Autumn 2009

hjweinbergfoundation.org

Annual Community Gathering

On behalf of the Trustees and staff of the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation, we are pleased to invite you to:

The Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation
Annual Community Gathering
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
4:00 - 6:00 p.m.
Beth Tfiloh Congregation
3300 Old Court Road, Baltimore, Maryland 21208

Last year, more than 500 community leaders attended the Foundation’s annual gathering. Rabbi Mitchell Wohlberg will formally welcome the crowd this year. The Foundation’s President, Shale D. Stiller and Trustee Barry I. Schloss will be the featured speakers. Please RSVP to this e-mail! Please let us know if you plan to attend by calling 410-654-8500, ext. 267 or e-mail jjordan@hjweinberg.org. We hope to see you on November 4!

Annual Report Available On-line after November 4, 2009

In an effort to reduce printing costs, this year’s annual report will be available as a download on-line at the Weinberg Foundation website after November 4, 2009. (www.hjweinbergfoundation.org - click the link “2009 Annual Report” on the home page of the website.)

More than 1,100 Letters of Inquiry Received in August

The Weinberg Foundation accepted Letters of Inquiry during the month of August as part of a new grant cycle the Foundation recently implemented. The Foundation received more than 1,100 Letters of Inquiry representing $238 million in total grant requests. After lengthy review and discussion, the Trustees approved 85 Letters of Inquiry, representing 8% of total requests. These approvals now move to the next step in the grant process, the submission of full grant applications. The Fall will be a busy time as the Foundation Trustees and Program Directors review grant applications, make site visits, and discuss grant funding recommendations. By the end of January 2010, all grant funding decisions will have been made and communicated to the 85 organizations.

2010 Grant Cycle Coming

The Foundation will begin a new grant application cycle in 2010. Letters of Inquiry may be submitted to the Foundation no earlier than January 11, 2010, and must be submitted no later than 4:00 p.m. on Thursday, January 14, 2010.

A detailed summary of the Winter 2010 grant cycle will be posted on the Weinberg Foundation website by December 1, 2009.

Weinberg Fellows Program - Accepting Applications

The Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Fellows Program is a leadership development program for executive directors of agencies serving disadvantaged Maryland residents. It provides hands-on, practical, interactive sessions focused on key elements of nonprofit management; exploration of issues important to agency leaders; the chance to meet and form long-term relationships with peers, and opportunities to identify and connect to a rich network of other helpful resources.

While the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation is especially interested in increasing dialogue and strategic collaboration among human service agencies and neighborhood organizations, a greater purpose of the Fellows Program is the creation of a wider array of partnerships between the business community, foundations, grassroots groups, government agencies, educational institutions, and others working for a stronger Baltimore.

If you are interested, the Weinberg Fellows Program is accepting applications to the 2010 program through November 6, 2010. Maryland executive directors of nonprofits who serve people in need can apply to the program on-line at www.weinbergfellows.org.

Congratulations to the 2009 Graduating Class of Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Fellows! The 2009 class of Weinberg Fellows has completed a year-long professional development program designed to enhance their leadership skills and promote collaboration among the region’s nonprofits.

Graduates of the 2009 class and the organizations they represent include:

“It has been a privilege to work with this class of dedicated nonprofit professionals. They are committed to their organizations, the people they serve, and improving their communities,” said Dr. Ann Cotten, director of the Schaefer Center for Public Policy at the University of Baltimore and program director for the Weinberg Fellows Program.

A More Disciplined Focus in Disabilities Grantmaking

After many years of supporting effective nonprofits that provide direct services to people with all types of physical, sensory, and intellectual disabilities, the Weinberg Foundation has decided primarily to concentrate its grantmaking in the field of disabilities for intellectual disabilities. Intellectual disabilities that will be considered for funding will include, for example, autism spectrum disorders, mental retardation, epilepsy, cerebral palsy, psychiatric disabilities, and learning differences such as dyslexia in children. The Weinberg Foundation is now funding primarily integrated settings in the community where disabled and nondisabled individuals can play, work, live, and worship together.

As part of this new, purposeful approach to supporting children and adults with intellectual disabilities, the Foundation will focus on housing, jobs, early intervention, service coordination, assistive technology, legal aid, life planning, and staff development and training. Increasing access to housing for adults and early intervention for children with intellectual disabilities is also a priority. The Foundation will continue to support summer camps for those with disabilities.

The overarching vision for the Disabilities portfolio is the same for all anti-poverty programs in the Foundation: helping low-income and vulnerable people achieve self-sufficiency, to the greatest extent possible.

In Israel, the Foundation is now reviewing proposals for some of the first 3- to 4-person group homes for adults with disabilities, the first cognitive behavior therapy program for children with autism, programs for children with dyslexia, and detached homes in the community for older adults with disabilities who would otherwise be in nursing homes or institutions.

