November / December 2004

Dear Friends,

How does a foundation balance a commitment to long-term relationships with its grantees with an obligation to seek out and embrace new partners? This is one of the questions I recently explored in Irvine's 2003 Annual Report as one of several tensions inherent in the vital work of any philanthropic enterprise.

At Irvine, we seek to develop meaningful, long-term partnerships with many of our grantees. At the same time, however, the Foundation recognizes the need to identify high-quality organizations which can effectively advance our mission but which may have no prior relationship to Irvine—entities that are often smaller, younger, and located in more remote areas of California.

To strike this balance more effectively, a team of Irvine staff recently redesigned the Foundation's procedures for managing unsolicited grant inquiries. That mechanism—now known as The New Connections Fund—allows grantseekers to apply directly to Irvine for grants of less than $50,000. We have just concluded the inaugural round, and I would like to share some of the results.

Through this new, competitive process, Irvine received nearly 400 applications—far more than expected—of which 345 fit our program priorities. At its October 2004 meeting, the Board of Directors approved $1.38 million in one- and two-year grants to 55 New Connections Fund grantees. The majority (84 percent) of these grantees had no prior history with Irvine. Nearly all of them (90 percent) were small organizations with annual budgets of less than $2 million.

In addition, as we had hoped, the first New Connections Fund grantees comprise a diverse group that will enrich Irvine's roster of projects statewide in our Arts, California Perspectives, and Youth program areas:

• With Irvine support to Community Partners in Los Angeles, Khmer Girls in Action will produce and share “Stories from Khmer Long Beach;” the Berkeley Symphony Orchestra will stage the world premiere of a musical exploring the legacy of the Japanese American internment camps; and Centro Binacional para el Desarrollo Indigena Oaxaqueno, Inc. will nurture Oaxacan indigenous dance and music in the San Joaquin Valley.
• Aligned with our California Perspectives goals, the California Elected Women’s Association for Education and Research in Sacramento will launch a media campaign to encourage young women in the Central Valley, Inland Empire, and Los Angeles to vote; Domestic Workers Elderly and Disabled Home Care Center will motivate and educate voters in traditionally disengaged communities in San Diego County; and Rose Foundation for Communities and the Environment will engage young people in Oakland in new-voter education in low-income, ethnic communities in the East Bay.
• Formerly homeless youth in Hollywood will receive training and employment assistance from Covenant House California, which received support for its “Educational Advancement and Career Readiness” program; GirlSource, Inc., will provide low-income women with college counseling, application assistance, and other support through its “Bound for Success” program in San Francisco; and the Coalron Lyceum will prepare low-income youth in the San Joaquin Valley for college life.

The next application period for the New Connections Fund remains open until December 1, 2004, and a third round of applications will be accepted between January 1 to March 15, 2005.

Irvine expects to add more than 150 grantees to its portfolio during this pilot year of the New Connections Fund, and through fine-tuning our future outreach, we hope to receive more eligible applicants from Irvine's priority regions of the Central Valley, Inland Empire, and Los Angeles County.

In the meantime, I invite you to review the updated, online New Connections Fund application. For a taste of the rich variety of projects that we are able to support through this new endeavor, please browse the list of inaugural New Connections grantees. And, as always, please send along your questions, comments, and suggestions. We appreciate your interest in our work.

Sincerely,

James E. Canales
President & CEO

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