The Fair Food Foundation, which was established less than a year ago to improve food access and support urban agriculture in Detroit and the San Francisco Bay area, announced today that it was shutting down because its money was handled by Bernard L. Madoff, the respected investment manager who turned out to be running an alleged $50 billion Ponzi scheme.
“Due to the loss of funding, Fair Food Foundation is no longer in a position to consider any requests for funding,” Oran B. Hesterman, the group’s President and chief executive announced in an email today. “We will be spending the next few weeks closing down our operation.”
When it announced its formation in 2007, the group said it would have a startup budget of between $12 million and $20 million per year, primarily to be awarded as grants to non-profit organizations.
“The loss of the Fair Food Foundation and the potential financial support it would have provided is a stinging blow to the community of activists, advocates, organizers, and funders dedicated to redesigning our broken food system,” Mr. Hesterman said in the e-mail. “All of us at Fair Food Foundation remain totally committed to the mission we have articulated and will find ways to bring our talents, skills and energies to continue working toward a more sustainable and equitable future. We encourage you to do the same!”
