Philanthropy News Digest

The largest-ever pooled private investment for arts across Los Angeles County
will sustain community organizations and save jobs

(more…)

MyNewsLA

The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health’s Community Health Worker (CHW) Outreach Initiative has been extended after the federal government extended the CARES Act funding into 2021. Originally slated to end December 30th, this extension will provide an estimated $3 million in unspent funds for partner agencies to conduct outreach by deploying CHWs through end of January and possibly into February.

The CHW Outreach initiative began mid-October with a budget of $18.5 million and mobilized a Public Health Team of about 60 CHWs, and in partnership with California Community Foundation, contracted with 16 community-based organizations with existing peer outreach networks to conduct outreach countywide to those most impacted by the virus.

MyNewsLA

NBC News

Health Pathways Expansion grants will help providers reach people experiencing homelessness despite longstanding, complex obstacles to good medical care

LOS ANGELES – The California Community Foundation and United Way of Greater Los Angeles announced a nearly $2.5 million collaboration to deliver critical care to people experiencing homelessness throughout Los Angeles County, building a foundation for further integration of health and homeless service systems on top of providing direct services.

Sparked by a $500,000 founding gift from Cedars Sinai, the Health Pathways Expansion grants include investment support from L.A. Care Health Plan, UniHealth Foundation, and a generous $1 million contribution from Providence.

The urgency of COVID-19 created an opportunity for collaboration and innovation to produce a new system to serve this vulnerable population. Early on in the pandemic, the gap in care and challenges in coordinating across health and homeless service systems grew rapidly. A series of United Way-led Zoom conversations resulted in the formation of the Health Pathways Group, which brought in additional public and philanthropic partners. The group continues to meet to support the health needs of people experiencing homelessness and integration of systems.

Guided by United Way, public-private funding partners turned conversations into action and created the Health Pathways Expansion grants. The investment funds 16 local health service providers who will deliver quality healthcare to Project Roomkey sites, interim shelters, and through street-based services. The reach is county-wide and pairs health service providers with local homeless service agencies.

Grants will enable a range of support including medical and benefits staff, equipment, patient care costs for ongoing health needs, and helping clients establish health coverage.

“The pandemic highlighted the fundamental gap between health and homeless services. It made accessing healthcare nearly impossible for people experiencing homelessness,” said Elise Buik, President and CEO of United Way of Greater Los Angeles. “Our vulnerable neighbors will now be able to get the care they need. In addition to on the ground services, the Health Pathways Expansion grants create an unprecedented opportunity for the system to strengthen and innovate to better serve people experiencing homelessness.”

“As we connected with partners in the health and homeless service spaces, we were struck by the disconnects preventing people from receiving care,” said Antonia Hernández, President and CEO of the California Community Foundation. “The grants address this gap. The lessons we learn from these initial investments have the potential to inform policy, improve access, and change the way we deliver health services.”

“We know that reliable medical care is hard to come by if you are unhoused. Early data gathered from LA County Project Roomkey sites showed gaps in health care for participants, despite being qualified for coverage. Partnerships like this are imperative and allow healthcare providers to meet people where they are,” said Heidi Marston, Executive Director, Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority. “Whether you are on the street or indoors, you deserve access to medical care. We are eager to see this resource come online to support people in their journey to permanent housing.”

“Providing excellent health care to people who need it the most, is our mission,” said Alicia Mardini, Chief Executive Officer, East Valley Community Health Center. “East Valley is thankful for the Health Pathways grant as it will allow us to expand our services to two Project RoomKey sites and a homeless shelter within our communities.”

“St. John’s Well Child & Family Center is grateful for the Health Pathways Expansion grant funding, which will be used to support our mobile clinic team expand critical medical services at Project Roomkey Interim Housing Program sites in South Los Angeles for people experiencing homelessness who are most at risk of contracting COVID-19,” said Jim Mangia, MPH, Chief Executive Officer, St. John’s Well Child and Family Center. “This funding creates an opportunity for innovation to address health equity for one of the most marginalized populations in Los Angeles County.”

“This funding is an opportunity to bring essential medical and supportive services that address the social determinants of health for people experiencing homelessness,” Sharine Forbes, MSG, RN, Director of Chronic Disease Management & Health Equity, St. John’s Well Child and Family Center. “With our mobile clinic, St. John’s Well Child & Family Center docks at Project Roomkey Interim Housing Program sites and sees between 20 – 35 clients per day, providing health insurance screening and enrollment, medical care, behavioral health care, and case management.”

Health Pathways Expansion Grantees:

MEDIA CONTACT:

Roshin Mathew at rmathew [@] calfund [.] org or (213) 452-6229

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United Way of Greater Los Angeles is a nonprofit organization fighting to end poverty by preparing students for high school graduation, college, and the workforce; housing our homeless neighbors; and guiding hard-working families towards economic mobility. United Way identifies the root causes of poverty and works strategically to solve them by building alliances across all sectors, funding targeted programs and advocating for change.

The California Community Foundation has served as a public, charitable organization for Los Angeles County since 1915. Its mission is to lead positive systemic change that strengthens Los Angeles communities. CCF stewards $1.8 billion in assets and manages 1,700 charitable foundations, funds and legacies. For more information, please visit www.calfund.org.

 

 

KCET

Los Angeles Times

 J. Paul Getty Trust and the California Community Foundation announce a first major round of support to local art organizations and artists facing historic challenges

LOS ANGELES – Four hundred artists and 80 arts organizations received $2.7 million in total grants as part of a broad-based COVID-19 relief effort for the visual arts in the Los Angeles region, the J. Paul Getty Trust and the California Community Foundation announced today. The emergency support was designed to reach individual artists throughout all areas of LA County and arts organizations that serve the region’s culturally diverse communities.

