County provides grant to the Los Altos Mountain View Community Foundation for local programs
SAN JOSE – The Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously recently to provide support to the Los Altos Mountain View Community Foundation (LAMVCF) for its Community Grants Program. The County’s support, proposed by County Supervisor Joe Simitian, will allow LAMVCF to provide additional grant funding to local nonprofits and organizations which tackle emerging needs in the community, including, but not limited to, housing, health care, equity needs, and food insecurity. Applications to LAMVCF for their Fall 2024 grant cycle will open in August, and grant recipients will be announced in December 2024.
“Whether it’s the affordability crisis, lack of access to proper health care, food, or a range of other concerns, there are real challenges in our North County communities,” said County Supervisor Joe Simitian, who represents Los Altos, Los Altos Hills, and Mountain View, and brought the proposal to the Board. “But there are also real solutions. We have groups like the Los Altos Mountain View Community Foundation and the organizations and nonprofits it supports who make a difference in the lives of our friends and neighbors.”
Simitian said he proposed the funding ($167,000) because of his belief that the grant would, “allow the Foundation to act nimbly, to respond to changing and newly emerging needs while still providing community accountability. We can’t always predict the next challenge, the next need. My expectation is that these funds will permit a measure of rapid response when it’s called for. Crises don’t arrive on schedule,” he noted.
LAMVCF has worked for over 33 years on behalf of the communities of Los Altos, Los Altos Hills, and Mountain View by providing grants, organizing leadership programs, and by convening groups to solve local issues.
"This grant is vital funding that will empower local nonprofits to continue their invaluable work, providing essential services and support to our most vulnerable populations," said Adin Miller, CEO of Los Altos Mountain View Community Foundation. “Together, we are building a stronger, more resilient community where everyone has the opportunity to thrive."
LAMVCF has also played a key role in supporting and growing the local nonprofit ecosystem through its Nonprofit Incubator Program, which works with emerging organizations to grow their capacity and program delivery, and improve organizational effectiveness, to the benefit of the populations they serve and to the larger community. This support has helped establish organizations that have gone on to provide critical services to the community, including the Latina-led Solidarity Fund of Mountain View (Fondo de Solidaridad de Mountain View), which innovatively and successfully distributed emergency funding during the pandemic to hundreds of extremely low-income families in Mountain View hardest hit by the pandemic.
As a local grant maker, LAMVCF primarily aligns its local funding with nonprofits and public entities based in – or directly serving – the communities of Los Altos, Los Altos Hills, and Mountain View. Unlike most community funds, LAMVCF largely depends on institutional support to underwrite its Community Grants Program.
LAMVCF typically operates two community grant funding cycles each year. Funding recommendations are made by a committee comprised of community residents, who alongside Foundation staff, align resources for those nonprofits having the greatest local impact. In 2023, LAMVCF distributed over $223,000 to 69 organizations through this program. These grants included key support for core community safety net organizations like Community Services Agency, part of the County’s Emergency Assistance Network; organizations like Hope’s Corner that provide much-needed hot meals, showers, and laundry to unhoused and low-income residents; and organizations like the Day Worker Center which is focused on addressing the needs of Latinx, immigrant, and dayworker communities.
“The nonprofits that work in our communities tackle real problems on a daily basis,” said Simitian. “The LAMVCF Grant Program helps get them off the ground and in the air. I am glad that the County has provided this funding for the Fall 2024 grant program.”