$9 Million RFP for Older Adult Caregiving Programs - An Update

The Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation Family and Informal Caregiver Support Program is now underway. The goal of this Program is to increase support for the family and friends that deliver the majority of care to chronically ill and disabled older loved ones. The grants were made to organizations in California, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Maine, New Hampshire, New York, Pennsylvania, and Texas. During April 2009, the Family and Informal Caregiver Support Program made 14 grants totaling $8,184,145. The grants will provide support to innovative and evidence-based community initiatives or projects that help family and friends assist low and moderate income, community dwelling older adults in maintaining their independence and quality of life. The projects funded by the Program take many forms:

A significant portion of the project will be the external program evaluation. The external program evaluation of the Program’s projects will assess the impact of the initiative on caregivers, communities, and local aging networks. The evaluation will examine the extent to which projects are able to expand the availability of family caregiver support services, improve access to information and caregiver education, and implement promising new models of caregiver support. Site visits have been made to all projects to discuss evaluation and to offer technical assistance. Findings from the external evaluation will provide the projects, the Weinberg Foundation, and the larger field with ongoing feedback to achieve maximum impact for projects serving caregivers as well as important information on impact and sustainability. Each of the projects will also conduct their own internal evaluation that will provide more detailed information on the outcomes they are achieving in their communities. Project evaluators have begun to participate in a webinar program, led by Dr. Debra Sheets, the Program's external evaluator, focusing on issues of evaluation including, respite care; programs relying on volunteers; or training programs.

During the next month the Family and Informal Caregiver Support Program website will debut. The website will feature regular updates on the progress of the Program's projects, a focus on a different project each month, and as the evaluation collects data, updates on recent Program findings.

The funded projects are:
 AgeOptions, Oak Park, IL
Caring Together, Living Better uses an asset based community development approach to work directly with churches and other grassroots organizations that serve very poor older adults living in Chicago’s South Suburbs. An asset based approach includes mapping the expressed needs of the caregivers in the affected community along with the existing assets with which to meet those needs. Among the project's services are respite care, caregiver training, access to benefits, among many other things. 

Alzheimer’s Disease and Related Disorders Association of Southern California
Los Angeles, CA
The Asian and Pacific Islander Dementia Care Network provides services for caregivers directly through three Asian cultural and linguistic organizations providing respite care, legal, and financial counseling related to caregiving.

Eastern Area Agency on Aging, Bangor, ME
The Rural Community Based Caregiver Network and Support System offers in-home assessment and 20 volunteer support services, caregiver counseling at the point of hospital discharge, and training for caregivers living in this very rural area of Northern New England.

Isabella Geriatric Center, New York City, NY
The Caregiver Ombudsman Outreach Project supplements the work already done by overworked caseworkers allowing them to work with older adults while a group of specialists work with their family and informal caregivers. The Project offers respite care, caregiver retreats and training sessions, and homecare among other services.

Jewish Family and Children’s Service of Sarasota-Manatee, Sarasota, FL
Caregivers Accessing Resources and Essential Services introduces a widely used approach to planning and delivering services for children known as Wraparound Services to older adult caregivers. Wraparound services views everyone involved in the caregiver and older adult's life as having something of value to add to their well being and care. Through this project caregivers can expect to receive respite care from local volunteers and homemaker services among many other things.

Jewish Healthcare Foundation, Pittsburgh, PA
Caregiver Champions are older adults with caregiver experience providing peer support and counseling along with assistance in gaining access to services through monthly gatherings in their homes. Through this project caregivers are able to have direct contact with major service providers to older adults and to receive services including homecare, respite care, nutrition services, and personal lifestyle programming, such as exercise.

Monadnock Collaborative, Keene, NH
Transitions in Caring links together caregiver support programs in four counties of Western New Hampshire. This project features intensive caregiver training and respite care wherever the caregiver and care receiver live in this very rural area. Beside respite care and training caregivers are supported with in-home volunteers helping with homemaking and chore services.

Parker Jewish Institute for Health Care and Rehabilitation, New Hyde Park, NY
Willing Hearts, Helpful Hands recruits, trains and deploys volunteer respite care workers in Eastern Queens (Hyde Park). The Project features extensively trained volunteers who are able to step in for family and informal caregivers in an emergency or on a regular basis. 

REAL Services, South Bend, IN
Caregiver Connection is a community-based caregiver support system which features caregiver training as a pre-requisite for other supports, a community-based case management system, and home modification. The Project is aimed at a very poor community of older adults, both caregivers and care receivers, living in sub-standard housing which makes good care difficult to provide. 

