• Worst winter ever: “Unprecedented” number seek shelter • Foundation offers local charities dollar-for-dollar match when they attract new gifts • One charity sees donations increase 53%, thanks to Making a Good Gift Better more
...
• Successful model, founded by MacArthur “genius” Bill Strickland, now considered for other U.S. cities. • Will New Haven be next? • Funding the $150K study: UI, Empower New Haven, William Graustein, Yale-New Haven Hospital, The Foundationmore
...
For 5 years, PACK (Parents and Communities for Kids) has filled a void in our community by giving families free access to activities they might not otherwise be able to afford.
Winkler and Virginia Dietz Gosch were inseparable, and proverbial opposites. He, tall with a gruff exterior; she, petite with a voice that brought to mind a nightingale. Theirs was the kind of love that songs were written about—literally.
Seven towns of the Naugatuck Valley currently feeding and sheltering the homeless out of a Derby site will benefit from the construction of a new shelter in Shelton. The facility should be operational by spring 2008 and was made possible, in part, through an initial grant from The Community Foundation. more
...
Through their their donor-advised fund, a New Haven couple are creating rooms in neonatal intensive care units across America that provide privacy for parents to pray, plot strategies and hold their children. more
...
Ed Konowitz of Cheshire is a fairly quiet man; unassuming and definitely modest when he discusses his role with the Friends of the Cheshire Library. In truth, Konowitz, a retired CPA, was instrumental in convincing the Friends to transfer $50,000 in funds and its stock portfolio in order to create an agency endowment in June of 2006.more
...
Today, the sight of a child wearing a leg brace is a rarity as the crippling effects of the nearly-eliminated disease have been seldom seen over the past two generations. But that hasn’t changed the generosity of a group of orthopaedic surgeonsmore
...
In 2005, The Foundation established the New Haven Hurricane Katrina Relief Fund in response to the devastating impact of hurricanes on America’s Gulf Coast communities. Over $82,700 was donated to the fund and distributed to numerous families around New Haven through 9 local nonprofit organizations that provided direct care services to evacuees.more
...
If Arianna Jones wasn’t too shy to utter more than an occasionally “yes” or “no” in a squeak of a voice, she’d tell you the world can be a very scary place when you’re 6-years-old and about as big as a buttonmore
...
Rosa Nieves didn’t go to Florida for Spring Break like so many other college seniors in 2006. Instead, she dug rows and put in an irrigation system for families in La Goyena, Nicaragua so that they will be able to grow food when the rain season comes.
Picture this: A vacant lot in a residential neighborhood. It is an eyesore attracting questionable activity and illegal dumping. People walk or drive past it every day . . . One day, a group of residents from the neighborhood take action.
A group of 7th and 8th graders at the Worthington Hooker Middle School in New Haven experienced the thrill of a lifetime this year when they participated in the Odyssey of the Mind Competition at Iowa State University. The Foundation and other organizations awarded $2,500 for six students and two chaperones to attend the mind-challenging event. more
...
If there’s anyone who knows New Haven and has a strong desire to see it succeed over generations to come, it’s James Gilbert of Woodbridge.
The 86-year-old New Haven native can cite chapter and verse about the city in which he and his wife were born; where they raised their four children, and in the future dreams he has for seeing New Haven’s industrial growth return. more
...
Two Southern Connecticut teens have found a way to keep local middle and high school teens off the street and burn up what could have been negative energy and boredom.
When you ask Robert Page about the Alliance of African American Non-profit Executives he leans back, smiles broadly and gazes up to the ceiling as though you just told him he’d won the lottery.
“In the past,” he reflects, “I only heard of the demise of various colleagues’ organizations. I never got the chance to meet with them; never saw them; never spoke with them. Today, thanks to the establishment of the Alliance, the African American community is no longer fragmented; we’re a real community with identity.”more
...
If you didn’t know the late Jay Bovilsky before his death in 2000 at age 55, once you hear of his accomplishments you’ll wish you had been among his hundreds of friends. According to the 500-plus mourners at his funeral—many of whom eulogized him—Jay transcended the term “renaissance man.” more
...
