MEET MORE 2025 UNITY AWARD WINNERS
FOR VENICE WILLIAMS, the table has always been a meaningful place. Back in Pittsburgh, where she grew up, her father was a chef, baker and caterer and her mother was a grocer, providing food for the community.
As Williams grew older, she began to see the table as a symbol for helping those in need. Like many, Williams experienced difficulties in her childhood home. But she also saw her parents giving back to others.
“It was always about what the community needed and our role in providing that,” says Williams.
It’s time to pick your Milwaukee favorites for the year!
After college, Williams relocated to Milwaukee for a ministry job at a Lutheran church and the Milwaukee Lutheran Coalition. Her role included work in local schools, where she saw firsthand the disparities affecting students and their families.
As her parents modeled to her, she began building bridges – helping parents navigate the school system and advocate for their children.
What she thought would be a two-year stint working with local youth became a 35-year vocation serving Milwaukeeans of all ages. Today, Williams brings people of all walks of life together through her ministry, The Table, an homage to food’s ability to connect.
Williams’ mission focuses on creating a healthier humanity, stronger world and a worldview that has room for everyone – no matter their differences. She lives it out as executive director of Alice’s Garden, a 2-acre urban farm on the North Side of Milwaukee that brings together local families and organizations committed to growing healthy, pesticide-free food.
The garden nourishes souls as much as it nourishes bodies. Tending to their crops, Alice’s Garden cultivators hear one another’s stories. “They learn cultural, ethnic and agricultural traditions from each other, which creates a sense of unity,” says Williams.
It’s just one way she brings people together. Williams is also executive director of the Fondy Food Center, which empowers entrepreneurs and increases access to healthy food through the Fondy Farmers Market and Milwaukee Winter Farmers Market. And she runs the Kujichagulia Producers Cooperative in Sherman Phoenix, where she sells products from Alice’s Garden and community artisans.
Aside from her creating or selling local goods, many of Williams’ ministry events revolve around a physical table, gathering people for meals or just a cup of herbal tea – a bridge to help people see and honor their differences.
“There are very few things we do that don’t involve a table and place setting,” she says. “When people are being physically nourished, guards come down, and authenticity shows its face.”
An Organization That Inspires Venice
HIR (Healing Indigenous Roots) Wellness Institute provides mental health care to underserved people affected by trauma, based on ancestral teachings. Their tagline is “illness becomes wellness when ‘I’ becomes ‘we.’” The work is in some ways very quiet, but it has so much impact.
How can people create more unity in Milwaukee?
“Unplug and show up. Create more opportunities for authentic conversation, whether that’s within an institution or within your own family. We need to listen more than we speak.”
