Kitchen would improve food access, create jobs
The Milwaukee Center for Independence, an affiliate of the Centers for Independence, plans to develop a fifth commercial production kitchen at 27th and Wells as part of the Near West Side Partner’s Concordia 27 initiative.  
As a crucial component of Concordia 27, this kitchen will increase access to fresh, healthy meals for youth in economically disinvested neighborhoods and will be essential to serve additional lower-income early education centers and K-12 schools. This project will also create new jobs, increase culinary training, serve as an incubator kitchen to help launch neighborhood food entrepreneurs, and provide space as a demonstration kitchen to support health and wellness classes. 
MCFI has reached its production capacity and cannot accommodate the increased demand from additional schools without adding a fifth
production kitchen.
Please support MCFI’s commercial production kitchen at the Concordia 27 Near West Side. Help make this essential project for children and adults in the community a reality!

For more information, please contact:
Heidi Chada, VP Commercial & Employment Services
Or
Kasey Chard, Associate Director of Development & Donor Engagement.
Clients enjoying gift of hydroponics system
Who doesn’t love fresh food straight from a garden?
Our day program clients sure do.
The family of one of the program participants made a generous donation so that it could purchase a hydroponics system for the department. 
“Our participants love growing and eating their own food,” said Susan Winans, who oversees our horticulture programming. (The client at right is planting seedlings into the system).
“We do this every summer at our Community Garden plot,” Susan said. “I’ve been interested in getting a hydroponics system for a while because it allows us to grow food year-round, not just in the summer. Getting a financial donation large enough to cover the purchase of the system has made it possible.”
Hydroponics is a way of growing plants without using soil. Instead of getting nutrients from soil, plants get the nutrients needed from the water that is constantly pumped through the system. The participants add other necessary nutrients to the water. 
Because the nutrient and pH levels, and the light source, remain consistent, this is considered an efficient way to grow food.
Currently, the participants in the horticulture therapy program are growing 144 heads of lettuce by way of the hydroponics system.
“The hydroponics system provides them with sensory stimulation, as the water flowing through the system sounds like a fountain, or waterfall,” Susan said. “There is also a bright light and bright green plants that are visually stimulating.
“We are looking forward to using the lettuce we grow to make healthy salads.”
MISS KIM AND HER AMAZING ANIMALS VISIT
On May 11, Kim from Ms. Kim's Amazing Animals, an interactive live animal presentation, stopped by CFI Wells Street Academy let our children learn about and hold several different animals -- including a rabbit, hedgehog and snake. Thank you for the fun visit!
MCFI is again sponsoring
Summer Food Service Program
Stressing the importance of offering nutritious meals to children during the summer months, the Milwaukee Center for Independence announces the sponsorship of the Summer Food Service Program. 
The Summer Food Service Program, funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and administered by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, provides nutritious meals to children during the summer, when free and reduced-price school meals are typically unavailable. 
“This program fills a void created when school lunches are not available,” said Heidi Chada, Vice President of Employment and Commercial Services for MCFI. “Helping parents meet the nutritional needs of their children is the strength of this program.”
Free meals will be made available to children 18 years of age and under. People over 18 years of age who are determined by a state or local public educational agency to be mentally or physically disabled and who also participate in a public or private nonprofit school program during the regular school year may receive free meals as well.
MCFI is an affiliate of the Centers for Independence.