Imagine devoting your life’s work to promoting the use of organic materials in the earth only to come home and find your condo association has sprayed pesticides in all the flower beds under your bedroom window.
The resurrection of the Yale Folk Festival has led to one of New Haven’s largest off-campus, non-sporting events each fall Shades of Peter, Paul and Mary and The Kingston Trio now fill Edgerton Park through the music of artists such as the legendary Arlo Guthrie, The Grassy Hill Song Circle and Tangled Up in Blue.
If one evening you see 125 laughing 8th grade Branford girls dressed in pajamas and fuzzy slippers, making candles and gluing precious mementos like half an M&M’s wrapper to a pink door labeled “HER STORY,” you’ll probably call it the school’s largest pajama party.
Today, donors are playing a more proactive role in their charitable giving and donor advised giving is the fastest growing area of philanthropy, both locally and nationally. Jerry and Roz Meyer are donor advisors using The Foundation’s knowledge of the community and investment management expertise to maximize the impact of their giving.more
...
Imagine for a moment what it would feel like to be a graduate of college and debt free . . . the world at your fingers, ready for you to make your mark. This is the opportunity that Gary and Jacqueline Childress are giving to the students who win their scholarship. more
...
The Foundation’s Communities of Color initiative is raising awareness of philanthropic opportunities for African-American, Latino and Asian-American leaders. We are supporting their efforts as they build their networks to increase giving around important issues, problems and challenges that deeply affect their communities. Guided by John Padilla and his wife Frances, the Progreso Latino Fund Steering Committee is engaging the Latino community and raising $100,000 by year-end 2005.
With the assistance of Dr. Janice Gruendel, The Foundation’s FirstYearsFirst initiative is mobilizing the community to focus on the needs of the youngest among us. Through grants, through fundraising, through partnerships with other organizations including United Way, through extensive community outreach, and through tracking the progress of children born in 2004 to the kindergarten door, FirstYearsFirst is taking a comprehensive and collaborative approach to this challenge.more
...
People committed to the needs of Greater New Haven are increasingly turning to The Foundation as a source of knowledge about the community’s needs and opportunities and as a way to engage more deeply in defining how they want to be involved. Ron and Susan Netter, together with their daughter Sarah and son-in-law Andy Boone, share their perspectives on how The Foundation has helped them define their giving.more
...
At the Women & Family Life Center, a young woman working through the challenges of separation sits expectantly in her first support group session. Elsewhere at the Center, the adolescent girls participating in the "Speak Out" empowerment program discuss urgent issues, embark on nature-reflection walks, and consult their journals.more
...
Seven towns of the Naugatuck Valley currently feeding and sheltering the homeless out of a Derby site will benefit from the construction of a new shelter in Shelton. The facility should be operational by spring 2008 and was made possible, in part, through an initial grant from The Community Foundation.
Ed Konowitz of Cheshire is a fairly quiet man; unassuming and definitely modest when he discusses his role with the Friends of the Cheshire Library. 
If Arianna Jones wasn’t too shy to utter more than an occasionally “yes” or “no” in a squeak of a voice, she’d tell you the world can be a very scary place when you’re 6-years-old and about as big as a button
Rosa Nieves didn’t go to Florida for Spring Break like so many other college seniors in 2006. Instead, she dug rows and put in an irrigation system for families in La Goyena, Nicaragua so that they will be able to grow food when the rain season comes. 
Picture this: A vacant lot in a residential neighborhood. It is an eyesore attracting questionable activity and illegal dumping. People walk or drive past it every day . . . One day, a group of residents from the neighborhood take action. 
A group of 7th and 8th graders at the Worthington Hooker Middle School in New Haven experienced the thrill of a lifetime this year when they participated in the Odyssey of the Mind Competition at Iowa State University. The Foundation and other organizations awarded $2,500 for six students and two chaperones to attend the mind-challenging event. 
