Breaking New Grounds, Inc.

MISSION STATEMENT: The Breaking New Grounds concept is to develop a neighborhood-based, community food system with local farmers and other partners across the city that will:1) Grow food, grow farmers and grow jobs2) Empower local farmers, our neighbors and ourselves to create healthy worm compost, bountiful organic gardens, nutritious food, neighborhood-based economic development and community from food and other waste that is currently landfilled;3) Provide healthy food to neighbors and local non-profits, including several Kids' Cafes that serve breakfast and dinner to hungry children;4) Provide new job skills and incomes in neighborhoods where residents are underemployed; and5) Serve as a farm incubator and farmer training center to build economic growth and enhance the local food economy.Breaking New Grounds seeks to address both the economic and environmental needs of Metro Louisville. Louisville?s poverty rate of 22% is far higher than the national average. Over 17% of Louisville families with children and one working adult are poor, and the number of children in poverty is rising. In a 2005 Brookings Institute report, Louisville was ranked 3rd, just behind New Orleans, in concentration of poverty in our urban core.These areas of Louisville face high levels of food insecurity. A 2007 Community Food Assessment found neighborhoods in Louisville?s inner core have far fewer grocery stores than suburban parts of the city. Only 25% of these stores sold food from all five food groups; and of these, the only vegetables they offered were hard vegetables like onions and potatoes, of low quality and higher cost. Heart disease and cancer are the two leading causes of death in these neighborhoods, and obesity and asthma occur at higher rates here than elsewhere in the city, according to the Louisville Metro Health Department. The local food bank, Dare to Care, reported between 40 and 45% of families served had to choose between food and utilities, food and heat, food and housing, or food and medicine /medical care.At the same time some neighborhoods in Louisville are struggling, part of our community?s treasure is literally being thrown into the trash. Nationally, about 13% of the waste stream is organic matter. This garbage costs local businesses money when they pay for garbage pick up. Perhaps more significantly, the entire community pays when the garbage is carried to landfills.

Food Resource Type
Non-profit

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