Midland Area Community Foundation Helps Fund Scouting Anniversary Activities Midland Area Community Foundation News

The Lake Huron Area Council, Boy Scouts of America, along with other local councils throughout the US, is preparing to celebrate the 100 Year Anniversary of Scouting in America, which occurs during the year 2010. The Midland Historical Society has partnered with the Lake Huron Area Council to create an exhibit that will display local and regional artifacts, describe the unique contributions of the local Scouting movement, and highlight area Scouts over time.

Lake Huron Area Council, Boy Scouts of America, serves 13,332 youths in 19 counties in NE lower Michigan through the efforts of 3,118 volunteers.

A Pittsburgh-based maternal and child health care collaborative will undertake a unique and innovative initiative to help families face the challenges of parental depression and early childhood developmental delays.

Under U.S. federal law, all states must implement a system of early intervention services for infants and toddlers, birth to age three, who have developmental concerns, and their families. Many states do not include risk factors in their eligibility criteria.

The Helping Families Raise Healthy Children initiative is supported by a three-year, $500,000 matching grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Local Funding Partnerships program. The grant was awarded to Community Care, the managed behavioral health care organization in Allegheny County. Local funders of the initiative currently include The Highmark Foundation (nominating funder), UPMC Health Plan, The Pittsburgh Foundation, The Fine Foundation, FISA Foundation, and Jewish Healthcare Foundation.

Hall of Famer and Baltimore native Pam Shriver approaches her annual charity tennis classic in much the same way the U.S. Postal Service goes about delivering mail. Nothing is going to stop it.

"I think there is still a great desire to have that one fun night of tennis in Baltimore, and I'd like to see us reach 25 years," said Shriver, who will host the event for the 24th time Dec. 9 at 1st Mariner Arena. "And if it has to stop, I want a better reason for not having it than that the banks are having an economic downturn. We still have to go out and have our fun."

Shriver is the event's major guarantor this year, a shift from the past 23 years, when one bank or another -- five of them all together -- sponsored it. But this year, PNC Bank declined to renew its sponsorship, and no else has stepped forward to attach its name to the event, which benefits the Baltimore Community Foundation in partnership with children's charities.

Northland AEG announced today that the Hartford Wolf Pack Community Foundation is partnering with Trinity College to launch a "Ryan Gordon/Hartford Wolf Pack Community Foundation Learn to Play Hockey Program".

The program will be conducted at Trinity College's Koeppel Community Sports Center and is open to children aged 4-16 who are residents of the City of Hartford.

The stated mission of the Hartford Wolf Pack Community Foundation is to help fund charitable and non-profit endeavors that offer support to inner-city youth, amateur sport, and promote the health, education and well being of Connecticut's children.

Next up for the ART for Life program is a series of mural projects, starting with one at the detention center. "It will be done in phases of six-week increments," Taylor said. "The kids in detention now are doing the background layer and the next group will do the next layer."

The ART for Life project is supported by Brazos County, the cities of College Station and Bryan, the Texas Commission on the Arts, the Brazos Community Foundation and the Barbara Bush Literacy Corps. But, Taylor says, additional community financial support is vital for this and other council projects, especially in the face of the aforementioned funding reductions.

The Kern Community Foundation released an important new study today, looking at the "Status of Women and Girls" in Kern County.

The full report can be read online, but warning: it's not for the faint of heart. As the report said, the most pressing issues faced by women and girls in Kern County are "domestic violence, substance abuse and self esteem."

The Los Altos Community Foundation plans to launch a new community program, Family Giving Project, a four-part series that will provide children in grades 1 through 7 and their parents the tools for lifelong community philanthropic engagement.

LACF will match the fee and return $100 to each family at the end of the course to be used as the families first post-course giving project.

This way, the children and their parents can put into action what they've learned and have a chance to share where and why they decided to give their $100, said Nancy Lippe, LACF program officer.

The Parsec Prize for the second quarter 2009 was recently awarded to Big Brothers, Big Sisters of Western North Carolina. The organization has been serving Western North Carolina since 1982 and provides services to eight counties.

Parsec also made donations to the Boys Home of the South, Community Foundation of Western North Carolina, Asheville Community Theater, Caring for Children, and Special Olympics of North Carolina.

As mentioned in a previous newsletter article, Parsec matches a portion of employee donations.

What is now the Central Kansas Community Foundation used to have a golf tournament and a duck race to help raise money for its Greater Newton Kids FUNd.

'Two duck races was enough,' John Torline said.

When the foundation had a chance to be the title sponsor of the Sand Creek Station Pro-Am, part of the festivities of the Nationwide Tour’s Preferred Health Systems Wichita Open, the group jumped at the chance.

The Kids FUNd started in 2005. The CKCF has raised more than $51,000 in that time. The Kids FUNd was started by Barrick Wilson, marketing director of Newton Medical Center and a former foundation administrator.

The State of Black Oregon was published today by the Urban League of Portland for the first time in 17 years. The report contains a stark inventory of statistics that show a persistent gap in living standards between black and white Oregonians – a gap that is growing wider as a result of the current economic downturn.

"During the last eight years, the poverty gap in America and in this state has continued to grow," says Marcus C. Mundy, president and CEO of the Urban League of Portland. "If there's a poverty gap for Americans generally, the African-American poverty gap widens to chasm proportions. This flies in the face of the ideals our country stands for, and simply should not be acceptable here in Oregon or anywhere else."

This report was funded by: Oregon Community Foundation (Northwest Area Oregon Fund of the Oregon Community Foundation), Northwest Health Foundation (Kaiser Permanente Fund at the Northwest Health Foundation), Oregon Community Foundation, (Janette G. Drew Fund of the Oregon Community Foundation), and the City of Portland, Office of Neighborhood Involvement, Diversity and Civic Leadership Program.