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Cobb Community Foundation (CCF), today announced it is establishing the Cobb COVID-19 Community Response Fund. This charitable fund will provide flexible resources to non-profit organizations serving Cobb and meeting critical needs either arising from or exacerbated by the novel coronavirus. According to President and CEO, Shari Martin, the organization’s previous focus on fundraising for Cobb Community Opportunity Grants, inspired by the results of last year’s Cobb Human Services Needs Assessment commissioned by CCF, is taking a back seat to the current crisis.
“We are all in unchartered territory. We don’t know what’s ahead, but we know that as a community foundation, it’s our role to build and deploy resources to help our community get through this relatively unscathed, or at least as unscathed as possible,” she says. CCF has shared on its blog, throughout social media, and in its newsletter information about many of the organizations that are at the forefront of caring for Cobb’s most vulnerable populations in the midst of COVID-19. Martin says, “For many in our community, those and many other organizations are that domino that keeps all of the others from falling, and because more of our community will need their help, now more than ever, these organizations will need our help.”
Board member, Kim Gresh, agrees. “There’s no doubt that this is the right thing to do.” Gresh, owner of S.A. White Oil Company, First Vice Chair of the Foundation’s board and chair of the organization’s Events Committee, says that the Foundation has decided to cancel this year’s Partners in Philanthropy event, opting instead to focus the budgeted money where it will be most needed. “In the environment we are in, it just makes more sense to use that money to help the organizations that are out there helping people in our community stay afloat.” Martin agrees. “The grant checks are much more important to grant recipients than the fanfare.”
Al Martin, Regional External Affairs Manager for Georgia Power Company, serves on the board of Cobb Community Foundation and also chairs its Grants and Scholarships Committee. “Anyone can give to this Fund and know that, other than credit card fees which don’t come to us, 100% of their contribution will be distributed to non-profits meeting critical needs.” According to Mr. Martin, the process to receive a grant is going to be quick and painless. “These organizations have enough to take care of without having to fill out some long application.”
In addition to offering an opportunity to contribute to the Fund, CCF is also urging its own donors to look for opportunities to support local nonprofits currently addressing critical needs, organizations such as Sweetwater Mission, MUST Ministries, Center for Family Resources, Good Samaritan Health Center of Cobb, The Zone, and others, by making direct contributions. General contributions provide the greatest amount of flexibility for non-profits, which is particularly important at a time when needs are rapidly changing.
“Non-profits are not only dealing with more clients with more needs, they are also having to deal with postponed events,” Shari Martin says. “They are having to handle more with much less. The Cobb COVID-19 Response Fund will help to replace those lost revenues, and then some.”
Details on how nonprofits might request and access general operating resources from the Cobb COVID-19 Community Response Fund will be announced in the coming days. For more information and to donate, go to cobbfoundation.org.
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