More than $20 Million in Grants Awarded

The Community Foundation for Southeast Michigan announced more than $20 million in grants to organizations and initiatives primarily within southeast Michigan’s seven counties in areas including health, education, the arts, and housing and human services.

“Our goal is to improve the quality of life for all of the residents in Southeast Michigan,” said Mariam C. Noland, President, Community Foundation for Southeast Michigan. “We accomplish this by partnering with organizations and leveraging our networks, expertise, resources, and leadership.”

Grants announced include:

• $225,000 over two years to the University Musical Society for the expansion of a partnership with the Michigan Opera Theater to offer dance performances and programs in Southeast Michigan. The partnership for the expansion will bring to Detroit acclaimed dance companies and create engagement opportunities for existing and new dance patrons.
• $50,000 to the Grosse Pointe War Memorial to fund Arts at the Alger programming at the Patriot Theater, including community-focused arts events and live performances. The Alger House (circa 1910) is a designated Michigan State Historic Site and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
• $30,000 to the Michigan History Foundation to research, write, and publish an educational guidebook about President Ulysses S. Grant’s life and impact on Detroit. The Detroit home of Ulysses S. and Julia Grant is the only publicly-owned house of a president in Michigan. Currently located at the former State Fairgrounds in Detroit, through a collaboration between the Michigan Department of Natural Resources the Eastern Market Corp., the Michigan History Center, the Michigan History Society, and Heritage Michigan, the Grant House will be moved from its current location to a site owned by the Eastern Market Corp.
• $70,000 over two years to Gleaners Community Food Bank, Inc. to evaluate the impact of providing nutritious food to low-income participants in the Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP), a division of the Michigan National Kidney Foundation of Michigan. The project will capitalize on Gleaners’ knowledge of cost-effective food procurement and delivery, including just-in-time delivery to allow for greater varieties and quantities of healthy food. The work will be focused in urban areas including Detroit, Pontiac, and Inkster.
• $70,000 to the Groundwork Center for Resilient Communities Inc. to expand a project that empowers schools to purchase locally grown food. Groundwork’s largest farm-to-school program, 10 Cents a Meal for School Kids & Farms, provides matching funds for schools to purchase Michigan-grown fruits and vegetables. The goal of 10 Cents is to increase children’s access to healthy, local foods, while building markets for farms and local food economies
• $75,000 to the Regents of the University of Michigan to provide a comprehensive behavioral health care strategy for all students within the Detroit Public Schools Community District. The grant will fund a partnership between Detroit Public Schools and Transforming Research into Practice to Improve the Lives of Students (TRAILS), which was developed by the Flinn Foundation.
• $65,000 to Alliance for Housing, Oakland County’s Continuum of Care to pilot a program providing free legal services for homeless individuals in Oakland County in a partnership with Street Democracy. Program goals include: offering treatment instead of punishment for persons experiencing homelessness, poverty, or disability; reducing the impact of aggressive sentencing and collection practices in Oakland County against the poor; and providing a framework for all district courts to become specialty courts that can adapt and mobilize to address individuals’ specific needs.
• $70,000 over two years to the Maurice & Jane Sugar Law Center for Economic and Social Justice to create community-based workshops on employee rights for individuals entering or reentering the workforce. The project seeks to educate community members and help them develop realistic and meaningful workplace expectations. It will give workers the confidence and the knowledge they need to advocate on their own behalf in an informed manner, without confrontation or the need to invoke legal processes. The primary focus will be in Wayne, Macomb, Oakland and Monroe counties.
• $60,000 to the Grandmont/Rosedale Development Corporation (GRDC), to implement and document the process of creative placemaking projects in the Grandmont/Rosedale Community. GRDC has implemented a number of creative placemaking projects in the past, including installing pocket parks on Grand River, mural-painting, and neighborhood pocket park renovation, in addition to managing a successful farmers’ market.

Current grants also includes nearly half a million dollars to children and youth initiatives through the Detroit Auto Dealers Association Charitable Foundation Fund, New Economy Initiative grants and other special grant programs.