La Crosse Nonprofits Set Vibe for Community Grants

August 28, 2024

By Lauren Journot, Grants & Scholarships Manager

New community grants program created by and for local nonprofits

As many local nonprofits know, La Crosse Area Community Foundation took a break from grantmaking earlier this year to listen, learn, and evolve our community grant processes. During that time, we learned much from nonprofit representatives in our community, including directors, board volunteers, and paid staff.

Broad participation lent new insights

Through seven in-person sessions and open online submissions, we received feedback from 65 unique individuals who engage regularly with a nonprofit organization in our community. While nearly one-third of the participants reported they’ve been involved in nonprofit work for just one to five years, the average was around 17 years. While every impact area was represented, we recognize the limitations of engagement included time and capacity to participate, the unspoken power imbalance between grantees/grantors, and the existing quality/reach of relationships LACF has within the nonprofit sector.

Focus groups led to new community grants program

The focus group outcomes revealed that while working or volunteering in the nonprofit sector may feel siloed and discouraging, similarities between the needs, challenges, and opportunities for nonprofits across the sector reassure us that none of us is alone in feeling the pressure or stress of engaging in meaningful and charitable work. This realization can open doors for increased collaboration and innovative solutions to shared challenges, and we saw many of those ideas pop up during the focus group sessions. (You can see the full report here.)

Nonprofit Resource Center to evolve

Your feedback and insights helped guide our new competitive grantmaking program and will continue to shape the resources and support LACF provides to the nonprofit community. Now that our competitive grant processes have evolved, LACF is focusing energy into evolving our Nonprofit Resource Center to provide networking opportunities, governance support, community education and engagement, professional development opportunities, an online resource library and nonprofit directory, fiscal sponsorship opportunities, and data collection and reporting on areas of interest, including local wage and benefits reports.

Listening and learning will continue

While we’ve come a long way, we recognize that the nonprofit sector continues to be responsive to the needs of our community, and, as a true partner in that work, we are committed to continuing to listen, learn, and adapt our resources and support to meet your evolving needs. We know we can do more together, and we are committed to empowering the nonprofit sector to be healthy, collaborative, and impactful.