Through our Coalition and Community Impact work, CFSC supports Family Resource Centers by strengthening partnerships, connecting resources, and encouraging collaboration to better meet the needs of families across Snohomish County.
Investing in People and Building Generation Change
For generations, Black, Indigenous, and people of color immigrant, and refugee-led nonprofit organizations have not had the same access to philanthropic relationships, networks, and long-term investment as many white-led organizations.
The Community Foundation of Snohomish County (CFSC) began to look at its role in contributing to institutional racism in philanthropy prior to the pandemic. With an influx of unrestricted COVID relief funding from donors and partners, we were able to live our values and refocus our giving in racial equity. We prioritized BIPOC, Immigrant and Refugee organizations and those with budgets under $500,000. Our pandemic funding allowed us to work with 72 organizations that had not previously felt comfortable navigating CFSC’s world.
We worked closely with these organizations, listening and learning. They shared with us, consistently and through formal and informal channels (surveys, focus groups, one-on-one meetings), the need for multi-year funding in partnership with sustainability support such as workshops, trainings, back-office support, advice, networking, etc.
In response to what was learned, to live our values and to stop the harm and start the healing of philanthropy, CFSC created the 15-50-5 program in 2023.
The program funds 15 organizations with $50,000 per year for five years (2022 – 2026) and couples the unrestricted dollars with dedicated staff support to help build each organization’s sustainability and fulfill strategic goals.
The total cost of the program is $3,750,000, of which CFSC committed the first $2 million and the Gates Foundation and North Sound ACH partnered to fund the remaining funds. The Community Foundation also committed its staff resources and the cost of the supportive services and did not and will not receive administrative support for this program. CFSC found funders to commit $1.75 million without asking the 15 organizations to do the work to receive the grants.
The organizations participating in 15-50-5 are:
Throughout the five years, organizations connect individually with CFSC staff and come together as a cohort. They help co-design training, outreach, advocacy, and other opportunities based on what they identify as useful to their organizations and communities.
We invite you to learn more about these organizations and support their work directly through a donation. Your generosity helps strengthen their efforts, expand their reach, and continue making a meaningful difference in the communities they serve.
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Throughout this work, CFSC kept labeling our work as capacity building. We were helping these organizations build capacity to do their work.
The 15-50-5 challenged our bias on that assumption. While, yes, they appreciated our knowledge and skills in the nonprofit work and guidance through administrative tasks, their lack
of capacity wasn’t due to their lack of knowledge. It was due to their lack of sustainable funding. If they had the resources that white-led organizations did, their capacity could be met, planned and strategized.
While CFSC donated almost an additional $2 million to these organizations through its Donor Advised Funds and grants, as well as secured additional millions from other funders for the organizations, these funds were still based on the philanthropic norms of nonrecurring, one-time funding.
These organizations wanted and needed agency in their own sustainability and that was through endowment building.
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While that multi-year, unrestricted funding is providing critical operating funds, it hasn’t provided sustainable funding that can help counter and weather systemic racism and historical underfunding. Endowments are a sure way to build wealth for an organization. However, the small amount of data available for organizations like the 15 is dismal. Those few that do have endowments have funds that are four-times smaller than their white-lead counterparts.
As we are nearing the end of the five years, we are moving to finding new ways to help these now 13 organizations find assets that build wealth over time. We will be working closely with these organizations to start building endowment funds through internal education and donor solicitation.
We will be starting endowment funds for each of the 13 at $20,000 each. While this isn’t a huge sum, it is the starting point of starting to build the culture of owning your current sustainability and building for the future leaders.
As we did five years ago, we are looking for funding partners who understand their role in philanthropic racism and will work towards giving these
Connect Casino Road Thriving Families. A Resilient Community.
Located in South Everett, Connect Casino Road (CCR) is a community-led collaborative bringing together residents, nonprofits, schools, businesses, and community partners to strengthen the Casino Road neighborhood.
Rooted in years of relationship-building within Latino and immigrant communities, CCR focuses on empowering local leaders, strengthening existing organizations, and creating opportunities for connection and collaboration.
Since 2016, we have supported CCR’s growth into an independent nonprofit through capacity building, organizational development, and strategic investments. Today, the Foundation continues to serve as the Backbone Organization, providing administrative and strategic support to advance CCR’s community-led work.
Casino Road is one of the most diverse neighborhoods in Snohomish County, with a strong Latino and immigrant community and deep networks of families, leaders, small businesses, faith communities, and grassroots organizations.
At the same time, families in the neighborhood have experienced barriers created by systems that have historically limited access to resources, funding, opportunity, and decision-making. Institutional racism and inequitable systems have had real impacts on families and on many of the organizations serving communities of color.
Connect Casino Road represents a different approach, Instead of building solutions outside the neighborhood and bringing them in, the collaborative invests in the leadership, knowledge, relationships, and organizations that already exist within the community.
By creating stronger connections between residents, nonprofits, funders, service providers, and other partners, Connect Casino Road helps community-driven efforts grow stronger and become more sustainable.
Connect Casino Road is working to create a community hub where residents and organizations can find connection, opportunity, resources, and belonging.
Community change takes time.
Connect Casino Road reflects a long-term commitment to investing in people, organizations, and relationships rather than funding short-term programs alone.
The work is about building the infrastructure necessary for Casino Road residents and community organizations to continue shaping the future of their neighborhood.
When communities have strong organizations, trusted gathering spaces, meaningful partnerships, and opportunities to lead, families are better positioned to thrive.
That is the vision behind Connect Casino Road: A connected neighborhood. Strong community organizations. Local leadership. Thriving families. A resilient community.
Snohomish County is growing and changing quickly, and the need for affordable housing continues to grow with it. Rising housing costs, population growth, and changes in housing funding have created significant challenges for families and communities. The Community Foundation of Snohomish County is committed to supporting solutions that help preserve affordable housing, create new opportunities, and strengthen housing stability across our county.
We have been working alongside key partners, including the Housing Consortium of Snohomish County, local housing providers, nonprofits, municipalities, housing authorities, and LISC Puget Sound. Together, these partnerships help connect organizations to resources, technical expertise, training, and opportunities to collaborate around the changing housing needs of Snohomish County.
Our housing initiative is designed to grow and change with our community in mind. We invest in housing partners by supporting operations, capacity building, technical assistance, and expert consulting. By strengthening the organizations already doing this work, we are helping build a stronger and more sustainable housing system for the future.
