Patricia Macdonald sat down with us to discuss Black Community Fund’s (BCF) work funded through the W.K. Kellogg Foundation’s Catalyzing Community Giving grant opportunity. The Black Community Fund (BCF), an affiliate of the Greater Kansas City Community Foundation, has the mission is to improve quality of life and socio-economic aspects of the African-American community in Greater Kansas City. They accomplish this by increasing charitable giving, educating and connecting donors to community needs they care about, and providing leadership on critical community issues.

Q: What are your current efforts to catalyze community giving?

A: We focused our Catalyzing Community Giving grant work on the launch of a Kansas City-specific, crowd-funding platform for nonprofits called Daily Deeds. In addition to providing a way for individuals of every economic position to participate in improving conditions in Kansas City, it educates the user about critical community needs and which organizations are meeting those needs. The initial thrust has been focused on featuring organizations addressing early-childhood toxic stress caused by chronic and prolonged adverse childhood experiences (ACE’s). We want individuals to come to appreciate, that when organized and pooled, even a $3 contribution can impact systemic change and makes a difference. We sweetened the pot by providing a matching dollars incentive, provided by an external donor, with the hope that this will inspire people to jump in and participate.

Our soft launch in the summer of 2015 went to 200 people who helped us pilot the platform. We’re now working to get the community to own it. We worked with our Mayor to promote Daily Deeds during National Black Philanthropy Month. We are talking with parents to encourage philanthropy with their children and teens who, through Daily Deeds, can learn about community needs and decide how they want to allocate $1-$2 right through their phones. The word is out now, the Black Community Fund has launched this and PSA’s on Black radio, upcoming “how-to” videos with social media boosts will help to spread the word. It’s exciting.

Q: Do you think projects like yours are part of a larger movement to link community-based giving to critical issues in communities of color?

A: I certainly hope so! Black people give all the time, but this is helping us, to help our community, become more organized and deliberate about how we meet our community needs and goals. Being a part of this W. K. Kellogg cluster and cohort has propelled our philanthropic leadership to an entirely new dimension and I can say I do feel the steam building up.

Q: What would you say is your unique approach to philanthropy?

A: We’ve always had a message of participation. That has always been the Black Community Fund’s message. It’s about getting involved and talking to the community about what’s going on. We connect to the everyday givers, provide the community with high-quality information, and help them to them to feel confident in, and good about, their gift. When someone feels successful, they don’t stop and they want to do it again. We also lift up what others in the community are doing with regard to time, talent and treasure. We endeavor to provide leadership in philanthropy.

Q: How are you documenting this project?

A: In some ways, it’s documenting itself. Daily Deeds commits to providing a report within so many days. Documenting the whole effort, however, is something we have to get our arms around so we can take it to the next level. W. K. Kellogg’s reporting requirements, and opportunities like this one to share also help with documenting. We tell people how things are going along the way through mail, e-mail and social messages but we have not yet found the pathway beyond what I’ve just described to document with intention. It’s because we want the Black community in Kansas Cityto appreciate the advancements we have made together, we know it’s important to find time to document how we got here so the work has have a life outside of the internal drive in our office!

Q: Where can people go to find additional information?

A: People can go to www.BlackComunityFund.org and that leads anyone to DailyDeeds.com. The Black Community Fund is on Facebook and everyone should feel free to call me directly at 816-268-3296.

Michael E. Roberts, President of First Nations Development Institute, sat down with us to discuss his organization’s work funded through the W.K. Kellogg Foundation’s Catalyzing Community Giving grant opportunity. First Nations Development Institute’s (First Nations) mission is to strengthen American Indian economies to support healthy Native communities. The organization invests in and creates innovative institutions and models that strengthen asset control and support economic development for American Indian people and their communities.

Q: What are your current efforts to catalyze community giving?

First Nations’ Catalyzing Community Giving project is designed to further democratize philanthropy and direct more philanthropic resources to America’s almost invisible rural and reservation-based Native communities. Called Nurturing Native Givers and Giving, our project It combines technology, training, technical assistance, convenings, and research to raise awareness of the needs in Native communities.

We’ve developed a web-based giving platform called NativeGiving.org. It promotes a group of First Nations’ current and past grantees, allowing the organizations to highlight their work and raise funds. We train organizations on the platform through one-on-one coaching and provide examples and resources for successful fundraising in their own communities. This first set of projects is focused on promoting the health and well-being of our most valuable resource – our youth.

Q: Do you think projects like yours are part of a larger movement to link community-based giving to critical issues in communities of color?

Absolutely. It was our intention from the outset that our efforts would prompt a larger conversation nationally and regionally; not just about philanthropy, but also about the community and economic impact tribes are making through their philanthropic efforts. By the time this interview is published, First Nations will have released a major new report as a result of the Catalyzing Community Giving grant titled Telling Our Giving Stories: Native Philanthropy and Community Development. The report details the growth of the Native philanthropic sector over the past 40 years, successful tribal grantmaking models, and the highly positive implications for the development and expansion of Native economies and the civil society sector in reservation communities.

As an educator and advocate for Indian country, First Nations is painfully aware that few people know that there are actually numerous Native-led grantmaking programs in North America. As such, we felt it was important to share the giving stories of these grantmakers and catalyze a national conversation on the very positive contributions they are making inside and outside their communities.

Q: What would you say is your unique approach to philanthropy?

Our Catalyzing Community Giving project and First Nations’ approach are rooted in our asset-building strategy. Since 1980, First Nations has been working in partnership with Native communities to restore control and culturally-compatible stewardship of those assets – be they natural resources, human capital, physical assets, social capital, political assets, cultural heritage, or natural resources. A positive and collaborative approach, asset-building focuses on cultivating traditional knowledge and practices, and creating new ones to build Native capacities, capabilities and communities.

We believe that Native nations are uniquely knowledgeable about their own communities. They know the strengths, challenges, and needs of their communities better than outside agencies. That’s why asset-building works - because it strengthens the effectiveness of Native nations to find solutions to their own challenges and allows them to decide how to best leverage their resources on their own terms. Our Catalyzing Community Giving project and our work are rooted in this approach. We were excited about this project because it matched our values and allowed us to be innovative ourselves by creating the first-of-its-kind giving platform to direct more resources to grassroots initiatives.

Q: How are you documenting this project?

Reservation communities are by and large isolated from each other so we publish what we’ve learned often and share best practices. This provides a way to share lessons learned, successes, and resources to build capacity and knowledge in Native communities. There are 567 tribes recognized in the U.S. and there’s no way to reach every single one of them.

Our online giving platform, NativeGiving.org, documents many successful projects in Native communities. In fact, NativeGiving.org was featured in Indian Country Today. Our latest report, Telling Our Giving Stories: Native Philanthropy and Community Development, details the growth of the Native philanthropic sector over the past 40 years, successful tribal grantmaking models, and the highly positive implications for the development and expansion of Native economies and the civil society sector in reservation communities.

Q: Where can people go to find additional information?

First Nations believes in widely sharing best practices, key findings and successful or promising models with practitioners in Indian Country, government entities (federal, state, local and tribal), mainstream philanthropy, and the public at large.

Our online Knowledge Center is open to the public at www.firstnations.org/knowledge-center. We also send email alerts and news directly to our mailing list. Sign up on our website.

Of course, we encourage people to visit nativegiving.org to learn more about the great work happening in Native communities.