McKnight Focuses on Midwest Climate, Energy

April 10, 2013

logo_mcknight_200This week MCF member The McKnight Foundation announced a new strategic focus to make the Midwest a leader in addressing climate change.

The new Midwest Climate & Energy program complements over 20 years of McKnight support for renewable energy in Minnesota and the Midwest. Aimee Witteman will direct the new initiative.

“Over the past five years, McKnight has invested over $60 million globally through the ClimateWorks Foundation network, which has yielded major advances in carbon reduction and helped draw other funding into key areas around the world,” noted Kate Wolford, foundation president. “Now building on the Foundation’s history as a place-based funder, we will concentrate attention and funding in the Midwest.”

“America’s Midwest contributes 22 percent more greenhouse gas emissions per capita than the national average,” explained McKnight board chair Ted Staryk. “With the right vision and collaboration, we have an opportunity now to use the Midwest’s industries, geography, and bipartisan political will to our advantage for greater economic prosperity and an overall better regional future.”

$25 Million in Grants Announced
McKnight is jumpstarting the Midwest Climate & Energy program with $25 million in funding to two key partners:

  • RE-AMP received $5 million over two years to promote policies in the Upper Midwest that advance clean energy and combat climate change. A grantee since 2004, RE-AMP is a network of more than 150 nonprofits and 14 foundations working in eight Midwest states to reduce pollution that causes climate change.
  • Energy Foundation, San Francisco, received $20 million over two years to win new clean energy policies in the Midwest and reshape the national narrative around energy and climate. McKnight has partnered with EF since 1993, with a primary focus on public policies to encourage markets for renewable energy and energy efficiency.

Public, Private Integrated Approach
McKnight’s climate-related work will engage the region’s public and private leaders, decisionmakers, and communities. Key objectives are:

  • Climate and energy policy: Support for grantees and networks to advance related Midwest policies in energy generation, efficiency, transmission, agriculture, and transportation.
  • Community engagement: Support to advance community-level efforts that promote energy and transportation efficiency, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
  • Resilient clean energy economy: Support to facilitate private-sector leaders and networks to develop, promote, and implement climate and energy objectives for the Midwest.

For more, read the Star Tribune’s coverage of the announcement or visit The McKnight Foundation website.

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McKnight Open Letter Forecasts Its 2013 Grantmaking

January 23, 2013

mcknight-foundationIn an open letter to its grantees and program partners, The McKnight Foundation announced its grantmaking plans for 2013.

These plans includes core giving of $79 million in the coming year, about on par with previous years, as the foundation continues to recover from the economic downturn. McKnight will also finalize $25 million in grants that will go toward addressing climate change and developing renewable energy.

The foundation also celebrated some key 2012 achievements, and tied them back to its new strategic framework grounded in adaptive leadership, meant to infuse new agility in how the foundation serves the community. These 2012 milestones include:

  • Co-funding a University of Minnesota report on ensuring a network of 14 Twin Cities transitways planned for 2030 reaches its full potential.
  • New grants to Twin Cities school districts and charter schools to create a seamless pipeline from pre-kindergarten through grade 3, and increase the percentage of successful third grade readers. McKnight also funded a case study that examines the impact in Minnesota from investments in early education.
  • Loans that helped the State of Louisiana purchase coastal wetlands important to the native environment.
  • The launch of the State of the Artist blog, which provides a new platform for important conversations about and among regional and national thought leaders in the arts.

Congratulations to The McKnight Foundation on these accomplishments, and on the recent launch of its new website! You can head over to it to read President Kate Wolford’s full open letter.

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Member Post: Pe’ Sla Returns to Oceti Sakowin

December 13, 2012

pesla

We hear today on the blog from MCF member Indian Land Tenure Foundation. The foundation shares its story of a recent victory in protecting a site sacred to the Oceti Sakowin — a great example of how philanthropy can successfully help to fight for a community in need.

Last week in Rapid City, South Dakota, full ownership and control of the sacred site Pe’ Sla, located in the Black Hills, was officially returned to the Oceti Sakowin (Great Sioux Nation). We at Indian Land Tenure Foundation would like to offer our sincere and heartfelt congratulations to the Oceti Sakowin on its return of the control of this sacred site to all the people of the Nation and its relatives today and for all future generations.

