Since March, Community Foundation Sonoma County has granted more than $4.6 million to support nonprofit organizations responding to coronavirus.

When the coronavirus pandemic struck Sonoma County in March 2020, Community Foundation Sonoma County (CFSC) and our donors immediately responded, making significant grants to help support the nonprofit organizations working on the frontlines of this crisis.

Today, we are glad to announce $1,750,000 in grants to nonprofits serving communities in need.

These grants include a $750,000 grant to On the Move to support the COVID-19 Urgent Response Aide (CURA) Project. CURA is a county-wide outreach and education campaign in response to the adverse and disproportionate impacts of COVID-19 within the local Latinx and indigenous communities.

Led by On The Move’s program locally known as La Plaza: Nuestra Cultura Cura (Our Culture Heals), CURA brings together several partner organizations to meet the varied and unique needs of our most vulnerable community members. The funding from CFSC will provide direct, emergency financial support to those families that have lost income because of the Pandemic and require additional resources in order to safely isolate and quarantine.

“We are delighted to support this important program,” says Elizabeth Brown, President and CEO of CFSC, “The years of disaster and emergencies—the Tubbs and Kincade fires, flooding, the power shutoffs, and now the Glass and Wallbridge fires—have unmasked and exacerbated the depth and breadth of our community’s racial inequities.”

Addressing the additional burden that COVID-19 puts on these disparities requires an all-hands-on-deck approach with public entities and private agencies coming together to address the systemic inequities that COVID-19 has exacerbated.

“Right now, people are facing the impossible choice of quarantining or working to be able to pay rent, pay PG&E bills, and put food on the table,” explains Brown. “This grant will enable nonprofit case managers to offer emergency financial assistance to their clients, allowing families to have the opportunity to make critical decisions about following COVID-19 quarantine and isolation protocols, ultimately helping to keep our community safe and healthy.”

In addition to this $750,000 grant, we have also made $1,000,000 in grants to 53 nonprofit organizations working across the county to support vulnerable communities, especially Latinx, indigenous, homeless and senior communities. Grants include:

• Boys & Girls Clubs of Sonoma-Marin to provide academic support to low-income youth through Boys & Girls Clubs Distance Learning Clubs
• Petaluma Downtown Streets Team to provide basic needs stipends in the form of gift cards for food, clothing, and medicine to individuals experiencing homelessness
• Family Justice Center of Sonoma County Foundation to provide food, housing, immediate needs (gift cards), and emergency supplies to victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, child abuse, elder abuse, and human trafficking
• Integrative Healing Action Networks to support Farmworker Clinics by providing free integrative health services to Latinx community members working in Sonoma County vineyards
• North Bay Childrens Center to provide direct child care services and early educational programs for children of essential and front line workers disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 pandemic
• Northern California Center for Well-Being to provide medical nutrition services and increased access to critical resources to low-income Latinx and senior populations who are disproportionately impacted by COVID-19
• Vintage House to address food insecurity and mental health issues resulting from the economic and social impacts of COVID-19 on low-income seniors and Latinx residents of Sonoma Valley
• California Indian Museum & Cultural Center to provide financial assistance, food, and other relief to Native people in Sonoma County
• California Human Development to provide education, PPE, and food to day laborers and families that utilize the Day Labor Center Program during COVID-19

Including these recent grants, Community Foundation Sonoma County and the donors we work with have granted over $4.6 million to COVID-19 causes since the pandemic first struck in March.

Funding for these grants comes in part from CFSC’s COVID-19 Resilience Fund and from the Silicon Valley Community Foundation and their COVID-19 Regional Response Fund. Donors who wish to support our efforts can give at sonomacf.org/donate.