In the News
2024 Highlights
Urban Growers Collective voted “Best Urban Farm” 2023, Chicago Reader
Thank you, Chicago! 🌟 You selected us by audience vote as #1 Urban Farm in Chicago Reader's "Best of Chicago, 2023" issue! Shout out to our runner-ups—good company with which to be building a local food system that works for Chicago. ✊🏿 @theurbancanopy @GlobalGardenRefugeeTraining Farm @bigdeliciousplanet
Text from UGC Instagram. See the results: Best of Chicago Food & Drink Poll Winners, Chicago Reader
Urban Growers Collective Founders Announce Leadership Transition —PR Newswire
Urban Growers Collective (UGC) announced a significant leadership transition as co-founder/co-CEO Laurell Sims steps down from her role. "Erika Allen and Laurell Sims's combined vision and leadership have been instrumental in shaping the organization, and we are confident in Erika's ability to guide UGC into its next phase of growth and impact. We offer our deepest gratitude to Laurell Sims for her dedication, passion and significant contributions to UGC," said Erika Dudley, UGC Board President.
Erika Dudley, Urban Growers Collective Founders Announce Leadership Transition, PR Newswire
Erika Allen selected for the the 2024 Willie’s Warriors Leadership Initiative cohort, Chicago Foundation for Women
The Rev. Willie T. Barrow was a Civil Rights activist, minister, co-founder of Operation PUSH, and mentor to multiple generations. Rev. Barrow believed in bringing women together to support and learn from each other. That work continues through Willie’s Warriors, a leadership development cohort of Black women in the Chicago region. CFW is proud to announce the 2024 Willie’s Warriors Leadership Initiative cohort. The 19 Warriors represent a cross-section of Black women and nonbinary leaders from diverse backgrounds, sectors, and industries.
—Willie’s Warriors Leadership Initiative, Chicago Foundation for Women
The Intersection Between Community Food and Justice —Awarepreneurs Podcast
“…the complexity of the historic legacy of how communities have been exploited by the food system, but also knowing that food is our culture. It's how we connect and that there is something in that. There is something in the in process of reclaiming food growing as a healing force, but also as a real tangible answer to how I can change my day to day living.
—Erika Allen, #317 The Intersection of Community Food & Justice with Erika Allen, Awarepreneurs Podcast
2023 Highlights
An Interview with Erika Allen — Garden & Health
“I grew up on a small family farm, no off-farm labor, growing vegetables to help my family just have supplemental income,” she explains to Garden & Health, giving a glimpse into her formative years that brought her to her work today. “I saw an opportunity to begin growing food in cities as both an actionable problem-solving pathway for youth employment and to provide nutritional density and public health services in our communities.”
—Erika Allen, Urban Growers Collective Cultivating Food Justice, Garden & Health
New South Chicago Farm Maker Space — dwell
'“UGC’s mission is to integrate the healing arts into our work," [Erika Allen] explains. "We’re able to be on the farm but need a designated environment where we can step away from the labor of the farm and create together."
—Erika Allen, Charcoal, Mushrooms, and More Become Building Parts for a South Chicago Artist Residency, dwell
UGC Awarded $1 Million Dollar USDA Forestry Service Grant — Block Club Chicago
'Mayor Brandon Johnson and Sen. Dick Durbin joined community leaders on a sunny September morning at the nonprofit’s South Chicago farm, to award the group a $1 million grant. Urban Growers Collective will continue its efforts to establish ‘a food forest’ to fight food insecurity, sequester environmental and health hazards in communities of color and build sovereignty and agency in Chicago’s neighborhoods, Erika Allen said.
—Erika Allen, Urban Growers Collective Gets $1 Million To Plant Trees, Combat Climate Change On South Side, Block Club Chicago
Green Era Campus Anaerobic Digester—Next City and Energy News Network
The Green Era Campus digester and commercial compost facility is expected to divert 85,000 tons of food waste and organic matter from landfills each year. Inorganic wastes such as metals, plastics and glass are eliminated prior to processing. Digester operations include a 1.7-million-gallon processing tank, a 320,000-gallon holding tank and a 5,000-square-foot facility for methane processing — cleaning the methane of impurities so that it is pipeline quality, Halene says.
—A Unique Bioenergy Project Fueled By Food Waste Powers Community Connections, Next City and Energy News Network