A foundation that provides thousands of dollars in financial support to Nakusp groups every year is encouraging the community to apply for funding this spring.
The Nakusp and Area Community Foundation is about to begin its 15th year of supporting community groups by funding community-building actitivities.
“Every year we have eligibility guides lines for grants,” says Foundation board president David Jackson. “Each year we target the arts, social welfare, or focus on the environment or recreation.”
A community foundation is a pool of money — endowments — carefully invested to produce funds for community projects. Investment income is distributed as grants to local, charitable organizations.
The capital pool is never touched and provides a perpetual source of income that can be used to meet needs in the community. Once a foundation is established, it continuously generates revenue even if no new donations are received.
Working with the Kootenay Savings and Credit Union, the NACF has built a pool of $300,000, allowing it to hand out $10-$12,000 every year to various gorups.
“Our grantees are all over the map,” says Jackson. “While we discourage groups from coming back to us year after year, there are folks we contribute to regularly, like Sufferfest.”
The NACF supports community groups and activities in an area where raising funds can be difficult. Despite all that good work over the years, Jackson admits the NACF has to work on its profile and image.
“People just don’t really understand what a foundation does,” he says. “In Nakusp we get confused with perhaps the Community Forest organization, and other outfits.”
“We have had articles in the Arrow Lakes News for close to 20 years practically now, and even though we hand out money to folks, they don’t really understand who we are and what we are.”
Another hurdle is how the money has to be handed out, says Jackson. Only registered not-for-profit charities can apply for grants, a huge hurdle for most small groups. But the way locals can get around it is by partnering with other agencies. The Arrow Lakes and Slocan Community Services agency is one such organization that helps locals apply for the funding using its charity status.
“It helps overcome that bit of red tape for a slowpitch league, or minor hockey or high school clubs,” says Jackson.
And people looking for support will find an open door at the NACF.
“We have good intentions to target our funding, but we grant to whomever fits our criteria. We are always trying to promote our criteria for the year, for a healthy community, arts or culture, but if we only get two applications from that area, we will consider the other applications.
“Typically we don’t give out large sums of money, wouldn’t give out our whole $10- or $12,000 to one group, we’d have a hard time justifying that to the community.”
The spring intake for grants will start soon. Interested groups should check the NACF’s website for application criteria and details, https://nakuspfoundation.com/