Connecting the Community Beyond Grant Making The Community Foundation goes beyond distributing funds to connect folks across the Midlands You may be aware of Central Carolina Community Foundation’s grant initiative Connected Communities, focused on increasing livability and helping connect folks across the Midlands. But how does Central Carolina Community Foundation go beyond grant making to further our goal of connecting communities? Through our strategic partnerships with community organizations, leaders and groups, the Community Foundation is able to provide support, leadership, and hands-on participation. Our team often joins others at the table to make our community a better place to live, work and play. “Our organizations have many shared goals,” said Melanie Huggins, Executive Director of Richland Library and leader of Do Good Columbia, a two-day community problem-solving workshop. “Part of the Community Foundation’s goal aligns beautifully with the library. We call it Community Cohesion. They call it Connected Communities. And, it’s about how we make (the Midlands) a place that people want to live, that attracts and retains talent and where diverse opinions are heard and respected.” Do Good Columbia was one of many efforts where the Community Foundation worked with other community organizations to improve our region. “And, the Foundation was not just a funder,” said Huggins. “They were part of the steering committee that I used as the community- and subject-matter-experts to really structure and formulate what that weekend event would look like.”
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“It was foundational to the success of Do Good Columbia that we had this group of people in place,” Huggins continued. “We needed people who were invested in this challenge, who understood humancentered design, and who bought into the process from the beginning.” Three CCCF staff members, Erin Johnson, Kevin Patten and Jamesha Shackerford, served as Do Good visitors to columbia’s main street take part in an exercise as part Columbia participants. of the city’s public space public life survey They joined 105 of the Midlands’ most energetic, to ensure they have the resources and support creative minds for the two-day needed to implement their projects. Recent event. Using human-centered design techniques, projects include a survey of how residents participants sought to answer the question, “How interact in public spaces and study tours where can we make our rivers more accessible and community and city leaders travel to flourishing enjoyable?” By the end of the two days, Do Good cities across the country and beyond and bring Columbia had a winning idea to be implemented back ideas to improve our city and region. with a $50,000 grant from the Knight Foundation’s Donor Advised Fund housed at the Community Foundation. But, according to Huggins, “the best result was that participants left feeling proud and connected to Columbia.” The Community Foundation also works closely with the City of Columbia on a number of projects, many of which are also funded by the Knight Foundation’s Donor Advised Fund. The Foundation staff works with City employees
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“When the city offices partner with another organization here in Columbia, what it does is bring a lot of extra people to the table. It starts to engage areas of public input that we don’t always capture,” said John Fellows, City of Columbia Planning Administrator. Because the Foundation works with a variety of — continued on page 3
news brief | 2 president’s letter | 2 at a glance | 3 agency and designated funds | 3 connected communities grants | 4 welcome new donors | 5 generosity’s way | 5 donors make impact | 6 mark your calendar | 6