We’re looking ahead to 2019, which will feature our first year of Community Choice SEED grant recipients. Our selection process for our 12 yearly SEED recipients is entirely staff-led, with the majority of cashiers serving on the committee. Show your support to our front-end staff by rounding up at the register throughout the year!
Here are our 2019 SEED grant recipients and the months during which they’ll receive funds. There will be one Community Choice recipient each quarter.
January: Mental Health Resources (Community Choice)
Mental Health Resources’ Seward Community Support Program (“CSP”) drop-in center on Minnehaha Avenue provides healthy snacks, meals, and health mentoring for 400 neighbors who are recovering from serious mental illness so they can thrive physically and mentally.
February: Cultural Wellness Center
The Dreamland Co-Café, a project of the Cultural Wellness Center, will create a blend of Culinary Heritage, self-love, and business incubation for African American food entrepreneurs in a cooperative and supportive environment that will allow us to reconnect, rediscover and reinvent the culinary traditions of our past.
Come sit around the “farm table” at the Seward Co-op Creamery Café and learn more about the Cultural Wellness Center 6-8 p.m. Feb. 19. Enjoy a meal designed by Creamery Café staff and inspired by this work, with ingredients sourced from Community Foods producers. Tickets are limited and may be purchased via Eventbrite.
March: Soup for You Café
Soup for You provides free, healthy, organic meals to all members of our community, Monday through Friday from 11 a.m.–1 p.m. We build community one bowl at a time.
April: Sexual Violence Center (Community Choice)
Sexual Violence Center, a nonprofit rape crisis center in Minneapolis, provides free support services to individuals impacted by sexual violence in Hennepin, Scott, and Carver counties. Funds from this program will help us build a gender-neutral bathroom in our office.
May: Appetite For Change
Appetite For Change advocates for food justice and economic development in North Minneapolis, with SEED funds supporting our Youth Training and Opportunity Program and our policy and advocacy work through Northside Fresh Coalition.
June: Urban Strategies, Inc./Green Garden Bakery (Community Choice)
Green Garden Bakery youth, supported by the nonprofit Urban Strategies, Inc., grow vegetables in their urban garden, bake them into healthy vegetable-based desserts (vegan and gluten-free), and market them using sustainable practices. We sell the desserts for “pay-what-you-want” and donate our
proceeds back into our community.
July: Isuroon
Isuroon is dedicated to building support for Somali women and girls social connectedness and self-sufficiency so that they can lead healthier, more productive lives in Minnesota and globally. SEED funding will be used in support of a culturally-specific food shelf that provides support for social connectedness, dignified service and healthy foods, including fresh fruits and vegetables, to any person in need.
August: Southside Services, Inc.
Southside Services supports adults with cognitive and developmental disabilities to become increasingly active, contributing members of their community.
September: Dream of Wild Health
Dream of Wild Health is a Native American-led nonprofit farm that provides leadership programs for Native youth. Dream of Wild Health grows indigenous seeds and foods and supports Native youth in advocating for a healthy community.
October: Village Financial Cooperative
Village is establishing a loan fund to disrupt the predatory financial market; establishing a Black-led credit union, filling the void of accessible and affordable banking; and providing cooperative development for emerging co-ops in North Minneapolis.
November: Sabathani Community Center
Sabathani provides food, clothing and housing to 26,000 neighborhood residents each year in South Minneapolis. We feed the chronically poor, those on disability or chemical dependent individuals and families. Sabathani Community Center has been providing basic
needs services for nearly fifty years.
December: Open Arms of Minnesota (Community Choice)
Open Arms cooks and delivers free meals tailored to meet the nutritional needs of individuals living with life-threatening illnesses. They also serve the children and caretakers of those living with illness, free of charge.