Neighborhood Funders Group

NFG REPORTS
SPRING 2002 ISSUE ONE • VOLUME NINE

Resources

People

Congratulations to Mary G. F. Bitterman new President and Chief Executive Officer of The James Irvine Foundation of San Francisco and Los Angeles, California. Dr. Bitterman was previously President & CEO of KQED, Inc. in San Francisco, one of the nations most successful public broadcasting organizations.

California Wellness Foundation elected Luz A. Vega Marquis (NFG Board Member) president of the Casey Family Grants Program (Seattle) to be chair.

Chuck Shuford has relinquished his position as Executive Director of the Needmor Fund effective the end of March 2002. Chuck was with the Needmore Fund for seven years. Before that he was the first Executive Director of the Neighborhood Funders Group.

Congratulations to Anthony Tansimore, previously with the Fannie Mae Foundation, has accepted a new position with the San Francisco Community Foundation.

Cris Stainbrook was named President of the Indian Land Tenure Foundation, beginning Feb.18, 2002. This new organization will assist Indian people and tribes in regaining ownership and effective management of lands within the boundaries of reservations and other lands of high cultural value. Cris has been with the Northwest Area Foundation for the past 12 years.

Web Sites

The Fannie Mae Foundation announces the launch of KnowledgePlex, a comprehensive interactive resource for the affordable housing and community development field. Designed for practitioners, scholars and policy makers, this Web site offers practical solutions and collaboration opportunities with other housing leaders. To learn more about KnowledgePlex and view the many tools the site has to offer, log-on to www.knowlegeplex.org.

Grantmakers Concerned with Immigrants and Refugees (GCIR) invites you to visit its new Web site at www.gcir.org. A national network of funders interested in issues affecting immigrant populations, GCIR seeks to promote awareness and understanding among grantmakers about migration trends, public policies and other issues affecting immigrants and refugees. Among the Web site's new features is an interactive map of the United States, which displays population and migration data for each state.

Professional Development

The Terry Sanford Institute of Public Policy at Duke University has created a new Civil Society Fellowship program - in honor of Joel L. Fleishman, founding director of the institute. The Fleishman Fellows Program will provide leaders from non-governmental organizations, foundations and other civil society groups in the United States and abroad with the opportunity to come to the institute for four-week mini-sabbaticals. Fellows will perform research and work with institute faculty and other Duke affiliates on issues relating to the development of civil society. The Fleishman Fellows program is part of a larger institute initiative, the Program on Civil Society, which focuses on the changing public-policy roles of philanthropic foundations, non-governmental organizations and other participants in the non-profit sector nationally and internationally. For more information contact Amy Hepburn at 919-613-7315 or hepburn7@ps.duke.edu.

Publications

Affordable Housing and Smart Growth: Making the Connection is a new report from the National Neighborhood Coalition. The report offers 19 public-policy and private- sector approaches that foster smart growth without sacrificing housing affordability. It is the result of collaboration by more that a dozen organizations comprising the Smart Growth Network Affordable Housing Sub-group. For copies of the report contact the Environmental Protection Agency's Development Community and Environment Division at 202-260-2750 or the National Neighborhood Coalition Web site at www.neighborhoodcoalition.org.

Aging and Smart Growth: Building Aging-Sensitive Communities is written by Deborah Howe, in collaboration with the Funders' Network for Smart Growth and Livable Communities and Grantmakers in Aging. The paper outlines the challenges of helping seniors overcome obstacles created by existing development.

A new guide from the Amherst H. Wilder Foundation provides nonprofits with a road map to shaping public policy at the state and local levels. The Lobbying and Advocacy Handbook for Nonprofit Organizations gives detailed, step-by-step instructions for developing an effective plan and putting it into action. It educates nonprofits about the role lobbying can play in achieving their missions. Then, it shows how to develop and implement an advocacy plan. Worksheets, sample agendas, and checklists break the process into manageable steps For more information call toll free:1-800-274-6024 or email: books@wilder.org.

Creative Family Giving in the Arts, is the second in a series of Grantmakers in the Arts Field Resource Books for arts grantmakers. The Resource Books are written to serve arts grantmakers, not as a template or a formula for "how to do it" - but as a guide to creative thinking about grantmaking and as a networking tool for the future. For more information or to order a copy contact Grantmakers in the Arts at 206-624-2312 or email gia@giarts.org.

Public/Private Ventures
Workforce Development Publications: Hard Work on Soft Skills: Creating a "Culture of Work." Understanding and adapting to the norms of the workplace are important to long-term success in the labor market. Preparing participants to meet these challenges requires more than a weekly session on how to dress and the importance of showing up on time. Hard Work on Soft Skills describes the efforts of four different organizations that have developed sophisticated strategies that integrate soft-skills development with hard skills training. For a preview of the training video and guide, go to www.ppv.org/softskills.

Public Private Ventures
Working Together to Build Beacon Centers in San Francisco, is an evaluation summary of research conducted on the first five Beacon Centers in San Francisco. The summary identifies key accomplishments and the inevitable challenges that have emerged during this complex and ambitious effort.

The Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP) is pleased to announce the availability for the following new report on child care policy: Unfinished Agenda: Child Care for Low-Income Families Since 1996 - Implications for Federal and State Policy, by Jennifer Mezey, Rachel Schumacher, Mark Greenberg, Joan Lombardi, and John Hutchins. The report synthesizes findings from five separately published reports and puts them into a national context. For a complete report go to www.clasp.org/pubs/childcare/finalreport.pdf.

NFG Public Policy Paper, A Grantmaker's Guide to Housing Policies: A Foundation for Social Policy Investment, by Paul Leonard. This is the first in a series of papers intended to help grantmakers better understand the nature of affordable housing public policy issues and to encourage strategic public and private investments in housing. Subsequent papers will explore in greater depth key housing policy areas including multi-family housing, homelessness, home ownership and housing for special populations. To receive copies contact the NFG office at 202/833-4690 or download from the NFG Web site.