It was first announced in August that the land containing Pe’ Sla was going to be auctioned to the highest bidder. The area known as Pe’ Sla by the Lakota is one of five holy sites for the Nation and the only one not on public land. This area is particularly important in that it is the site of the Lakota origin story and star knowledge.

A collaborative effort raised the $9 million purchase price for the 1,942 acre parcel of land. While recognizing that the ownership of this land and the remainder of the Black Hills is still disputed by non-Indians, gaining control of this site was an opportunity too good to pass up and too important not to fight for.

It has truly been an honor for Indian Land Tenure Foundation and Indian Land Capital Company to be a part of this remarkable effort and to work with the Lakota and Dakota nations and other partners over the past few months. Indian Land Capital Company, ILTF’s affiliate lender, was able to provide $900,000 in rapid financing in order to help the tribes secure the initial purchase agreement.

In the end, all of the tribes of the Oceti Sakowin will have contributed time, effort and scarce funds to make this transaction possible. It is anticipated that each tribe will also participate in the oversight and management of the land to ensure its spiritual and cultural values.

As Indian people, we are faced every day with the loss of our sacred lands and the way in which this has impacted our communities, families and cultures. History being what it is, we recognize that our struggle to recover these lands will be difficult and long but we do not accept that these losses are permanent. The return of Pe’ Sla has renewed our spirit. To see so many people willing to support the rights of American Indians and the return of Indian land makes us hopeful that there is a growing number of people that understand the magnitude of what we have lost.

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Grantmaking at Margaret A. Cargill Philanthropies

October 26, 2011

Margaret Cargill

Read the fall issue of Giving Forum for an update on what’s happening at Margaret A. Cargill Philanthropies, where grantmaking has started in the areas of Environment; Relief, Recovery and Development; and Arts and Cultures.

  • Environment: Grants made in June focus on land-use solutions in the Tongass National Forest in Alaska and neighboring Great Bear Rainforest in Canada; also Micronesia, to support efforts to preserve coral reefs and land-based resources. The next grants likely will be made in Asia, focused on marine- and land-use in Indonesia and Cambodia. Watch for a local subprogram focus on connecting youth with the outdoors.
    Email: environment@macphil.org
  • Relief, Recovery and Development: First “rapid response” grants made in September 2011 to Midwest community foundations, to help residents affected by flooding and tornadoes.
    Email: reliefrecoverydevelopment@macphil.org
  • Arts and Cultures – Native Arts, Teacher Education, and Folk Art: Organizations working on Native Arts in the Pacific Northwest are now being invited to apply for grants from the Native Arts program. Those doing similar work on Native Arts in the upper Midwest, including Minnesota, will soon be invited to apply.
    Email: artsandcultures@macphil.org

Other program areas that the organization will address are under development. They will include: Aging services; children and families; animal welfare; and planned health.

Most, if not all, of these areas will include a component of local giving. Terry Meersman, vice president of programs for Margaret A. Cargill Foundation, explains:

“We’re clear about our program areas, and we’re clear there will be local giving. As much as possible, we’d like to be consistent in the areas we’re defining for national and global giving, but until we have things laid out completely, it’s hard to say that there will be an exact parallel structure locally.”

Read the Giving Forum article for much more information.

- Susan Stehling, communications associate

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New Biodiversity Fund Supports Duluth-Superior Region

February 14, 2011

A newly created fund at the Duluth Superior Area Community Foundation provides new grant opportunities for nonprofits focused on the environment. More specifically, the Biodiversity Fund will support efforts to maintain and strengthen biodiversity in the Duluth-Superior region through preservation and restoration of habitat, help for particular species and ecosystems, planning for changing conditions, research, and education.

The purpose is to consider now the value to future generations of the species and ecosystem diversity that will remain when and if human population stabilizes. The grant deadline for this competitive fund is April 1. Grants will range from $1,000 – $10,000.

Fund creator, UMD Physics Professor Tom Jordan, has a long-term vision of ensuring that ecosystem diversity remains for future generations. “Things have changed in my lifetime,” Jordan says. “The world has filled with people.  Human population keeps growing and this is putting pressure and impacts on other species of life.” Jordan goes on to say that by establishing this fund, he hopes to make a difference within the community he loves. “This is what I can do to play a part in ensuring that diversity of life has an opportunity to survive. We can reverse some of the damage that’s done to the environment, but once a species is extinct, we cannot bring it back.”

