials, as well as purchased building materials, DC’s volunteer crew will build a 32’x 36’ Clearspan building. This building will provide space for a range of sustainable farming topics, including making maple syrup, regenerative no-till gardening, raising sheep and goats, flower farming, beekeeping, permaculture, elderberry growing, supporting beneficial birds on farms and land conservation. https://driftlesscuriosity.org/

Fields of Sinsinawa

A new farmer-led learning center based in southwest Wisconsin, Fields of Sinsinawa seeks to inspire the informed adoption of holistic soil care practices through collaborative learning, field-scale demonstrations, and meaningful community connections. We believe that more resilient farming systems ensure consistent and healthy food production and a healthier planet.  
 
For our Building Healthy Soil Field Demonstrations program, Fields of Sinsinawa is hosting a series of field and/or classroom events in 2025. These events will convene farmers and other soil caretakers to learn about the importance of maintaining living roots in the soil, diversifying crop rotations, reducing tillage, protecting the soil surface, integrating livestock to boost soil organic matter and microbial life, and more. The Seed Money will be used to help cover the costs associated with hosting and promoting the events. https://fieldsofsinsinawa.org/projects-events/.
 

Flax Fiber Seed Selection Initiative

Midwest Linen Revival is working to establish each of the elements for a flax to linen textile system in our bioregion. Starting where it always starts, with the seed, our project supported by the Food Faith and Farming grant forwards our previous efforts laying the groundwork for developing a Midwest specific climate change resilient high quality fiber flax seed. This is a long-range project! The grant we received from FF&F will be dedicated to tending this year’s seed increase and, importantly, to funding the cost of having select plant fibers from this year’s crop sent to a lab capable of providing us with critical insight on the characteristics and quality of the fiber from them. https://www.wisconsinlinenrevival.org/

Food Is Medicine

Rural families with children who have ADHD face daily stress, challenges, ostracization, and prejudice in their community and schools. Families need to understand that one important tool to support their ADHD kids is knowing that food is medicine. That good, local organic food can help them heal and manage the hyperactive symptoms often brought on by poor nutrition and lack of sleep and exercise. The program will produce a local guide with resources and ways to support their ADHD kids. The guide will be given out in the community and at an expert panel presentation featuring a healthcare professional, nutritionist, organic food grower, and ADHD education IEP/504 expert. After the session, parents will be encouraged to sign up for a monthly Parents with ADHD Kids Support Group hosted by their local faith community. This support group will help parents help each other by sharing their sometimes frustrating journey while navigating how to get affordable healthy local foods, educational resources, IEP/504 guidance, and emotional support. Child advocates and guest speaker experts will be invited to present to the group to continue to build parents’ toolbox of resources, kid-friendly recipes, and information.

Hubbard Hills Heritage Conservation Area

The Hubbard Hills Heritage Conservation Area Project is a community-based initiative started in 2024 in Viroqua, SW WI, to increase climate resilience, agricultural sustainability and biodiversity. Project activities include establishing prairie plantings, restoring savanna habitat, implementing bird friendly haying and grazing techniques, and conducting bird and pollinator surveys on the 42-acre Hubbard family property, that features a trail system open to the public. 
This project is coordinated by local nonprofit, Valley Stewardship Network, hosted by the Hubbard family and will engage a diverse network of community members, farmers, landowners, conservation organizations, volunteers, and natural resource professionals. Public access for education and recreation will be enhanced through hands-on planting opportunities, educational events, and a conservation education walking trail. https://valleystewardshipnetwork.org/

Little Platte Catholic Worker Farm

Little Platte Catholic Worker Farm is a new intentional faith community living on the historical land of the Ho-Chunk and Sac & Fox (Meskwaki) near Platteville, Wisconsin. The farm aims to model the justice and charity of Jesus Christ by offering service and programming around regenerative agriculture, nonviolence, decolonization, spirituality, and land-based craftwork. Seed money will go towards the construction of a timber-framed, commercial glass greenhouse to be used for growing transplants, furthering our mission to eliminate all fossil fuels and plastics from our vegetable production. https://bio.site/littleplatte
 

