Washington County Community Foundation

Grant-making the Foundation operates a diverse grants program organized in eight funding areas of animal welfare, arts & humanities, Community improvement & economic development, conservation & environment, education, health & fitness, human needs, and religion & faith. Altogether, 272 nonprofits providing charitable services in our Community were supported in 2023.a significant portion of grants are awarded for capacity-building, which is defined as any activity that increases the nonprofit's operational, programmatic, financial, or organizational maturity. Foundation donors with donor advised funds have also embraced the concept of capacity-building grant-making. In 2023, 49 capacity-building grants ranging from $5,000 to $60,000 and totaling $700,000 were issued. Financial process improvement, communications, and data management are funding priorities, but grants are also issued for facility improvements, program expansion and technology.

Donor services the Foundation accepts and administers a diversity of gift and fund types to meet the varied philanthropic objectives of our donors and the needs of Washington County. We work to educate and engage donors in identifying and addressing Community issues and grant-making opportunities. As detailed above, we created the Community snapshot website, which serves to educate donors about Community needs. Donors may also learn about local charities through our primary website, which features a searchable database of more than 100 registered 501(c)(3) local charities providing services in Washington County.

Community leadership the Foundation works to identify and address Community issues and opportunities and also serves as a leader and convener. For years we have hosted free educational sessions for local nonprofits on a variety of topics impacting the sector. While we had been pleased with the results of those sessions, we knew that a more comprehensive educational program was needed. In response we developed the Community pillars program which provides in-depth educational sessions on six broad topics of mission, strategy & evaluation; governance & leadership; legal compliance & ethics; finance & operations; fundraising & resource development; and public awareness & advocacy. The pillars program was modeled after an accreditation tool of the Pennsylvania association of nonprofit organizations, a leading authority on nonprofit governance and management. The inaugural pillars class convened in the fall of 2023 and a new class will be convened each year. In 2023, we also launched the Community snapshot website as our Community needs assessment, choosing a web-based format so that the information gleaned from our research, focus groups and annual survey, would be continuously accessible to Community members. We also included a component that is not common with other needs assessments, the ability for nonprofits to identify their individual needs. The result is a centralized location to learn about broad Community needs, as well as the specific needs of more than 100 nonprofits providing valuable services in our Community. Our donors have quickly embraced this new tool and have directed more than $100,000 in grants from donor advised funds to needs identified on the Community snapshot website. Annually, the Foundation hosts an annual giving event, wccf gives, which is conducted over several months. The Community giving begins on june 1 with check contributions and concludes on a designated day in september, when credit card contributions are also accepted from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Via a dedicated website. The wccf does not charge any fees to the charities or to the donors to facilitate wccf gives, and annually secures a bonus pool to encourage giving. Cumulatively, close to $12,000,000 in grants has been issued through wccf gives.