Enabling all of us, individual and corporate citizens, to give back to our community by building permanent legacies…
The Barrie Community Foundation is a public foundation that builds and manages endowment funds to support charitable activities in Barrie and area.
Endowment funds are “forever” funds, meaning that the original capital contributed as well as subsequent donations to the fund are never encroached upon or spent but continue to grow over time. A portion of the investment income generated from the funds are granted out on an annual basis to support the causes the funds were set up to support.
A donation, large or small, will make a difference, now and forever.
Looking back, and forward.
2021 was a terribly challenging year. FULL STOP!
We all felt the impact of the pandemic, on our wallets, on our mental health, and on the relationships to the important people in our lives. We are still missing out on time together, for an impromptu visit, cup of coffee, and mostly just the welcoming company of others.
What we have seen from our community is the absolute commitment to help. Thank you to each and every person who raised their hand to help – whether it was with a gift to us, to another charity, a lunch dropped off to an isolated neighbour, a thank you to a front-line worker, or any of the myriad ways you’ve found to help out.
THANK YOU!
Thoughts from the Chair
JANUARY 2022
It’s hard to believe that three years ago I didn’t know what the Barrie Community Foundation was, and now I am honoured to be the head of this important community organization.
First of all, as I try to carve out some goals for 2022, it is important to understand what the Barrie Community Foundation is. We are NOT a fundraising organization. Besides our Community Crisis Fund and the Vital Barrie Fund, the first which we established during this time of pandemic to meet the emergency needs of some key Barrie community services and the second is in place to support, long-term, the varied elements in our community that make it a wonderful place to live, work and play – we do not fundraise in competition with the very organizations we look to support. Our job is to help create impact in those community organizations to serve their ends more effectively, and to help Barrie’s great philanthropists meet their charitable goals.
In the last three years we have grown the charitable funds held at Barrie Community Foundation to over two million dollars. And because of that investment in our community by local philanthropists, large and small, our fundholders granted almost $27,000 to community needs in 2021.
So where do we go in 2022? There are many community-minded individuals and families in our community who we feel would like to make their philanthropy a long-term plan. They can do this by establishing, as my wife and I did ourselves, a family endowment. This year, the money earned by our endowment helped the Barrie Food Bank meet their year end shortages. The most wonderful part of having a family endowment at Barrie Community Foundation was that it gave us a chance to have a “family consult” and include our 3 adult children in the decision. As our grandchildren grow up. we hope to include them in the annual decision and help them learn the importance of philanthropy.
So, one goal for this year is to grow our number of endowments – large and small. Did you know that you could create an endowment with as little as $10,000?
Another goal for the coming year is to continue to leverage our relationships with all levels to continue as their local connection to the needs of this community. In the last two years we worked closely with the Ministry of Infrastructure and Communities, and Community Foundations of Canada to be the local administrator for $390,000 in Emergency Community Support Funds, and $1.4million in Canadian Healthy Communities Initiative funds aimed at helping to get us through and past the pandemic.
So, my overall goal for the Barrie Community Foundation in 2022 is GROWTH. We want to grow the impact that we can have in this City by helping our generous, philanthropic neighbours activate their passions and have a strong hand in building this community for years to come. The result, we believe, will be to make Barrie a wonderful place for all to live and work.
~ Marshall Green