Mark Trumm Legacy Rotational Grazing Program

Crawford Stewardship Project, alongside Boscobel School, Natural Resource Conservation Service, and Mississippi Valley Conservancy are introducing a new grazing education program to a Southwest Wisconsin school. Boscobel School officially accepted the program plan during the February 2025 school board meeting. The “Mark Trumm Legacy Rotational Grazing Program” will utilize 9 acres of grassland located at the Paul Brandt School Forest. The land will be fenced off according to an NRCS grazing plan and the small herd of cattle will be rotated through the pastures throughout the grazing season, allowing students and staff to get a hands-on look at the positive impacts that well-managed grazing has on the landscape. Seed Money funding will help make this project feasible. https://www.crawfordstewardship.org/.
 

Mind the Gap: Bridging Boundaries and Barriers

Wisconsin Women in Conservation is a program led by Michael Fields Agricultural Institute, and partnered by Renewing the Countryside, Wisconsin Farmers Union and Marbleseed. WiWiC will bring together their second gathering of Conservation Educators from across Wisconsin to Stevens Point on April 25th, 2025 to learn, network and aspire, This year’s special focus is on developing deeper connections between the diverse cultures and stakeholders nurturing Wisconsin’s landscape.
WiWiC serves the women landowners, farmers, non-operators, gardeners, beginning farmers and farm workers of Wisconsin, and conducts many in-person events in the SW counties of Dane, Green, Iowa, Lafayette, Grant, Sauk, Crawford, Vernon, and Richland. Participants will leave the conference with a “reflect and respond” session with the learnings from the conference. The educators from the southwest counties of Wisconsin will benefit from the networking and skill support shared at the conference. https://www.wiwic.org/

Monona Grove Farm to School Program  

The Monona Grove School District’s Farm to School Program is launching their sustainability project, Food. Friends. Farm., in the upcoming school year to ensure students across the district continue to have Farm to School experiences beyond the AmeriCorps WI Farm to School Program. This project will consist of building resources, curriculum, and relationships, both district-wide and in the community, to provide PreK-12 students with hands-on learning opportunities. These hands-on learning opportunities consist of nutrition, local agriculture, and school gardening both in the classroom & cafeteria. It will also provide students with more locally provided school menu items & scratch-made options by enhancing school nutrition staff food handling training & resources. Students will gain exposure to local menu items through monthly cafeteria taste testing. Our goal is that Farm to School activities will strengthen our school community's connection to where food comes from and deepen the appreciation for local agriculture. https://www.mononagrove.org/

Producing and Using Better Corn in Poultry Rations

Time to Get the Word Out in Southwest Wisconsin! After nearly four decades of WI-based corn breeding using classical, not bioengineering methods, Mandaamin Institute (MI) has developed more nutritious and ecosystem-friendly corn varieties. Widespread embrace of MI corn for poultry diets could be a game-changer on a national/global scale. FFFN funds will be used to host lively spring and fall events that will introduce farmers and others to the “why,” the “what” and a bit of the “how” of MI’s high nutrition corn varieties (and the harms of the standard corn varieties) grown for animal feed. At the spring event, packets of MI seed will be gifted to farmers interested in trying out these better varieties, so long as they are comfortable providing feedback about “how things went.” The fall event will be held at a farm where MI corn is growing and will include a field walk. See mandaamin.org for background and lots of information.

