A local organization celebrated its 30th anniversary by distributing $735,000 in grants to 59 area nonprofit, educational, arts, and historical groups.
The Community Foundation of the CSRA (CFCSRA) grants will support groups in Richmond, Columbia, Burke, and McDuffie counties in Georgia and Aiken and Edgefield counties in South Carolina.
“The Community Foundation really exists so that we can give back,” Shell Berry, President and CEO, explained for ABD. “It is a community endowment that’s been contributed to, most significantly by the Masters Tournament for 29 of those 30 years. And that gives us both an opportunity and a responsibility to support those who are helping those least fortunate in our community. It is an unending privilege for us to be able to do that year in, year out.”
The process begins in the fall when organizations submit applications for the grants. Those are reviewed by 200 volunteers who also conduct site visits to each applicant. Berry said distributing the grants in January boosts the organizations’ financial health at the start of a new year.
“We also allow them to use them for things that other grants don’t normally pay for, like operating funds or salary funds, or maybe the capacity to keep something going once government funding has dried up,” she said. “We’re in conversations right now with all the nonprofits who’ve lost funding from the city, and how we can help them manage their way through the challenge of losing a significant amount of funding.”
Grants are broken down by categories, including arts, history, health, and environment. Organizations selected this year range from the familiar, such as the Ronald McDonald House and Gap Ministries of Augusta, to groups that were selected for the first time.
“I’m excited,” said Tyler Galles, President of Friends of North Augusta Animals (FONAA). “Not only did we get a grant, we also got $15,000, which is the max amount. I was excited to get any money.”
This was the first time FONAA applied for a grant. Galles said the money will be used to prevent euthanasia and improve animal welfare by funding spay/neuter services and heartworm prevention and treatment.
“We scrambled for money for these things, and this is the first time to be recognized by a prestigious community group, the Community Foundation. And it’s also inspiring to be in a room with so many other groups that are doing great work. It does definitely legitimizes what we’re doing.”
Berry said this is an example of what they call the “capacity building cohort.”
“Our small and emerging nonprofits who need the support of our staff, essentially executive coaching, financial coaching, how to build a board, all of those things, some of those participants were actually successful for the first time in applying to and receiving grant funds from this process,” she said.
CFCSRA was created in 1995. The following year, the Augusta National Golf Club (ANGC) joined as a partner. It contributes money raised during the annual golf tournament, joining donations from other community partners and individual donors. This year’s grants bring to more than $12 million dollars the amount the foundation has distributed.
“We’re doing it with the utmost integrity, in a way that really is grounded in what our community truly does needs,” said Berry. “I’m one of the luckiest women in this community, and today is just a reminder of how grateful people are, and it’s a little bit overwhelming to take in all this gratitude.”
