Re: Vision, a community-driven non-profit, is spearheading the fight against food insecurity in Southwest Denver. Led by LLI Graduate Mariana del Hierro, Re:Vision cultivates urban farms, family gardens, no-cost groceries, and career pathways for SW Denver community members. Re:Vision’s story embodies the power of community ownership, laying the groundwork for a thriving and equitable food landscape for years to come.
Read more to learn about their innovative solutions, collaborative spirit, and Mariana’s leadership journey.
Q: Re:Vision’s impact on Southwest Denver is undeniable. Can you elaborate on the tangible results you achieve and the broader changes your organization fosters in the community?
Mariana: Re:Vision directly works with community leaders in SW Denver by hiring community residents to lead our work in cultivating community food systems and creating an economy owned by the community.
SW Denver is made up of many neighborhoods that are considered food deserts. We directly support a family’s food security through our urban agriculture model, which consists of 120 family gardens and 3 urban farms, producing over 100,000 pounds of food for families in SW Denver each year. In addition, we offer our year-round no-cost grocery, which currently supports 800 families each week with nutritious and culturally responsive food—resulting in families having one less bill to pay that week, that month, that growing season.
Re:Vision addresses the root cause of food insecurity by providing jobs with thriving wages, benefits, and career pathways to our community members, specifically Latinx immigrant women, to mitigate the adverse economic and social conditions that can lead to a family’s food insecurity — acknowledging the long-term impact that providing a woman a job can have on herself, her children, and her next generation.
Q: Collaboration is critical to achieving social change. In a landscape with potentially overlapping missions, how do you build strong relationships with other non-profits, community leaders, and even similar organizations to maximize your collective impact?
Mariana: Unfortunately, our communities in SW Denver have not had the opportunity to define what “recovery” looks like post the COVID-19 pandemic, with the economic impact of the pandemic on our communities only compounded by historical and present financial struggles. We recognize that we need strong partnerships to address all the needs that one family may come to us with.
Our team mantra is: our focus is food. We ground ourselves in the humility that we can’t do everything because we shouldn’t do everything – part of our responsibility in our community is to refer and deliver the families we work with to the highest quality resource for their specific needs.
Image Courtesy of Re:Vision
Q: The LLI is celebrating 10 years of leadership, community, and impact this year. In what ways did the LLI contribute to your leadership journey?
Mariana: The power of relationships. The LLI has created a supportive network of Latinx leaders working in their respective fields to support our Latinx communities. Through the LLI network, I know I am never alone in this leadership journey, and I know I always have someone to call on for advice and support or a potential cross-sector collaboration.
Two Photos that Help Tell the Story of Re:Vision
Mariana: This picture of the launch of our new urban farm highlights our strong collaborative approach at Re:Vision. At the beginning of 2024, we launched our SW Denver urban agriculture model in partnership with the Office of Council President Torres and Denver Health. With Council President Torres, we are documenting best practices to support the replication of our urban agriculture work in other communities across Denver. With Denver Health, we are launching a food prescription program where families are screened for food insecurity and are given a food prescription to receive a weekly CSA box filled with produce from our farms.
Image Courtesy of Re:Vision
Mariana: The second picture is our team: We are now a team of 20, and we are continuously identifying ways to expand our work to create more jobs with solid wages, benefits, and flexibility for the moms on our team.
Image Courtesy of Re:Vision
About the Latino Leadership Institute
Born from a vision of influential Latino leadership, LLI celebrates a decade of advancing nearly 800 leaders across industries, generations, and geographies. The past decade of impact fuels our unwavering commitment to building a more inclusive and representative U.S. leadership landscape. Our 10-year anniversary marks a springboard for the next decade, fueled by your investment. Together, we’ll build an even bigger vision for representative and inclusive leadership – join us.
