The Chaffee County Community Foundation (CCCF) has announced the award of grants to 39 local nonprofit organizations with $154,078 in funding from the Spring Municipal Grants Cycle.
The average award size for each nonprofit was approximately $3,950. For this cycle, CCCF partnered with the Town of Buena Vista and the City of Salida to administer their community grants programs.
CCCFs services included managing the grant application portal, eligibility review of applications, technical support to applicants, convening an independent review committee reflecting the two communities, and facilitating the scoring, follow-up, and review process. Recommendations from the volunteer review committee were shared with the Buena Vista Trustees on April 11 and Salida City Council on April 18 for final approval. Awardees are currently receiving their grant agreements and funds are expected to be distributed the week of April 24.
“We are honored for the opportunity to partner with the City of Salida and Town of Buena Vista to increase our local nonprofit capacity through administering the grant process.” Said Chaffee County Community Foundation Executive Director Betsy Dittenber. “Our local nonprofits offer critical services that make our community stronger. Grantmaking is one way we can support their important work.”
The Spring Municipal Grants have become increasingly competitive as more applicants apply each year for a limited amount of funds. As part of its goal to increase nonprofit capacity, CCCF offers grant writing support to nonprofit organizations. The recipients were determined by the CCCF Grant Review Committee, which consisted of eight volunteers who contributed at least 30 hours each to review applicants and make funding recommendations.
“The time, energy, and dedication of our review committee volunteers was incredible,” added Dittenber. “We are always grateful for individuals who help us provide a fair and balanced community review process to steward available funding to high-impact programs and organizations.”
The organizations receiving funding from the Spring Municipal Grant Process are:
Roy Williams Foundation $1,500
Valley to Valley Senior Care Center $5,000
New Bees $3,500
Caring and Sharing $2,800
Unbottle and Protect Chaffee County Water $1,150
Collegiate Peaks Chorale $1,700
Salida Senior Citizen, Inc. dba Salida Community Center $6,000
Articipate $2,500
Mini-Blessings $1,400
First United Methodist Church $1,600
Ark Valley Lacrosse Club $1,000
Elevating Readers Together $2,800
Salida Concerts Inc. (Salida Aspen Concerts) $2,720
Buena Vista Chamber of Commerce $2,090
Salida-area Parks, Open-space & Trails (SPOT) $1,500
High Country Fine Arts Association $1,400
Salida Circus Outreach Foundation $2,620
Shining Mountains Montessori School $2,000
Neighbor to Neighbor Volunteers/The Chaffee Shuttle $3,940
Colorado Theater in Non Traditional Spaces $1,658
Chaffee County Public Health $3,230
Truth Has a Voice Foundation $2,750
Full Circle Restorative Justice 6,250
Peak to Peak Pickleball Club $1,000
Blue Elements $1,300
Ark-Valley Humane Society $1,500
Buena Vista Singletrack Coalition $1,800
Colorado Farm To Table Inc. $3,150
Chaffee County Early Childhood Council $12,000
51:10 Youth Ranch $2,500
Greater Arkansas River Nature Association $7,300
KHEN 106.9fm Community Radio $3,000
Salida Mountain Trails $5,750
Achieve, Inc. $4,400
Chaffee Housing Trust $20.000
The Alliance dba The Alliance Against Domestic Abuse $2,380
elevateHER $4,290
Boys & Girls Clubs of Chaffee County$ 1,8000
Guidestone Colorado $4,600
Betsy Dittenber, Executive Director of Chaffee County Community Foundation
“We encourage anyone who is interested in building a more competitive grant application to attend our Community Summit which will offer a grant writing series as a part of the full day of educational offerings for nonprofit professionals.” shared Dittenber. “We are committed to helping our community partners achieve the most impact possible and grant writing can be a critical pathway to reaching that impact.”
The Community Summit will be taking place on September 19 at the Chaffee Fairgrounds. The full-day educational opportunity is designed to help nonprofit leaders build the skills needed for success and collaborate across the sector. Registration for the event will open in June. In addition to the Summit, CCCF also offers regular workshops, review of grant narratives on request, and capacity support for nonprofit organizations via consultation.
As previously reported, Truth Has a Voice Foundation DBA Ark Valley Voice received a grant of $2,750 to begin our “Diverse Voices” pilot program. This effort will focus on representing the voices and stories of the county’s growing Hispanic/Latinx community.
Dittenber reiterates that in all of the grantmaking CCCF undertakes with its partners, it is committed to a transparent, non-biased grant process that is focused on high-impact grant-making that increases the capacity of the hard-working local nonprofit organizations. The process includes sharing the grant application questions and evaluation rubric with the applicants while they are developing their applications, incorporating follow-up interviews to clarify aspects of the application, and a combined scoring and discussion approach to ensure good projects, not just good grant writers, are recommended for funding. In recognizing that Chaffee County is a very interconnected community, a recusal process is used to ensure there are no conflicts of interest in the review process.
The Chaffee County Community Foundation (CCCF) was founded in 2018, as a public, nonprofit organization established to promote and facilitate philanthropy in Chaffee County, created by and for the people in that area. CCCF acts as a catalyst to inspire positive change through the power of philanthropy to enrich the lives of all people within the county. Its goals are to make informed philanthropy accessible to all, build local nonprofit capacity, and enable community conversations. Since 2018, CCCF has actively supported nonprofit organizations for the betterment of Chaffee County and the local communities. To learn more, visit www.chaffeecommunity.org.
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