Grants
Recent grants support the arts, environment and other charitable causes
Four times a year the Hampton Roads Community Foundation awards grants to nonprofit organizations through its competitive Community Grants and Special Interest Grants program. Funding comes from generous donors' unrestricted and field of interest funds. Organizations awarded grants in March 2020 included:
Cornland School Foundation, $24,000 to move a historic former school so it can be preserved and open for tours. Cornland School is the last school building remaining in Chesapeake that served African-American students from the early 1900s to 1952. It is on both the National Historic Register and the Virginia Landmark Register. Funding is in part from the Vernon and Judith Cofer Fund.
Elizabeth River Project, $350,000 over three years to help build the Louis & Pru Ryan Resilience Lab in Norfolk along the Lafayette River. The lab will be the regional nonprofit’s headquarters and will have a sea-level rise resilience park along the river. Funding is in part from the Community Fund for the Environment, Inge Family Fund for the Environment, Willliam Thomas Reilly Fund and the Barbara Upton Wilson Fund.
The Hurrah Players, $101,000 over two years to add a second floor to regional family theater’s Hugh R. Copeland Center in Norfolk’s NEON District. The expansion to the training center will include a television and film academy and costume storage.
Nansemond River Preservation Alliance, $50,000 over two years to expand to all third graders in Suffolk Public Schools the Watershed Explorers program. This environmental education program, which has been in Suffolk middle and high schools teaches students about waterways, watersheds and sea-level rise.
Southside Boys & Girls Club, $150,000 to help replace windows and renovate the nearly 40-year-old building’s classrooms, computer room, gym, kitchen and other areas. The club provides programs for 1,500 annually youth from Title I schools in the Berkeley and Campostella neighborhoods in Norfolk and the South Norfolk neighborhood in Chesapeake.
Virginia Stage Company, $157,425 to upgrade the outdated sound system at the Wells Theatre as well as its antiquated system that uses pulleys and sandbags to change sets. Funds come from the William A. Goldback Fund for the Performing Arts and the H. Lee Kanter Fund for the Performing Arts.
VOLUNTEER Hampton Roads, $75,000 for the VolunTier Vision software program that matches are volunteers with nonprofit opportunities.
Virginia Wesleyan University, $73,700 to upgrade the Fine Arts Building’s heating and cooling system and build a new kiln area in the building that houses ceramics, painting photography, and sculpture studios and also provides rehearsal space for instrumental and choral programs.
