Twelve grants totaling $103,725 have been awarded to local nonprofit agencies and groups for such projects as government reorganization, arts scholarships and the Special Olympics.

The Community Foundation of Muncie and Delaware County recently announced the awards for its third competitive grant cycle of 2009.

Grants are awarded in five areas of interest: arts and culture, human services, economic development, education and community betterment.

Bunnie Riedel had the pleasure of meeting Jerry Adams about a year ago and the pleasure of seeing the Human Services Coalition (HSC) of Prince George's County in action at a conference this summer. What the HSC does is fantastic! It leverages its members' capabilities and helps those Nonprofits build capacity.

There cannot be a more important time than now for Nonprofits to come together, share resources and support one another. I am reminded that whatever issues we face in our communities, it is usually Nonprofits at the forefront of solving those issues and providing service.

The Partnership for Prince George’s, a philanthropic effort hosted by the Prince George’s Community Foundation, has funded HSC to develop a public policy initiative concerning the county budget. We also collaborated on hosting three excellent forums on advocacy seeking to get more of our members comfortable with joining the advocacy efforts.

The Willow Springs Community Foundation is pleased to announce that they have met their goal of raising $26,000 as part of the Harry Cooper Supply Company Campaign for the Ozarks. This money will matched dollar-for-dollar through the Cooper Campaign. Representatives from the Community Foundation of the Ozarks will be on hand to present a check for the matching funds on Friday, July 17, 2009. The local match was made possible thanks to the generosity of Steve and Ginny Norman.

The Harry Cooper Supply Company Campaign for the Ozarks is a dollar for dollar challenge grant in partnership with the Community Foundation of the Ozarks that is part of an overall regional effort to enhance community grantmaking endowments, establish administrative/operations endowments, and promote appropriate and best practices by community foundation board of directors.

Some leaders seem born to it; others might grow into it. Still others have leadership capability that needs cultivating and encouraging. That last big bunch became the focus of the many community-organized leadership-development courses that blossomed nationwide during the past three or four decades.

More than 300 achievers and potential achievers have been through Leadership Santa Fe's six-weekend offerings in a 30-year tenure interrupted by, well, less-than-successful leadership - but resumed in recent years.

The group has just taken a couple of seven-league strides: It's now a program of the Santa Fe Chamber of Commerce. The chamber's counterparts launched leadership courses in many American cities, so our community's business group can draw on plenty of experience. At the same time, the Santa Fe Community Foundation has agreed to provide leadership training for those interested in serving on boards of our area's many nonprofit organizations.

The Community Foundation of the Ozarks is now accepting proposals from our Agency Partners for the annual targeted Endowment Building Grant Program. This year, grants awarded through this program must be used for specific plans to promote planned giving and legacy societies on behalf of the applying organization. CFO will award 10 grants of $1,500 each through this program.

The Community Foundation of Acadiana is open to the idea of taking over nonprofit or “external agency” funding from city-parish government. CFA Director Raymond Hebert says the organization has been in talks with several city officials about the idea over the past year. Councilmen William Theriot and Jared Bellard are introducing an ordinance at tonight’s council meeting to zero out LCG’s supplemental funding of local nonprofits.

The ordinance also redirects the remaining three years of funding to the Community Foundation of Acadiana, which would then decide how the funds get distributed among the agencies.

Hebert acknowledged another idea being discussed is for LCG to continue funding nonprofits, but that the grants be awarded through the CFA, as a means of removing politics from the process.

The Community Foundation for Southern Arizona (CFSA) is pleased to announce $442,000 in grant funding to 20 Southern Arizona nonprofit organizations including $50,000 for technical support to strengthen the nonprofit sector. >> View list of grantees

The Community Foundation is supporting effective nonprofits through grants and technical assistance in creating visible, positive impacts for populations most impacted by the economic crisis:

Victims of abuse and domestic violence - $100,000
Increasingly vulnerable populations - $100,000
Populations needing financial empowerment - $125,000
Nonprofits needing additional capacity and technical assistance - $117,000
Extensive community research and data provided by 176 nonprofits revealed these four impact areas for this years focus.

Information on a variety of nonprofits is also available to CFSA fund holders.

As the recession took hold and settled in last year, fundraising by U.S. charities began to falter, a new study says.

Many charities raised less money in 2008 than they did in 2007, and those that did raise more saw smaller gains than usual, says the eighth annual State of Fundraising survey from the Association of Fundraising Professionals.

Last year, 46 percent of organizations raised more than in 2007, compared to six in 10 that typically show fundraising growth from one year to the next.

via Fundraising skids in 2008 | Philanthropy Journal.

The National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy (NCRP) released its most recent report, Criteria for Philanthropy at Its Best: Benchmarks to Assess and Enhance Grantmaker Impact. The paper discusses how philanthropic institutions are timid when providing for the greater good.

These organizations have under minded the beneficial impact that they can achieve by improving the overall condition of many communities in need. The article aims to answer the following questions. ”

1. What differentiates an exemplary foundation from the rest of its peers?
2. What can foundations do to improve its relevance to nonprofits, the economically and socially underserved Americans and society as a whole?”

This article provided a set of guidelines to improve charitable giving and focused on the idea that private institutions should direct more of their attention to the needs of impoverished populations.

The surveys reveal a relatively split foundation community on whether a recession means that foundations should hunker down on existing missions or rethink purpose. A debate in a Council on Foundations newsletter between Karl Stauber of the Danville Regional Foundation and Emmett Carson of the Silicon Valley Community Foundation summarized the merits and liabilities of revising foundation mission during a down period. Stauber argued for continuity and suggested that foundations “must have the courage and will to balance the short-term charity needs with the long-term philanthropic opportunities.” Carson, on the other hand, argued for change, saying, “Each foundation has an obligation to consider whether, and how, to respond to this crisis.”

Both Stauber and Carson lead community foundations whose discretionary grant pools may have more room to consider these questions than at private foundations whose restrictions are tied to their endowments.