2019 Annual Report

View our 2019 Annual Report

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Founder’s Letter by Sharon Prince

Grace and peace.

Grace and Peace are the purposeful words found in our Plaza, one of many welcoming spaces to enter Grace Farms. While these words remind us of our values and how we approach our work, they are also an invitation to experience grace and peace throughout our extraordinary River building and the surrounding 80 acres of rolling landscapes.

As we reflect on the past year, I look back at the unprecedented challenges presented by COVID-19. When Grace Farms closed in early March, we quickly pivoted to use our interdisciplinary humanitarian model and entrepreneurial ethos to fill the PPE supply/demand mismatch gap throughout Connecticut. We brought together local and global partners in the Grace Farms Alliance Against COVID-19. Through our Alliance and Relief Fund for Connecticut, we expediently donated and delivered 1.9 million pieces of PPE to health care workers and provided food relief to our neighbors.

The pandemic and the solidarity around dismantling systemic racism heighten the need to break down barriers between people to foster a more just, diverse community. This is at the core of Grace Farms. We draw upon our private and public partnerships, cross-sector expertise, and leading artists to illuminate complex issues and address humanitarian crises with grace and peace.

On the heels of Julianne Swartz’s Joy, still remarkable sound installation in the Sanctuary, Carrie Mae Weems’ provoking Past Tense performance enraptured us with Imani Uzuri, Carl Hancock Rux, Eisa Davis and Francesca Harper, all of whom implored us not to forget the young black lives lost by police brutality.

Grace and peace require action.  Nobel Peace Prize recipient and surgeon Dr. Denis Mukwege, who is repairing lives of brutalized women at a staggering pace in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, poignantly urged us on towards courageous actions by sharing his medical teams’ work in a conversation with Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Nicholas Kristof on an unforgettable May afternoon in the Sanctuary.

Our commitment to end modern slavery and gender-based violence deepened over the past year through work on ethical supply chains and domestic violence. We presented a Conscious Consumerism series, exploring how companies and consumers can support ethical supply chains. To fight rising violence against women and children, Alina Marquez Reynolds who is a former federal prosecutor and expert on the Violence Against Women Act, joined our team.

Our Nature Initiative addressed climate change with the Pollinator Pathway and restored native meadows critical to bees. Our sustainability efforts garnered our second LEED certification for Operations + Maintenance. We held round tables, panels, and provided Space Grants to 40 not-for-profit organizations working on community frontlines. Our Faith Initiative explored concepts of a life worth wanting and Dr. Matthew Croasmun initialized a partnership with the U.S. Army Chaplains, welcoming participants from around the world.

2019 was a pivotal year in our work to illuminate the issue of modern slavery in the building materials supply chain and to initialize a radical paradigm shift towards a slave-free built environment. We brought together more than 60 leaders as a part of the Grace Farms Foundation Architecture + Construction Working Group to Design for Freedom, a first-of-its-kind initiative. We started a powerful movement; there is no turning back or looking away.

We press on with our purposeful actions to bring grace and peace more fully into the world,

Sharon Prince
CEO and Founder

Grace Farms Foundation