COLUMBIA—The Sisters of Charity Foundation awarded $240,000 to six strategic grantees addressing the root causes of poverty in South Carolina.
The Foundation’s mission to address generational poverty focuses on three broad categories of health, education and social services.
The six recently awarded grantees are:
Anderson Interfaith Ministries: AIM’s mission is to connect people with support, resources and education so they can empower themselves to be self-sufficient. Programs are offered on a continuum from crisis stabilization to asset building programs designed to move economically disadvantaged people out of poverty. AIM’s crisis stabilization programs are limited to Anderson County, but most of their asset building programs (education/ training and housing) cover Anderson, Oconee, and Pickens counties. Funds are to be used for building the capacity of their organization. (Anderson, Anderson, Richland, Lexington, Oconee, Pickens, Greenville, Spartanburg, Sumter, Calhoun)
Community Foundation of Greenville, Inc.: The Community Foundation of Greenville is serving as the fiscal agent for this grant which will support OnTrack Greenville, an innovative initiative designed to address the root causes of poverty through evidence-based early warning and community intervention models aligned within middle schools. (Greenville)
Greenville Area Interfaith Hospitality Network: GAIHN orchestrates a partnership of local congregations in Greenville County that provides emergency shelter, meals and short-term housing to local families that include children, while intently focusing on helping those families achieve self-sufficiency and self-fulfillment. To help address the ongoing crisis of affordable housing locally, GAIHN has established a housing continuum that effectively equips homeless families to find and, more importantly keep housing that is safe and adequate for their families’ long-term needs. (Greenville)
Homes of Hope, Inc.: (pictured) Homes of Hope’s mission is to “Rebuild communities through developing affordable and energy efficient housing, and rebuild the lives of men overcoming addictions through job training and mentoring.” Their strategy is to produce life-change, not just circumstance change; focusing on building relationships with each participant (housing, or men’s development) to help them beyond the foundational part of their work (housing and job training). Addressing root causes of poverty (housing and energy affordability, better job skills, becoming banked, working on a budget, and growing assets), the organization finds that the best practice is working with each participant on their own personal road-map to success. (Greenville and Georgetown)
Impact America – South Carolina FocusFirst: Hundreds of thousands of children across the nation suffer from poor vision each year, leading to reduced academic performance, a substandard education, and low self-esteem. FocusFirst provides a cost-effective direct response to the vision problems of children who live in urban and rural communities. Impact America – South Carolina staff, in collaboration with students from local colleges, provide free vision screenings to children, ages six months to five years, at Head Starts and daycares located in low-income neighborhoods across South Carolina. High-tech, digital optic scan cameras are used to perform screenings. All children failing the screenings receive follow-up care from local eye care providers, coordinated by Sight Savers America. (Abbeville, Aiken, Allendale, Anderson, Bamberg, Cherokee, Colleton, Darlington, Edgefield, Fairfield, Florence, Kershaw, Lexington, Marlboro, Newberry, Oconee, Pickens, Saluda, Williamsburg, York)
Metanoia Community Development Corporation: Metanoia invests in neighborhood assets to build leaders, establish quality housing and generate economic development. Metanoia’s strategy for this round of funding is rooted in an understanding of the economics of poverty. Five new units of affordable housing will be developed in the grant period and this rate of new units being produced will be sustained or grown in subsequent years as Metanoia’s capacity increases based on the revenue from these projects; 10 new jobs will be created for low income residents within the one year grant period (anticipate 40 new jobs being created over the next three years); one new community business will be incubated and offer pay and job training to local residents (this will be Metanoia’s new café in partnership with Duval Catering which will open in August of 2016). (Charleston)
The Sisters of Charity Foundation of South Carolina, established in 1996, is a ministry of the Sisters of Charity Health System. The Foundation is committed to addressing the needs of the poor and underserved in all 46 South Carolina counties, and strategically uses resources to reduce poverty through action, advocacy and leadership.
Photo from Homes of Hope website
