SUPPORTER SPOTLIGHT: McKnight Foundation

In July, the McKnight Foundation sent a letter of support for the East Phillips Urban Farm project to the city of Minneapolis, in the midst of active purchase negotiations between EPNI and the city.

We can't wait to close this deal and start building the community-owned resiliency hub this neighborhood has been refining for over a decade now.

Though many foundations and grantors have told us how ready they are to financially support this project, a lot of those funding streams can't be applied for unless EPNI owns the site, or at the very least, can access the site.

That said, EPNI did manage to secure a few big grants this summer that we can put into action, as soon as we have site access. Those grants will allow us to build an outdoor farm on top of the parking lot, with raised beds and large-scale compost systems, as well as assess the land surrounding the site that's not capped by pavement, as the first step toward healing the land through environmental remediation.

You can read more about this summer's purchase negotiations in this article published after EPNI’s press conference last week.

Many thanks to the McKnight foundation, and to each of you, for walking with us on this long path toward overdue healing and justice in East Phillips, and beyond 💫