The United Way of Greater Milwaukee recently awarded urgent need grants to The Fondy Food Center and the Harry & Rose Samson Family Jewish Community Center. Each grant totaled $25,000 and will be taken out of the 2010/2011 Urgent Need fund.
Fondy Farmers Market offers an opportunity for people to use food stamps to purchase affordably priced, fresh, locally-grown food directly from small-scale farmers during the growing season. The requested funds will be applied to a new initiative for 2010: the Fondy WIC Match Program, which will allow the program to provide a one-to-one match to families bearing free market produce vouchers from the federal WIC program, effectively doubling their purchasing power. The funds will also help enhance two existing programs at the market: the SNAP Food Stamp Redemption and the Taste the Season Cooking Demonstration programs.
The Jewish Community Pantry was destroyed in the July 2010 flood. Jewish Community Center has identified a new site for the pantry and has retained an architect who has developed a plan that creates a space that meets code and will serve JCC clients efficiently and respectfully. JCC is currently in negotiations with the property owner and will work with the City of Milwaukee to enable them to reopen in December. The additional $25,000 emergency grant from United Way will help build out the space and bring it up to code.