Senior Action in a Gay Environment, New York City, NY
Life Choices I Care/My Care recognizes that caregivers and care receivers in the LGBT community may have only informal caregivers or friends to provide their care. As such, while a caregiver provides care for a friend, they too need to think about and plan for their own care as they grow older without immediate family. This Project offers training for caregivers but also legal, financial, and personal care planning assistance; as well as respite care from trained volunteers and chore services.

Share the Care, Orlando, FL
Caregiver Central is designed around telephone access to services, a “Caregiver College” serving as a hub for services and training, and three satellite campuses, in older, low-income African American and Latino communities in Metropolitan Orlando. At the hub or any of the satellites a caregiver can find a care manager who will provide caregiving advice, a link to services, and hands-on training. Any of these services can also be accessed over the telephone.

Southern Caregiver Resource Center, San Diego, CA
The Partners In Caring Collaboration brings services for caregivers to the South Bay area, the very diverse communities south of San Diego along the Mexican border. The Project delivers respite care, training, Meals on Wheels, as well as homemaker and chore services to older, often mono-lingual, caregivers who have no current access to services. Each community in the area has its own care manager located in the community to coordinate these services and training opportunities.

Wellmed Charitable Foundation, San Antonio, TX
The Alamo Caregiver Tele-Connection Collaboration is a rich mix of services and supports available by telephone, on the web, or in person to low-income older adults in the San Antonio area. This bi-lingual, bi-cultural program is based on the Telecare model currently used in Montreal. The Alamo Tele-Connection allows a caller or visitor to the web or program site to have access to services delivered by all of the older adult serving agencies in San Antonio. Services caregivers can receive through this program include respite care, in-home assessment, benefits screening for both the care receiver and caregiver, among many more services.

Grantee Highlights

Donn Weinberg at the Annual Philanthropy Roundtable Conference
Is the American Dream slipping out of reach? Many Americans—too many—feel like they just can’t get ahead. Working-class incomes have stagnated, and for many low-income wage earners, upward mobility seems like a vanishing prospect. Can working-class Americans still dream of a better life for themselves and for their children? Certainly many donors think so—and are working on effective ways to expand workforce opportunity. On October 2nd, Donn Weinberg moderated a panel that included three experts who discussed these opportunities at the Philanthropy Roundtable conference in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Under Barbara Dyer, the Hitachi Foundation has shaped the Jobs to Careers initiative, which works to meet the needs of frontline healthcare workers and the National Fund for Workforce Solutions, a nationwide effort to leverage local support for career advancement in twenty-two communities. Ron Hearn, Executive Director of the Baltimore Alliance for Careers in Healthcare, has worked closely with Baltimore’s healthcare community to increase the number of entry-level hires and provide training to upgrade the skills of current healthcare workers. And Elsa L. Holguín, Senior Program Officer at Denver’s Rose Community Foundation, has worked to support employment and training programs that help people find stable jobs and support services to get them climbing up the career ladder. This panel discussed career advancement strategies in the various economic sectors, costs and benefits of career advancement programs, and the effectiveness of philanthropy in this area.

Two Grantees are Highlighted in Public/Private Ventures (P/PV) Report on Sectoral Employment
“In 2003, with support from the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation, P/PV launched the Sectoral Employment Impact Study to test the efficacy of one such approach. Using a random-assignment design, P/PV researchers set out to answer the question: Can well-implemented, sector-focused training programs make a difference to the earnings of low-income disadvantaged workers and job seekers? Three organizations were selected to participate in the study: Jewish Vocational Service in Boston, Per Scholas in the Bronx, and the Wisconsin Regional Training Partnership in Milwaukee. This issue of P/PV In Brief, http://www.ppv.org/ppv/initiative.asp?section_id=26&initiative_id=9, summarizes impacts found for participants across the three sites, including increases in earnings and employment; a more detailed report on the study will be released in late 2009.” Jewish Vocational Service in Boston and Wisconsin Regional Training Partnership in Milwaukee are current Weinberg Foundation grantees.

Big Brother Big Sister of Israel
We congratulate Big Brother Big Sister of Israel (BBBS), a 2009 grantee, for receiving the Mayor of Jerusalem’s Award for Excellence in Volunteerism for 2008-2009. The award will be presented to BBBS at a special ceremony on October 18, 2009. This prestigious award recognizes the contributions of individuals and organizations whose activities enhance the quality of life for the citizens of Jerusalem. Bestowed upon a very small group of organizations and individuals, the award is testimony to the importance and necessity of long term mentoring for children and youth from single parent families in Jerusalem and throughout the country. Mazel tov to BBBS of Israel! www.bigbrothers.org.il

