PENSACOLA HABITAT FOR HUMANITY COMMUNITY LAND TRUST-AFFORDABLE HOUSING IN PERPETUITY Grant Year: 2022 | Focus Area: Family| Grant Amount: $103,820 | Grant Status: In Progress Founded in 1981, Pensacola Habitat for Humanity has the mission of seeking to put God’s love into action by bringing people together to build homes, communities, and hope. Their Home Buyer Program offers affordable, attainable homeownership opportunities for families within 30-80% of Area Median Income (AMI). Qualified applicants work toward homeownership through 200 hours of sweat equity and pre-purchase education. Homes are constructed by staff, subcontractors, volunteers, and buyers. Once requirements are complete, buyers are sold their homes through an affordable, below-market interest rate mortgage. Pensacola Habitat has built over 1,450 homes and is the 25th highest-producing affiliate in the country. Other programs include HUD Counseling, which provides pre-and post- purchase education, credit counseling, and foreclosure prevention. The Comprehensive Community Development (CCD) Program focuses on homeownership preservation, including...

ESCAMBIA COUNTY PUBLIC SCHOOLS FOUNDATION FOR EXCELLENCE, INC. PARENT UNIVERSITY: BRIDGING RESOURCES AND COMMUNITY NEEDS Grant Year: 2022 | Focus Area: Family| Grant Amount: $103,820 | Grant Status: In Progress The Escambia County Public Schools Foundation was established in 1986 and is recognized as the district-wide education foundation for public schools in Escambia County. Its mission is to enhance education by investing in children’s futures to ensure they graduate on time and are college or career ready. The Foundation works collaboratively with school leaders to determine how and where private-sector investment and volunteer involvement can have the greatest impact on student success. Since its inception, the Foundation has distributed more than $12.5 million in donated, raised, and grant funds. As a member of the Consortium of Florida Education Foundations, it is part of a collegial community committed to building partnerships, innovating leading practices, and impacting students coast to coast. Events to support and...

Rally Foundation for Childhood Cancer Research Rally Resource Room Powered by IMPACT 100 Grant Year: 2021 | Focus Area: Family | Grant Amount: $101,820 | Grant Status: In Progress Rally Foundation for Childhood Cancer Research empowers volunteers across the country to raise awareness and funds for childhood cancer research to find better treatments with fewer long-term side effects and, ultimately, cures. Through donors, community partners, and special events, Rally Pensacola (RP) works to raise awareness, support families with kids fighting cancer, and raise funds for childhood cancer research. This allows for additional resources to stay local, providing families with the ability to receive assisted funding through the Rally Pensacola Family Emergency Fund. RP also organizes memorable and joyous opportunities for children with cancer and their families through special events and activities. The Studer Family Children's Hospital at Ascension Sacred Heart is a member of the Children's Oncology Group. This gives local children the...

Vineyard Family House Caring for Families in Crisis Grant Year: 2021 | Focus Area: Family | Grant Amount: $101,820 | Grant Status: Complete The Vineyard Family House (VFH) is a faith-based respite house offering a home away from home where critical care families can come for rest, meals, support and friendship. Similar to the way Ronald McDonald House takes in immediate family members of hospitalized children 21 years and younger, out of town families with adult patients are offered a place to stay at VFH so they can focus on their injured or ill loved ones. VFH welcomes all types of families in need, without regard to religion, race, gender, or financial ability, so the patient may recover faster when not feeling the wilting effects of the situation on their loved ones. In addition to traditional lodging rooms, VFH offers “isolation” rooms, specifically designed for those with immune-suppressed systems and their caregivers. The...

FoodRaising Friends, Inc. FoodRaising Friends Foundational Food for Families Grant Year: 2020 | Focus Area: Family | Grant Amount: $106,000 | Grant Status: Completed The mission of FoodRaising Friends (FRF) is to remove barriers and improve access to food for children at risk or experiencing hunger in the local area. FRFs’ desire is to be part of the movement that begins by ending childhood hunger locally, and substantially impact the cycle of poverty for children in the community. Founded in 2016, FRF began by providing food for Christmas for students in the Santa Rosa Head Start Program. FRF found that every school had pockets of significant poverty where children were experiencing hunger. FRF has chosen not only to pursue adding those schools to the program but is also advocating in the community to bring the realities of childhood hunger to the community's attention. The bags of food from FRF feed the entire household -...