Reinvigorating a Monastic Garden

Many visitors to Holy Wisdom Monastery are hungry for both physical and spiritual nourishment; in the typical year their kitchen provides between 15,000 and 20,000 meals. In 2025, they expect to grow more than 1000 pounds of produce, substantially decreasing the amount of non-local produce purchased. Their harvest in 2025 will include leafy greens, root vegetables, squash, tomatoes, peppers and herbs. In this first year of renewed effort in the garden, they will focus on reliable, primarily direct-seeded crops that are regularly featured in the kitchen’s meals.
They will prioritize long-term sustainability of the garden by building soil health and a robust volunteer community. To build soil health, they will add biochar and organic fertilizer to the soil and use regenerative growing practices by nurturing cover crops and crop rotation. To sustain the garden workload, they will engage 50 or more community members and volunteers in garden tasks via semi-weekly garden shifts. Funds provided by this grant will reinvigorate the monastic garden. https://holywisdommonastery.org/

Thoreau College/Driftless Folk School Construction

Since 2006, Thoreau College (TC) and Driftless Folk School (DFS) have operated with the Driftless region as its campus, hosting classes, workshops and community events at family farms, homesteads, rented community centers, artist studios, backyard gardens, living rooms and more. Now, the organizations are ready to put down new roots by establishing a land-based campus on seven acres of donated land just outside the city limits of Viroqua, WI. This campus will enable students to grow food, care for animals, live and study together and support their academic studies with tactile experiences in the world and with soil. Seed Money funds will be used for construction of an energy efficient greenhouse with an adjacent garden and tool shed to support the first phase of infrastructure for the campus and its educational offerings: summer/gap semester programs for college-aged young adults and day/weekend courses in folk arts, craft and homesteading for adults of all ages. https://thoreaucollege.org/

Woollets: An Alternative Soil Amendment

Woollets is a women founded, owned and operated small business located just outside of Argyle, WI. Their mission is to foster resilient food systems, revive the Midwestern wool market, and scale a sustainable alternative to carbon-intensive and synthetic fertilizers through the use of waste wool. Woollets pays Wisconsin shepherds a fair price for raw waste wool and then heat-pelletizes it to create Woollets wool pellets for the farm, home and garden. When added to the soil, Woollets increase resilience in the face of drought by holding up to thirty times their weight in water; they also help aerate the soil while building soil structure. Woollets feed the microbes in soil with a whopping nitrogen boost and the slow release of calcium, magnesium, potassium, iron and sulfur. Using Woollets reduces watering needs by 25% while also increasing crop yields. Seed Money funds will be used to replace the die and rollers in the pelleting machine and increase the production capacity of Woollets, thereby improving soil composition in Wisconsin.  Visit their website here: https://www.woollets.net/

 

2025 Seeds of Hope Celebration:  November 4th

What a hope-filled celebration we had at our Seeds of Hope Celebration on November 4 at Taliesen! Our Seed Money recipients outdid themselves with wonderful slides and presentations. The room was abuzz from the minute people arrived to their final farewells - all reconnecting with friends and eager to connect with new faces. We basked in the energy that comes when surrounded by like-minds, all united by their love of the earth and its people. The occasion was exactly what our logo states “Connecting Community, Land and People”. The Dominican Sisters of Sinsinawa can rejoice that we gave witness to the intent of their mission when they founded Churches’ Center for Land and People in the 1980s.

 

The  2025 Seed Money recipients celebrated their successes with each other at our Seeds of Hope Celebration last November. You can learn more about that and watch the video of the event here.

Short descriptions of the projects we funded from 2019-2024 are available here.

2024 SOUTHEASTERN WISCONSIN PROJECTS

Our goal for Southeastern Wisconsin Seed Money projects is to help build strong rural/urban connections through education and promotion of local foods, sustainable farming practices and efforts to combat food insecurity.

Embedded Agriculture

The mission of Embedded Agriculture is to provide students with the knowledge and skills to lead healthy and sustainable lifestyles through a robust partnership between SDW’s Environmental Education program and Family and Consumer Science program. The program offers hands-on gardening and farming experiences that promote environmental stewardship, while also integrating farm-to-table education into the school curriculum. We are committed to promoting food justice and providing equitable access to fresh, locally-grown produce for all students. Our goal is to inspire a lifelong appreciation for healthy eating habits, sustainable food systems, and community involvement. Read more about SDW's program here.

