Photo by Ben Slowey
Maurice "Moe" Wince of Sherman Park Grocery Store
Maurice "Moe" Wince of Sherman Park Grocery Store
This past November, the Milwaukee County Board of Supervisors declared food apartheid—the systemic, structural disinvestments in availability and accessibility of fresh, nutritious food, especially fruits and vegetables, in low-income areas that disproportionately affect Black and Brown residents. The declaration came just days after federal cuts to SNAP benefits and amidst months of ongoing grocery store closures across the city. It builds upon the County’s 2019 recognition of racism as a public health crisis, which cemented commitment in enacting policies that achieve racial equity.
Milwaukee County is affected by at least 13 food deserts, many of them on the city’s North Side. Recent grocery store closures mean that number is likely now higher. In absence of grocery centers, many of these areas often contain a high influx of corner or liquor stores, where food prices are often higher and products not as fresh. 2023 data indicates that approximately 120,000 Milwaukee County residents live beyond a one-mile radius of a full-scale grocery store. While there are food pantries all over the Greater Milwaukee Area, most have limited hours and capacity.
In 2023 and 2024, Walmart closed its locations on Silver Spring Dr. and 70th and Main St., respectively. Last July, Kroger closed its Pick N Save location at 35th St. and North Ave. in Metcalfe Park—the neighborhood’s only full-scale grocery store. The company also announced it would be closing four additional Pick N Save’s in the county: Southpoint, Glendale, South Milwaukee and Oak Creek.
Closed Without Notice
In September, the Riverwest Co-Op closed after 24 years of community service. Then in January, ALDI closed its store near Sherman Blvd. and Custer Ave. in the Old North Milwaukee neighborhood with just a two-day notice. A week later, Sentry Foods closed its store at 64th St. and Silver Spring Drive with no notice at all.
The loss of grocery stores, compounded by recent cuts to SNAP, is analogous to Milwaukee County’s reduced access to healthcare and pharmacies. Last summer’s federal cuts to Medicaid and Medicare (from President Trump’s “Big, Beautiful Bill”) disproportionately affected communities of color, Community Catalyst finds. Metcalfe Park’s only pediatric clinic, Next Door Pediatrics, closed in 2023, plus Walgreen’s announced last July the closure of three of its pharmacies in southeastern Wisconsin, including two in Milwaukee.
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Along with the food apartheid declaration came $150,000 in contingency funding allocated to Milwaukee County organizations and coalitions addressing food insecurity in affected areas. Mayor Cavalier Johnson declared 2026 as the “Year of Housing" —and Milwaukee certainly needs as much affordable housing as possible. That said, the interconnectedness of housing, food security and clean water means all must be addressed in tandem.
Developing Strategies
On February 3, Alderwoman Milele Coggs authored a resolution directing the Milwaukee Health Department and Department of City Development to develop strategies for attracting and retaining grocery stores and pharmacies in Milwaukee.
In Metcalfe Park, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported more than half of all residents receive SNAP benefits. Melody McCurtis, executive director of nonprofit organization Metcalfe Park Community Bridges (MPCB), grew up in the Metcalfe Park and Harambee neighborhoods and experienced food insecurity disparities firsthand. “I remember my mom walking four blocks with a suitcase to go get groceries,” she says. “My friends and I would go get snacks from Pick N Save because it was cheaper there than the corner stores.”
The MPCB office is located right next to where Pick N Save was. McCurtis and her staff frequently purchased food in bulk from there to feed folks during organizational events and meetings. “I’ve seen the decline in that site from its inception to now,” McCurtis attests. “When I went there as a kid, there were fresh vegetables when you first walked in. Fast forward, you have the metal detectors and don’t have cashiers, and the produce is not as fresh. They got shut down for rodents.”
Grocery Store Redlining
McCurtis recalls when MPCB reached out to Pick N Save during Covid quarantine to see if Kroger would provide them food for their door-to-door drop-offs for community members. She says all Kroger offered them was 500 plastic bags. “I hate the term ‘food desert’ because it assumes that this is a natural occurrence,” McCurtis notes. “Food apartheid talks about grocery store redlining. When a company says they’re closing 60 stores, you’ll see those stores go in urban and rural areas, but then they’ll say they’re opening 30 stores in more affluent communities.”
When someone has no vehicle, options for groceries are limited. Systemic barriers have widened by budget cuts to the Milwaukee County Transit System (MCTS). “What if you’re disabled?” McCurtis points out. “There’s this push that you can just order your groceries online through DoorDash or Instacart, but they upcharge the costs online, and that’s really not a solution for people.”
It is simply not fair for one neighborhood in Milwaukee to have a surplus of full-size grocery stores while others have zero. For example, in the Yankee Hill area near Downtown, Kroger operates a Pick N Save just two blocks up Van Buren St. from a Metro Market—which it also owns. Between National and Lincoln Ave. near American Family Field is a Target, ALDI, Cermak, Walmart and Pick N Save all within a 1.5 mile radius. On State St. in Wauwatosa are Metcalfe’s, Metro Market and Outpost Co-Op all basically right next to each other.
“For every 40,000 people, you’re supposed to have three to five grocery stores,” McCurtis states. “We have communities that have one or none at all. These corporations want accountability for theft, but they don’t want accountability for taking a public good with a less-than-30-day notice. Where is the policy? Where is the accountability?”