Network For Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE)
Award-winning filmmaker Mary Mazzio’s newest project Ten9Eight is a thoughtful film which tells the inspirational stories of several inner city teens from Harlem to Compton, as they compete in an annual business plan competition run by the Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE). NFTE is an international nonprofit organization that teaches young people from low-income communities to think like entrepreneurs so they can take control of their futures. Founded in 1987 by Steve Mariotti, a former New York City public school teacher, it originally began as a dropout prevention and academic performance improvement program for students who were at risk of failing or quitting school. Today, NFTE has grown into a comprehensive business education program in 27 states and 13 countries with more than 230,000 graduates and 1,300 NFTE-certified entrepreneurship teachers. The Weinberg Foundation has provided over $1M for the Baltimore program and assisted in introducing the program to Baltimore and Israel, and is especially proud of the three Baltimoreans featured in the film, including William Mack, Ja’Mal Wills, and Anné Montague. www.nfte.com

Weinberg Grantees Move Into Common Space
Baltimore Urban Debate League, Teach for America, Experience Corps, and Building Educated Leaders for Life are four Weinberg Foundation past grantees who have all relocated to Miller’s Court in Baltimore City, a project of Seawall Development. Originally built at the turn of the 20th century as the headquarters of H.F. Miller and Sons, a tin box manufacturing company, the newly renovated Miller's Court now provides 40 affordable apartments targeted to teachers as well as office space with reduced rent for educational nonprofits. This building will provide opportunities for collaboration and idea sharing among multiple nonprofits working to improve opportunity in Baltimore.

Habitat for Humanity of the Chesapeake - 9.09.09 Project
HFHC 9.09.09 project has redeveloped a previously vacant lot at 2400 E. Fayette Street with nine new, energy efficient row homes. Using prefabricated modules that were brought in by trucks on September 9, HFHC worked with volunteers to complete the homes that will be purchased by low-income homeowners. Pictured here are two of the nine homeowners who will receive keys to their homes at a dedication ceremony on October 17, 2009. HFHC has demonstrated that it is possible to quickly and efficiently create new affordable housing stock, which is sorely needed in Baltimore City. www.chesapeakehfh.org

Maryland Small Grants Program (MSGP) - Recent Grant Awards

The Maryland Small Grants Program continues to respond to the current economic challenges by focusing its grants on services that address Basic Needs for poor and vulnerable populations. The MSGP supports programs that address food security, homeless services, health, family safety, economic assistance, and workforce development. Recent grants include:

Diakonia, Inc. was awarded a $40,000 grant over two years to support individuals who are homeless or in crisis in Worcester County, Maryland. The organization operates a house for emergency needs and homeless men as well as a second house with individual efficiency apartments and a large living unit for women with children. Support services and referrals are provided to encourage clients to move towards independence. In 2007, Diakonia provided 9,616 bed nights to 300 guests and served 55,000 meals.
www.diakoniaoc.org

Belair-Edison Neighborhoods, Inc. (BENI) was awarded $90,000 over two years to support programs that prevent foreclosures and in Baltimore, provide emergency relief. The organization developed a community-based model to combat foreclosures that involves counseling and aggressive community-based marketing and outreach. Last year, BENI counselors met with 255 households and were able to assist 51% of the clients to remain in their homes. They continue to work with the other families in an effort to reach a positive outcome. The emergency program covers utility bills and attorney fees needed to defend foreclosure proceedings, at a maximum one-time grant of $2,000 per family.
www.belair-edison.org

Healthcare for the Homeless Baltimore County, a program of the Franklin Square Hospital Center, received a grant in the amount of $100,000 over two years to support primary health care and some specialty programs for the County’s homeless population. Among other services, the grant will expand dental care to address a major service gap, provide transportation vouchers for patients to travel to appointments, and accommodate increasing patient volumes by expanding clinical space in the Eastern Family Resource Center. The goal is to increase annual patient volume 56%, from 500 patients annually to 780.
www.hchmd.org

Mid-Atlantic Gleaning Network (MAGNET) received an award of $25,000 to expand gleaning of fresh produce and delivery of emergency food assistance to low-income communities in central Maryland. Fresh food that would otherwise be squandered is donated by farmers, harvested by volunteers, and delivered to individuals through food banks and pantries. The grant would support the addition of 10 more farms in the target geographic area, recruit 1,000 more volunteers, and distribute 500,000 more pounds of food. Last year the organization distributed 446,611 pounds of food.
www.mid-atlanticgleaningnetwork.org

Family Crisis Center of Baltimore County, Inc. (FCC-BC) received an award of $20,000 over two years to support its Lethality Assessment Program. This program determines the degree of imminent danger and provides a continuity of services for victims of domestic abuse. The program, coordinated by the Maryland Network Against Domestic Violence, Baltimore County Department of Social Services’ Family Violence Unit, and the Baltimore County Police Department, began in one precinct and today it operates county-wide. www.familycrisiscenter.net

© 2009 The Harry & Jeanette Weinberg Foundation.
All rights reserved.


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