Emergency Food Program Support

The Journey Disaster Response Team in Kenosha hosts food events in partnership with local organizations in food insecure neighborhoods to hand out boxed food. These events are held several times a month to fill the gap in already existing services. Each guest leaves with approximately 30 pounds of fresh, frozen, and canned goods in addition to household supplies. The events offer the opportunity to provide peer support and foster trusting relationships. The funds received will be used for much needed supplies to maintain and expand their reach. Please visit the Journey Disaster Response Team Website

Feed Milwaukee

Full Circle Healing Farm is committed to addressing food injustice in their community by providing access to healthy food to people of color and those living below the poverty line. They provide opportunities for individuals, school groups, youth, and adults to learn how to grow their own food. Participants experience how to start from seed and take plants to grow in their own locations. Full Circle also donates the food they grow on their farm to local organizations that distribute food to those in need. Funding for compost, seedlings, seeds, and tools will enable them to produce more on their land and share their harvest with their community. Visit them on Facebook and Instagram.

Growing Gardens Together 

The Catholic Ecology Center is thrilled to offer a second season of their Growing Gardens Together Program. Utilizing the Center’s facilities and Clare Gardens Organic Farm on-site, they will teach a series of 3 programs open to the public throughout the 2024 growing season. They will focus on how sustainable growing practices can be applied to personal and local settings. New program topics for this year are Saturday, May 4th Gardening Basics: Prepping and Planting; Saturday, July 6th, The Garden Ecosystem: Working Within the Greater Context; and Saturday, Sept 7th, Composting: Vermicomposting Focus. Open to all ages and experience levels. https://catholicecologycenter.org

Growing Green

Riveredge’s mission is to support conservation through education that awakens curiosity, engages the body, and explores connections to nature for all generations. In 2022, we launched Growing Green as part of our mission to provide education supporting nature-rich lifestyles, promoting regenerative actions in alignment with community needs and the land. Through this series, we host educational programs and service-learning opportunities. These include gardening classes, soil health and composting classes, seasonal herb walks, shiitake mushroom inoculation workshop, and tours of local farms, among others. We welcome our community to learn through earth-minded interactions with native and edible landscapes. https://www.riveredgenaturecenter.org 

Racine Food Waste Composting
Pilot Program

To make Racine a more sustainable community by reducing methane produced by food waste in landfills (25% of the trash), we are initiating a Food Waste Composting Pilot Program. Collaborating with Racine Interfaith Coalition (RIC), North Pointe United Methodist Church and the Racine Dominican Laudato Si’ Action Team, we are working to educate and motivate youth and adults on the value of composting food waste. Households will learn how to separate, collect, and deliver acceptable compostable materials to a common bin, after which Compost Crusader will haul it to Blue Ribbon Organics to be turned into soil-enriching compost. As word spreads, we expect that 18 tons of food waste will be diverted in the first year, that additional drop-off sites will be needed, and that in the long term, 80% of Racine’s 31,000 households will be engaged in food waste composting. https://ricracine.org 

Racine Urban Garden Network Relocation Project

The Racine Urban Garden Network (RUGN) has grown to manage nine community gardens located across the City of Racine.  Two of the gardens located on land owned by the city are being sold or are slated for development. This displaces about 80 gardeners. RUGN will use Food, Faith and Farming Network 2024 Seed Money Grant dollars to expand three of their other gardens so that displaced gardeners can mostly be accommodated via relocation. The relocation project directly addresses the issue of urban food insecurity.  Visit them at www.growwithRUGN.org or on Facebook.

