The Community Foundation of Jackson County encourages philanthropy and provides grants to help programs and the people they serve in our community.
The foundation staff and our 20-member board of directors with help from other community volunteers do our best to prudently administer more than $16 million in assets to generate earnings that are granted for scholarships, classroom education grants, community impact grants and our fall grant cycle.
Those grants make an impact across Jackson County. Last year, for instance, we awarded 19 fall grants and helped people and programs in Brownstown, Crothersville, Medora, Seymour and places in between.
Work on this year’s fall grant cycle is underway with an Aug. 1 application deadline. Over the next several weeks, foundation Vice President Sue Smith and I will answer questions, review drafts and accept applications. Forms are available now online at cfjacksoncounty.org.
Once the deadline passes and Sue reviews them for compliance (all applications must involve 501(c)3 organizations or qualifying governmental units), our grant committee will conduct site visits to investigate the requests and their needs.
Two factors can play a large role in determining grants: Whether a nonprofit’s board is engaged financially and whether other funding sources are being pursued for the project.
We like to see board members with skin in the game (our board members certainly are), and we support the practice of bringing funding partners together to deal with community issues and needs. Examples include how the foundation worked with Jackson County United Way to meet the needs of nonprofits during the COVID-19 pandemic and is working with Child Care Network and other community partners to leverage support and assets for the opening of a community child care center.
Once the site visits are completed, the foundation staff and grant committee convene to determine which applications will be recommended for grants. This will take place in September, and our board will consider the recommendations in October. While we’d like to say every organization that applies receives funding, we can’t.
Last year, for example, the 19 fall grants approved last totaled $93,173. We denied three other applications. There weren’t enough grant dollars. Earnings from all of the foundation’s unrestricted funds, field of interest funds as well as grant dollars from the Orville and Mary Schnitker Memorial Endowment financed those grants last year.
Two of those grants aimed to help the community lift area residents out or off of the cusp of poverty. Another helped feed children enrolled in Jackson County schools. And two others provided children and family activities at area parks.
This year, the board of directors approved a granting rate that will pay out nearly $700,000 in grants from scholarship funds, donor advised funds, designated funds, agency funds and unrestricted funds. That’s up from $589,000 approved for 2021.
The increase is a result of our growing endowments and good returns on our investment portfolio and a result of the foundation’s board of directors again approving a 5% grant rate for 2022, the third year in a row that grant rate cap was approved.
Your new gifts, of course, can help make those grant dollars grow in the future, as well. If you would like to donate to any of the foundation’s endowed funds or to create your own endowed fund, call me at 812-523-4483 to set up an appointment. We can discuss your interest in helping others in the community and how to make your assistance a reality.
Your endowed gifts can, through prudent investment, generate earnings for scholarships, classroom education grants, fall grants, agency grants and community impact grants to help people across Jackson County. Over and over, year after year. Forever.
Dan Davis is president and chief executive officer of the Community Foundation of Jackson County. The foundation administers more than 200 funds with assets of more than $16 million. For information about how you can make a donation to any of the funds administered by the foundation or how you might start a new fund, call 812-523-4483 or send an email to Dan Davis at [email protected].