For complete information regarding selection criteria and application instructions visit dsacommunityfoundation.com.

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Women’s Rights — What’s Water Got to Do with It?

October 15, 2010

A lot — if you’re a woman in a developing nation who does not have easy access to clean drinking water.

According to Charity: Water, in Africa alone people spend 40 billion hours a year just walking to get water for themselves and their families. Most often the individuals who are bringing this vital resource back to their homes are women and children.

That time spent locating and lugging H2O as well as the time spent in bed because of water-borne illness, means hours not spent in school, working or taking care of families. Fortunately there is much that can be done to help these women and others like them around the world to have access to safe, affordable drinking water.

Pentair Foundation, an MCF member, is currently helping women and their families in Colon, Honduras have access to clean drinking water. With the help of nonprofit Water Missions International, Pentair’s Project Safewater has installed over 200 water-treatment systems and nearly 10,000 individual sanitation facilities throughout Colon.

Pentair is working with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and the Honduran Department of Health to track data about the effectiveness of these systems in preventing water-borne illness, with the hope that their deployment will serve as a model for similar projects worldwide.

Similarly, Aveda, another MCF member, organized more than 60 Walk for Water events across the globe in April to help raise money and spotlight the issue of the clean water.

I’m writing this post as a part of the international Blog Action Day on water. If you’d like to add your voice, it’s not too late! Learn more here. If you feel inspired to take action in other ways than penning a post, consider making a donation to a nonprofit working to ensure access to clean water, or sign the petition to the U.N. to halve the number of people who do not have access to safe water by 2015.

- Cary Lenore Walski, MCF web communications associate

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Colorado-Based International Giving Nonprofit Connects in Minnesota

September 16, 2010

When Global Greengrants Fund’s senior donor relations manager Jennifer Adams Kurr decided to move back to her home state – Minnesota, she proposed the idea of continuing her work on behalf of Global Greengrants Fund in the Land of 10,000 Lakes.

“Minnesota is very philanthropically minded and has a great emphasis on protecting the environment, so it only made sense to strengthen our connection to Minnesota,” says Adams Kurr. “And, becoming a member of the Minnesota Council on Foundations (MCF) is a great way to start connecting.”

So, please welcome Global Greengrants Fund as the newest MCF member.

Global Greengrants Fund describes itself as “bridging the gap between those who can offer financial support and grassroots groups in developing countries that can make effective use of that support.”

Because it is so difficult for grantmakers to identify grassroots groups in remote areas, transfer funds and then monitor grantee progress, international grassroots grantmaking is challenging to say the least. To navigate internationally, Global Greengrants Fund has built a network of 120 volunteer advisors around the world that enable the organization to capitalize on the expertise of the people who know firsthand where the most urgent and promising work is happening and to facilitate collaboration across language and cultural barriers.

Global Greengrants Fund makes grants typically ranging from $500 to $5,000 to grassroots groups in some of the world’s most impoverished places where other sources of support often are not available. Since awarding its first grant in 1993, Global Greengrants Fund has made more than 5,000 grants to groups in 120 countries.

Adams Kurr is looking forward to connecting with the others doing like-minded work here in Minnesota. In particular, she plans to be involved in the programs of MCF’s  Global Funders Network and hopes to explore partnerships with Headwaters Foundation for Justice, whose work is similar to Global Greengrants Fund’s’ – just on a local scale.

Global Greengrants already has a well-established partnership with locally based Aveda. Their work together goes back 13 years; most recently, Global Greengrants has served as a global partner for the past three years of Aveda’s Earth Month initiative. “I’m looking forward to strengthening our work with Aveda,” Adams Kurr says. “We’ve had a great partnership for many years.”

Adams Kurr will also work to connect with Minnesota companies that are part of 1% for the Planet, a new partnership for Global Greengrants. 1% for the Planet is an alliance of businesses that donate at least one percent of their annual revenues to environmental organizations worldwide.

No stranger to the work of grantmaker member organizations, Global Greengrants Fund is a leader with the national Council on Foundations (COF). Global Greengrants founder and president emeritus Chet Tchozewski  currently serves on the COF board of directors and chairs COF’s Global Philanthropy Committee.

- Chris Murakami Noonan, MCF communications associate

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