Ravensholme Victory Gardens

Evoking the image of victory gardens as a means of supporting community resilience and food independence, the Ravensholme Victory Gardens will be a community driven gardening operation with a focus on reconnecting people to food and land. Located at Tall Pines Conservancy’s “Ravensholme on the River” property, a 260-acre farm located just minutes from downtown Waukesha, Ravensholme Victory Gardens will serve as a space for bridging the divide between rural and urban communities and connecting people with fresh food and opportunities in agriculture. https://tallpinesconservancy.org/

This Project Is Garbage

Fondy Food and Kohl Farm are community agricultural projects providing land access to Milwaukee-area smallholder subsistence, direct to consumer, and wholesale growers. The projects are operated by Fondy Food and UW-Extension. A consistent problem encountered by many community agriculture projects around the country is the disposal of plastics left in fields by growers. These plastics break down into microplastics which are known hazards for human and environmental health. Hmong people make up a substantial portion of the clientele at each site. Through interpretation services they will be trained to appropriately dispose of plastics and educated on the recalcitrance of plastics on ecosystems. Funding will support dumpster rental and removal, and interpretation services. https://fondymke.org

Veggie Chop Shop

Tikkkun Ha-ir (Hebrew for “Repair the City”) of Milwaukee (THI) is a Jewish social justice organization committed to food justice. THI’s Veggie Chop Shop (VCS) is a community meal program that utilizes gleaned produce to prepare healthy vegetable-based meals for those struggling to access healthy food. The meals are distributed to vulnerable populations as well as Early Childhood Education Centers. The program has steadily grown since its inception 8 years ago. Meals are prepared at All People’s Lutheran Church, a longtime Milwaukee food justice hub that continues to serve people of the Harambee neighborhood, using a multifaith perspective to serve God and the community. As VSC continues to expand they will benefit from funding that will help them hire a summer intern. https://thi-milwaukee.org

Project Funders

We thank an anonymous donor for making it possible for us to support our 2024 projects in Southeastern Wisconsin.

2023 SOUTHEASTERN WISCONSIN PROJECTS

Farm To Classroom –
Waukesha School District

The School District of Waukesha's Environmental Education Program, in partnership with our Family and Consumer Science culinary classes, will be purchasing sustainable indoor garden systems for all three high schools; providing direct coaching support for the classroom teachers on sustainable growing and gardening; and building community connections with other local farms, master gardeners, and restaurants. The ultimate goal is that this is not only ecologically sustainable, but financially sustainable for our schools and community.  

Foodright Learning Gardens

FoodRight is building edible gardens at the youth-based organization, New Beginnings Are Possible (NBAP). Working with NBAP’s summer camp program, the gardens will serve as the site for fun, hands-on garden-based nutrition education programming, addressing the lack of access to fresh foods for low-income youth in Milwaukee while fostering appreciation for the land and the work of farmers. The gardens will also serve as a test site for developing viable school gardens. https://www.foodright.org

Growing Gardens Together at Catholic
Ecology Center

Utilizing the Catholic Ecology Center facilities and Clare Gardens Organic Farm on-site, we will teach a series of 3 programs open to the public throughout the 2023 growing/harvest season. We will focus on sustainable growing practices and how to do this in your personal and local settings. This includes how to farm organically at any scale and how to compost food waste. The programs will take place on Saturday May 6, Saturday, July 22 and Saturday Sept 9, capitalizing on the key times for preparing/planting, maintaining/harvesting and harvesting/Fall prep. Open to all ages and experience levels. https://catholicecologycenter.org

Growing Green,
Riveredge Nature Center

Riveredge’s mission is to support conservation through education that awakens curiosity, engages the body, and explores connections to nature for all generations. In 2022, we launched Growing Green as part of our mission to provide education supporting nature-rich lifestyles, promoting regenerative actions in alignment with community needs and the land. Through this series, we host educational programs and service-learning opportunities. These include native landscape design classes, soil health and composting classes, seasonal herb walks, shiitake mushroom inoculation workshop, and tours of local farms, among others. We welcome our community to learn through earth-minded interactions with native and edible landscapes. https://www.riveredgenaturecenter.org