Different Options, Different Needs
McCurtis mentions she often shops in that area near American Family Field since having different options can cater to different needs. All communities deserve such amenities, but clearly only certain communities are being prioritized. “If I want to go get fruit from Cermak, pantry items from ALDI, and meat and fish deals from Pick N Save, I can do all of that in that vicinity. That area with a different demographic and economic makeup has access to more.”
Sherman Park, adjacent to Metcalfe Park, is another neighborhood significantly impacted by food insecurity but home to several community institutions there to help. Longtime resident Maurice “Moe” Wince opened Sherman Park Grocery Store (SPGS) (5315 W. Fond Du Lac Ave.) in 2022, which is the only full-scale grocery store in the area, over a mile from the nearest alternative in Midtown Center. SPGS is also the only Black–owned full-scale grocery store in Wisconsin.
Wince says that in the last year and half, SPGS has been struggling financially. “I’ve been bending over backwards to make sure the store stays open. I don’t have the wherewithal to keep it open by myself.”
Closures of other grocery stores may bring Wince more customers, but that means he has to do extra legwork to keep SPGS fully stocked and reasonably priced at all times. “There’s very little margin in groceries at all, but this is not just a grocery store; we’re part of this community,” he adds.
While Wince does cite shrinkage and theft as issues, the store was brutally hit by last August’s floods, leaving lots of equipment and inventory damaged. This January, Wince enlisted Alderman DiAndre Jackson to put out a public call for community support. “Since then, we’ve had an amazing group of folks shopping, and the media has come out and given us an amazing platform to share who we are,” Wince affirms. Feeding America is now providing SPGS with healthy salads, sandwiches and fruit cups.
Pay What You Can
Tricklebee Cafe (4424 W. North Ave.), also located in Sherman Park, opened in 2016. The pay-what-you-can cafe and nonprofit organization offers nutritious meals made with locally grown and organic food. No one gets turned away. When she developed the cafe’s concept, founder and executive director Christie Melby-Gibbons considered factors like high unemployment rates and percentage of those living under the poverty line to determine where Tricklebee would best serve the community. She recently calculated that Tricklebee has served more than 120,000 meals since opening.
“The city is allowing these corporations to leave our neighborhoods, and there’s no plan to offer anything else,” Melby-Gibbons laments. “That’s the part that’s so sad and sickening. There should be a mandate.”
She continues, “A lot of our neighbors are elderly and rely on transportation, but routes are changing. Neighborhood grocery stores should be normal. There’s got to be some alternative to just abandoning a neighborhood and leaving these big, empty buildings.”
Before the cuts and closures, Melby-Gibbons says Tricklebee served 50 to 60 people a day on average. Now she estimates they get 75 to 100. “We’re not doing anything different from what we’ve been doing. We’re just doing more of it, and we’re selling out almost every single day.”
Generous Donations
The cafe often receives generous food donations from places like the West Allis Farmers Market and Trader Joe’s. “Most people don’t want to see food go to waste, and they know that we’re a receptacle for free things,” Melby-Gibbons explains. “Even if something’s rotten, we compost it.”
Additional community-driven solutions and mutual aid efforts are being developed by MCPB in addressing food apartheid. The organization has been building out its Food Justice Collective, with one of its initiatives being community-powered fridges in partnership with One MKE, stocked daily and stationed at different locations in the area. The first is in Tricklebee Cafe, with additional fridges being installed at the MPCB office (3624 W. North Ave.), Rooted & Rising (3940 W. Lisbon Ave.), Sherman Park Grocery Store and Dominican Center (2470 W. Locust St.).
MPCB has also launched the People’s Pantry, open twice a month while offering drop-off food delivery for homebound folks and holding community events with partnering organizations. In spring, McCurtis and company will re-open the Mutual Aid Shed (2620 N. 34th St.), where community members can come grab free clothes, sanitary products, diapers, hygiene kits and more every Friday.
These MPCB efforts are unfunded, and as such, the organization consistently needs volunteers as well as both food and monetary donations. “It’s work that we have to do because we are directed by the community,” McCurtis upholds. “It has been a hard six months, but we’ve been able to get a lot of this stuff done.”
Other Milwaukee organizations addressing food insecurity include Hunger Task Force, Milwaukee Food Council, Food Freedom Milwaukee, the FEED MKE Project and Milwaukee Street Warriors.
Long-Term Solution
McCurtis envisions corridors of scattered-site, community-owned grocery stores in Milwaukee as a long-term solution to food insecurity, where spots like a fruit market, deli, butcher and pharmacy could all be down one block. “We wouldn’t be relying on corporations being there temporarily,” she asserts. Metcalfe Park Community Bridges seeks folks interested in working towards this model. “We’re building up the neighborhood infrastructure, walkable communities and community-owned development and workforce.”
Melby-Gibbons concurs, as she envisions the models of Sherman Park Grocery Store and Tricklebee Cafe co-existing between neighborhoods. “We have so many abandoned buildings. It’s time for the city to stop letting slumlords just sit on these buildings and give them to organizations that want to do good with them.” She mentions that Tricklebee Cafe is a replicable, sustainable model that many communities could benefit from. “The more we create these community hubs, the healthier our community will be.”