“The arts are a source of expression, resistance, and healing,” says Joan Weinstein, director of the Getty Foundation, an operating program of the Getty Trust, which initiated the $10 million LA Arts COVID-19 Relief and Recovery Fund to help small and midsize visual arts organizations. “But our creative artists and arts organizations, who do so much to advocate for social change, will not survive this pandemic and its economic fallout if we don’t take action now to support them.”

The economic impact of COVID-19 has been especially hard on small and midsize arts institutions. The pandemic also laid bare inequities in funding, particularly for organizations that serve communities of color. Smaller arts organizations tend to operate without any endowment funds or cash reserves. Yet they act as essential community anchors, supporting creative expression for artists of color, providing access to the arts for underserved groups, and offering arts education in schools and at their own sites. Even while their doors have been closed, many have worked hard to maintain their community bonds, hosting COVID-19 testing sites or food distribution centers on their premises.

After months of lost revenue, these organizations are struggling to maintain staff, provide safe galleries and workspaces that meet new health and safety standards, and still ensure meaningful arts participation for their communities when they reopen.

The more than $2 million in emergency relief grants awarded to 80 visual arts nonprofits and museums provides support to meet urgent financial needs over the next three months, including staff salaries, rent, and emergency supplies to comply with public health measures. This basic operating support will also allow organizations some leeway to plan for reopening, restructuring, and collaboration. Innovation will be critical if these institutions want to continue their work.

“We’re going to have to become semi-experts in how to manage spaces and arts experiences through a public health lens,” says Betty Avila, executive director of the arts nonprofit Self Help Graphics & Art, which received an emergency grant.

Self Help has worked at the intersection of arts and social justice since 1973, serving its community in East Los Angeles by promoting local Chicana/o and Latinx artists. But Avila recognizes they won’t endure if they don’t adapt, and the COVID relief grant will start them on that path. “We cannot return to our work with a ‘back to business as usual’ perspective.” In the meantime, the emergency grant will help them cover operational expenses, including support for Self Help Graphics’ teaching artists.

The threats facing arts institutions extend to visual artists. Thousands saw their income evaporate as the museums and non-profit spaces that exhibit their work shuttered. Many also depend on part-time work as teaching artists or preparators who set up and take down exhibitions. Countless artists also survive on work in the gig economy. With high unemployment across the region, they are straining to find alternative sources of income.

The California Community Foundation and Getty responded by creating the Relief Fund for L.A. County Visual Artists. The Fund has provided emergency grants of up to $2000 each to 400 local artists who work in all visual arts disciplines. Artists who applied for grants were asked to demonstrate their artistic practice through an online presentation of their work and to describe their financial needs. Additional contributions came from a trio of local artist-endowed foundations: the Mike Kelley Foundation for the Arts, the Sam Francis Foundation, and the Shepard and Amanda Fairey Foundation. The artist relief fund is administered by the Center for Cultural Innovation.

“This crisis is a wake-up call to all Angelenos to support the organizations that provide access to the arts and the artists that inspire us to be resilient,” says Antonia Hernández, president and CEO of the California Community Foundation, which is administering the LA Arts COVID-19 Fund. “The emergency grants will reach a wide array of arts nonprofits and dedicated artists, but more help is needed. The demand for funds was far greater than the supply. We welcome others to join us in this effort to ensure the arts continue contributing to the cultural vitality and wellness of our region for the benefit of all residents.”

For over 30 years, Getty and CCF have been longtime collaborators in the arts, supporting one of the most prestigious fellowships for visual artists in the country, the biennial Fellowships for Visual Artists. The Fellowship, led by CCF, was created by an earlier endowment from the Getty and has grown with subsequent donations from CCF and individual donors. The LA Arts COVID-19 Relief and Recovery Fund was a natural extension of that partnership. The next phase of their work together will focus on recovery grants to help key museums and visuals arts organizations reimagine their operations in order to survive and thrive in the coming years. More information on recovery funds will be available before this fall.

FOR A LIST OF GRANTEES, PLEASE CLICK HERE

 

MEDIA CONTACTS:

Paula Valle Castañon at pvalle@www.calfund.org or 213.452.6233

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Getty is a leading global arts organization committed to the exhibition, conservation, and understanding of the world’s artistic and cultural heritage.  Working collaboratively with partners around the globe, the Getty Foundation, Getty Conservation Institute, Getty Museum and Getty Research Institute are all dedicated to the greater understanding of the relationships between the world’s many cultures.  The Los Angeles-based J. Paul Getty Trust and Getty programs share art, knowledge, and resources online at Getty.edu and welcome the public for free at the Getty Center and the Getty Villa.

 

The Getty Foundation fulfills the philanthropic mission of the Getty Trust by supporting individuals and institutions committed to advancing the greater understanding and preservation of the visual arts in Los Angeles and throughout the world. Through strategic grant initiatives, the Foundation strengthens art history as a global discipline, promotes the interdisciplinary practice of conservation, increases access to museum and archival collections, and develops current and future leaders in the visual arts. It carries out its work in collaboration with the other Getty Programs to ensure that they individually and collectively achieve maximum effect. Additional information is available at www.getty.edu/foundation.

 

About The California Community Foundation

The California Community Foundation has served as a public, charitable organization for Los Angeles County since 1915, its mission is to lead positive systemic change that strengthens Los Angeles communities. CCF manages 1,700 charitable foundations, funds and legacies. For more information, please visit www.calfund.org.