Community Building Grants

OVERVIEW

Community Building Grants: By invitation 
These grants support efforts to increase connections, build capacity and take community-led action.  Support will look different based on your community’s needs. There is no cookie-cutter approach to community building. While the specifics of the work vary from place to place, we always follow the Community Building Principles and Practices.

EXAMPLES

For information purposes only (similar projects are not guaranteed funding): Convenings; group process and engagement; community data collection and listening work; local project coordination; coaching; and facilitation. We look for projects that focus on:

• CONNECTIONS: By increasing Connections, communities foster more supportive, caring, inclusive and lasting relationships among people and across groups.  
• CAPACITY: Capacity is the ability to move community work forward efficiently and effectively. Acquire a new skill set, use data for decision making, have enough and the right people-power, or expand the ability to access and develop funding and other resources. 
• COMMUNITY-LED ACTION: Action is often the most visible form of community building. It can create powerful results when done inclusively and in alignment with community values and vision. Sometimes action is tried and true. Other times there are risks, experimentation and innovation. 

Download the Community Building Grants handout.

Working Together

REQUESTS FOR COMMUNITY BUILDING FUNDS NEED TO:

• Meet the Foundation’s eligibility and readiness requirements.
• Serve communities in rural Oregon or Siskiyou County, Calif., with less than 35,000 in population not adjacent to or part of an urban or metropolitan area.

WHAT TO EXPECT: 

• Very small grants can be decided within two months. Large grants can take up to six months.  
• If your request makes it beyond the initial review, we are happy to talk to you about decision timing to aid in your planning.  

Apply now »