It’s Giving Tuesday — the unofficial start to the season of sharing. Here are just a few of the local orgs and nonprofits that WE love to give back to.
Sun Valley Kitchen & Community Center
This hyperlocal community organization focuses on supporting and uplifting the children and families of Denver’s Sun Valley neighborhood by providing a safe space to explore, grow, and improve personally and professionally. The center’s programming includes community dinners, a no-cost grocery program, youth art and cooking classes, tutoring, and more.
St. Francis Center
Denver’s St. Francis Center provides shelter and services to Denverites experiencing homelessness with a special focus on transitional resources including employment preparation, permanent housing, street outreach, and health and wellness. This time of year the center is always in need of men’s jeans and winter coats.
African Community Center
ACC’s mission is to help Denver’s refugee and immigrant communities rebuild safe, sustainable lives in Colorado through sponsorship opportunities, integration programs, employment services, case management, cultural orientation, and so much more to make the resettlement process easier. Volunteers can help with housing, transportation, childcare, English lessons, and other community navigation services.
Florence Crittenton Services
Serving teen mothers and their children, FloCrit offers a high school education, on-site daycare and early learning, supportive mental and physical health services, and more to young Denver families. Along with financial support, FloCrit is regularly in need of diapers, Pull-Ups, and menstrual hygiene supplies, as well as new or gently used clothing for toddlers, strollers, and winter gear for moms and kids.
Food For Thought Denver
This 100% volunteer-run nonprofit strives to end the “weekend hunger gap” for local children who depend on school meals as their primary source of sustenance and nutrition. Food For Thought Denver services 79 Denver area schools, providing “PowerSacks” filled with enough non-perishable food items to feed a family of four for the whole weekend to families in need every Friday.
Servicios de la Raza
Servicios focuses on providing Spanish-speaking and Chicano communities with culturally-responsive support for mental health, educational, workforce, and everyday needs. The organization runs a re-entry program for formerly incarcerated people, manages a crisis hotline, provides finance and job coaching, and so much more.
Birdseed Collective
Birdseed does a lot — provides after-school activities for kids in the Globeville neighborhood, offers programming to engage senior citizens in the community, and hosts a weekly food pantry open to anyone at their Globeville Center. But with art at the root of everything they do, Birdseed also runs Alto Gallery, a studio and show space for up-and-coming artists at all stages of their careers.
The Center On Colfax
This local org has not only been providing a safe and supportive space for Denver’s LGBTQ+ community since 1976, it’s currently the largest community center of its kind in the Rocky Mountain region. The Center promotes statewide initiatives that support Colorado’s LGBTQ+ community, as well as offers programs and resources — including support groups, educational forums, and health and legal services — to members and allies, no matter how you identify.
