At Metro Caring, we work with our community to meet people's immediate needs for nutritious, culturally relevant foods while building a movement to end hunger at its root causes.
We know that Coloradans don’t go hungry because of a lack of food. Coloradans go hungry because they can’t afford to put food on the table. Unaffordable housing, low wages, an industrialized food system, and centuries of racism and oppression are some of the leading causes that force people to go hungry. We need bold new solutions to tackle these root causes. By investing in community wealth building, organizing our community leaders, and exploring innovative solutions to our food system, we know that, together, we can end hunger at its root.
Fresh Foods Market
Everyone deserves access to fresh, healthy foods to put on the table. Our free, grocery-store-style market welcomes anyone to shop and take home food. No identification, proof of need, or documentation is needed. Please make an appointment to shop in the Fresh Foods Market.
In-State Identification & Birth Certificate Vouchers
Through the Colorado ID Project, Metro Caring can provide you with a voucher that you can redeem at the DMV or appropriate office to waive the fees for an identification (ID), driver's license, or birth certificate. Availability is limited and first-come, first-serve. Please note: Vouchers are not eligible for ID or license reinstatement fees.
Colorado State Documents
For Colorado-state ID, driver's license, and birth certificate requests, vouchers are available at Metro Caring during our Fresh Foods Market hours, without an appointment. Not able to get to Metro Caring? Our ID, driver’s license, and birth certificate vouchers are available all over the state of Colorado. Check and see if we have vouchers at a more convenient location!
Out-of-State Documents
Metro Caring is not currently able to provide vouchers for out-of-state documents. For out-of-state voucher requests, please visit our ID Project partners at Colorado Legal Services and Holy Ghost Ministries.
For all other ID Project questions not related to out-of-state birth certificates, please contact our Community Development team at idproject@metrocaring.org.
Community Connectors
Hunger is often a complex situation, and social services can be hard to navigate. Metro Caring Community Connectors can help refer community members to partner organizations that provide rental and utility assistance, housing support, mental health care, re-entry support programs, and clothing. We are a referring partner with A Precious Child, which provides various baby and child needs.
No appointment is necessary. Walk in and ask to speak with a Community Connector during Fresh Foods Market hours.
Learn more about tax preparation resources at Metro Caring.
Nutrition, Health & Cooking Programs
Nutrition is crucial to living a healthy lifestyle. At Metro Caring, our nutrition programs welcome our community to share and strengthen skills that support each other’s health goals and manage health conditions impacted by access to food, like diabetes and heart disease. Our community organizes multiple free cooking clubs and nutrition classes for all ages. We foster spaces where a love of healthy cooking can grow and be shared.
Urban Agriculture & Community Gardens
Metro Caring’s Urban Agriculture team models community-based, farm-to-table food sovereignty. We create community engagement opportunities and educational programming to demonstrate how communities can establish and engage in local food systems.
We embrace a variety of farming styles in our urban environment, from traditional soil farming to hydroponics. Our main building hosts a greenhouse where gardeners start seedlings for the growing season. Those seedlings travel to our various farming and garden sites, and many are passed along to our community gardeners to plant and harvest during the growing season. Our Hydro Farm, an upcycled shipping container outfitted with a drip irrigation system, grows leafy green vegetables year-round. With the unique technology of hydroponic farming, we can grow over 2,500 plants at the same time—and, it only uses 10 gallons of water a day.
With our community garden at the park on 18th & Humboldt that features over 30 garden beds, the community comes together to share space, stories, and their harvests. Every season, each garden bed is offered up to a member of our community to grow whatever they wish. At the end of summer, you’ll find towering sunflowers in some beds and dozens of tomatoes in others. The gardens offer a space for community members to get involved in the local food system and build leadership skills and relationships with their neighbors. We take applications and assign plots in February each year for both locations.
Universal Basic Food | Community Food Utility
The industrial food system is increasingly failing to fulfill its basic goal: preventing hunger by feeding people adequately and sustainably. Universal Basic Food, distributed through a Community Food Utility, would provide guaranteed access to nutrient-dense, culturally relevant food for free, regardless of income.
Community Development & Wealth Building
Our current economic landscape favors large-scale producers, distributors, retailers, and service providers. Small businesses face greater challenges than corporations, including unequal access to government subsidiaries and lack of access to capital. Rather than have wealth extracted from the local economy and consolidated into a handful of businesses, we work to support local business owners to generate wealth and keep it in the local economy. From sharing our commercially licensed kitchen with caterers to hiring local translators and interpreters for our events, we strive to incubate, accelerate, and lower the risk for community-based enterprises to succeed.
The Mastermind Circle
Our community is poised to launch unique ideas and experiences into business ventures that serve their communities. Metro Caring’s Mastermind Circle is a cohort of entrepreneurs working to empower one another and build economic stability in our community. Through one-on-one business coaching, conceptualization and planning, and co-op development, our programming focuses on culturally responsive approaches that differ from dominant culture business programs so we can increase economic participation for historically marginalized communities.
Community Organizing
At Metro Caring, we focus on shifting power to the people that are most negatively impacted by our current food system. Those who have lived experience with hunger are the best equipped to address the root causes. But too often, our community does not see people in positions of leadership that share their experiences and relate to their challenges. Our Community Organizing program focuses on strengthening leadership skills and bolstering stories so that our community can be a strong base of advocacy and change. Our team builds sustainable power structures within the community with high-quality training and leadership development, civic engagement, advocacy, media training, storytelling, and intensive organizer trainings.