Growing Green Gardens Network

Growing Green Gardens Network is building upon our 2022 project, Let’s Get Growing. We will expand access to urban farmers and work to build relationships between rural producers and Milwaukee communities facing food insecurities. In our teaching gardens, youth and adults participate in hands-on farming/gardening and conservation education. They will be able to grow healthy foods of cultural relevance with the assistance of skilled gardeners. With our community partners, Alice’s Garden Urban Farm, Fondy Food Market, UW Extension, Five Star Educational Training Center and Lynn Precious Moments Childcare, GGGN will expand our outdoor classrooms in Milwaukee County from 1 to 3. Our partner, Five Star Community Resource Center, has graciously provided GGGN with an indoor classroom, in addition to outdoor garden space where food will be grown for community donation. Neema Therapy has partnered with us offering Art Therapy in the garden. We are looking forward to what the 2023 growing season delivers in Milwaukee. Healthy food, healthy bodies, healthy minds, healthy land, and healthy relationships are ahead. Let’s Get Growing! Growinggreengarderns.inc@gmail.com 

Nourish Farms
Good Food Club at
Sheboygan Falls
Elementary School

Nourish Farm's Good Food Club program, in partnership with the Sheboygan Falls School District, offers experiential education to students that weaves together important life skills and core standards of education such as math, science, biology, literacy, social studies, and health with the simple act of eating. Specifically, Good Food Club will teach kids how to plant, harvest, cook, and eat whole foods. Through Good Food Club students, parents, and teachers alike receive education regarding local food systems and producers and the benefits of eating locally grown, seasonal food. https://nourishfarms.org/farm-to-school

Racine Area Farm Corps at 
the Eco-Justice Center

The Eco-Justice Center is an environmental education center and organic farm in northern Racine County. Eco-J’s Farm Corps Program currently donates at least 30% of the yearly harvest to the North Side Food Pantry and will work to form relationships with additional local organizations. In addition to donating to new partners, the program seeks to help food insecurity through the following: growing food, educating interns regarding food insecurity, decreasing our food waste, and educating consumers about the donated produce. https://ecojusticecenter.org/

Reaching Urban Consumers
through the REKO Ring Model

REKO (pronounced wreak-o) is a Facebook-based pre-ordering system for local products, including farmed produce, meat, and other agricultural goods. The REKO ring will utilize the grant money to encourage growth and consumer participation in the group. First, we will create a streamlined graphic design branding toolkit to communicate with our consumers about deadlines, pick-up details, and to welcome new members. Second, we will also use the money to create a short video animation illustrating how the REKO ring works. This will help new consumers to quickly understand how the group works and jump right into placing an order with our local farmers. Thirdly, we hope to promote the group by awarding prizes to our consumers for their participation in our group during our anniversary month of May. https://www.foodforvictory.com/reko-ring

Tall Pines Conservancy and Farmers
for Lake Country Choas Garden  

First started in 2020 as a collaboration between Tall Pines Conservancy (TPC) and Farmers for Lake Country (FFLC), the Chaos Garden program has connected community members with local area farmland and farmers with a “free pick” garden plot. Short-season vegetable crops are sown into a field following wheat harvest in August and include spinach, kale, bush beans, peas, lettuce and bok choy, as well as edible flowers. In keeping with the true spirit of “chaos gardening,” watering is performed by Mother Nature and whatever nature supports as its bounty is free for anyone to harvest. Thanks to generous support from the Food, Faith and Farming Network, the Chaos Garden will expand its size and outreach for 2023, providing fresh, healthy, and free food to the greater community. For updates and more information please visit https://tallpinesconservancy.org  or https://farmersforlakecountry.org 

Youth-Tended “Herbin” Garden
at Tricklebee Café

Tricklebee Café is a pay-what-you-can community cafe in Milwaukee that offers healthy meals, food service training, and spiritual nourishment. This summer, we will hire inner city youth from our neighborhood to do "herbin" gardening. We'll fill our newly constructed garden bed and bus stop garden planter with soil, and then plant herbs from seed. The youth will then water, weed, and harvest the gardens throughout the growing season. In addition to harvesting the herbs to dry and use in our ever-changing cafe recipes, we will also give out organic seed packets to neighbors so they can grow their own herbs and vegetables. http://tricklebeecafe.org/

Bader Philanthropies, Inc

We thank Bader Philanthropies, Inc for their support of these projects and the Listening Sessions that preceded them.