Feeding the Gulf Coast, Inc. Feeding the Florida Panhandle Grant Year: 2020 | Focus Area: Family | Grant Amount: $106,000 | Grant Status: In Progress As a member food bank of Feeding America and a United Way Member Agency, Feeding the Gulf Coast works through member organizations and special programs to provide nutritious food to meet the challenge of feeding people who are hungry as a result of systemic poverty, personal crisis or disaster. Feeding the Gulf Coast also educates the public regarding domestic hunger, proper nutrition and other related issues. Feeding the Gulf Coast, Inc. was founded and incorporated in 1981. In 1988, the food bank became a member of Feeding America, the nation’s largest hunger relief organization. Since its founding, the organization has distributed more than 280 million pounds of food to charitable feeding organizations across the 24 counties it serves, including nine counties in lower Alabama, eight counties in lower...

AMR at Pensacola, Inc. The Phoenix Project - Tiny Home Communities Grant Year: 2020 | Focus Area: Family | Grant Amount: $106,000 | Grant Status: Complete AMR is currently expanding operations through “The Phoenix Project”, which includes the development and management of tiny home communities throughout Escambia County. The Phoenix Project is a sustainable housing solution for individuals and families in Escambia County who are financially, socially, and/or institutionally disadvantaged. The program assists those who do not traditionally meet the requirements for affordable housing options in Escambia County by creating safe, comfortable solutions at a lower price point. The idea is to develop a community that includes strategic designs with a shared community center and on-site healthcare, social, and workforce development services. AMR plans to pioneer the mission of increasing access to affordable housing with an environment that is sustainable, innovative, and eco-friendly. Upon completion, The Phoenix Project will include a total...

Young Men's Christian Association of Northwest Florida, Inc. dba YMCA of Northwest Florida The Wheels on the Bus Grant Year: 2019 | Focus Area: Family | Grant Amount: $106,000 | Grant Status: Completed The mission of the Young Men’s Christian Association is to put Christian principles into practice through programs that build healthy spirit, mind and body for all. The YMCA (the Y) of Northwest Florida’s local history can be traced back to the early 1880s. The Y developed the first day camp program, first water safety program, first night school, and first gymnasium in the community. Over the past 130 years, the Y has served families through programs such as childcare, aquatics, youth sports, wellness, special events, and community outreach. Through programs at two branches in Escambia County and one in Santa Rosa County, and additional programs at school sites, the Y reaches more than 15,000 men, women and children each year....

Pensacola Habitat for Humanity, Inc. Building Homes, Communities, and Hope, One Family at a Time: Tools for Construction Site Grant Year: 2019 | Focus Area: Family | Grant Amount: $106,000 | Grant Status: Completed The mission of Pensacola Habitat for Humanity, Inc. (Habitat) is to seek to put God's love into action, by bringing people together to build homes, communities, and hope. Since its inception in 1982, more than 1,300 families have purchased a home through their program. Habitat builds high-quality, energy-efficient homes and sells them to eligible families at cost with a 0% APR mortgage. All of the organization’s resources are devoted to ensuring each accepted family will live in a home; there is no waiting list. Over 2,500 volunteers come together to assist in building these homes. New technology that brought their application online was initiated. That has increased access for individuals who may not have the means to be transported...

Sacred Heart Foundation, INC. "Paw"erful Medicine - Using Animal-Assisted Therapy to Make "Ruff" Days a Little Brighter Grant Year: 2018 | Focus Area: Family | Grant Amount: $100,300 | Grant Status: Completed The mission of the Sacred Heart Foundation (the Foundation) is to be a philanthropic advocate in support of Sacred Heart Health System actively encouraging contributions and volunteer participation to support the work of Sacred Heart hospitals to improve health care and social services for the sick and poor of all ages in our region. In 1984, Sacred Heart Foundation was formed as a nonprofit, philanthropic organization committed to enhancing the current and future healthcare needs of the Gulf Coast by supporting Sacred Heart Health System’s programs, capital building and equipment needs. The original Sacred Heart Children’s Hospital facilities, built in 1959 to better serve the very distinct needs of a growing community, no longer accommodate the technologies and level of expertise...

Big Brothers Big Sisters of Northwest Florida, INC. There's No Place Like Home Grant Year: 2018 | Focus Area: Family | Grant Amount: $100,300 | Grant Status: Completed The mission of the Big Brothers Big Sisters is to provide children facing adversity with strong and enduring, professionally supported one-to-one relationships that change their lives for the better, forever. For more than 100 years, Big Brothers Big Sisters has operated under the belief that inherent in every child is the ability to succeed and thrive in life. As the nation’s largest donor-supported and volunteer-supported mentoring network, Big Brothers Big Sisters makes meaningful, monitored matches between adult volunteers (Bigs) and children (Littles). Big Brothers Big Sisters partners with parents/guardians, volunteers and others in the community and holds themselves accountable for each child in the program achieving higher aspirations, greater confidence, better relationships, avoidance of risky behaviors, and educational success. Current programs include Community Based Mentoring,...