A community-wide campaign was launched to support nonprofit organizations that are struggling to meet the surge in demand from families and individuals as the result of the economic crisis. A special fund to help strengthen the region’s safety net for families and individuals in hardship was launched with more than $700,000, which includes a grant of $350,000 from The Pittsburgh Foundation and another of $250,000 awarded anonymously by another local foundation. Research conducted by The Forbes Funds was instrumental in quantifying the extent of the crisis (PDF) for local human service organizations.

The detailed study was conducted to evaluate the impact of the sharp economic downturn among the coalition of 350 local nonprofit members of the Greater Pittsburgh Nonprofit Partnership. The survey, which also included additional human service agencies in the region, found that more than 73 percent of agencies are experiencing increases in the number of requests for help over the past six months from “first time” clients — families and individuals who had not sought charitable support in the past. Over 53 percent of agencies reported an upturn in unemployed clients, and nearly 47 percent reported an increase in uninsured clients.  This special fund is called Neighbor-Aid. 

Attendees at a recent Nonprofit Summit were asked to address one primary question, “What are the next big steps the nonprofit sector can take?” The attendees were assigned to small groups where they discussed, voted, recorded their ideas on networked computers and witnessed their collective thoughts synthesized and fed back to them in real time. After reviewing the participants’ ideas collected through this activity, it became clear that the specific community action items could be categorized within the following three themes:

• Creative Collaborations Within the Nonprofit Community. In this era of declining public resources for meeting community needs, how can the nonprofit sector model innovation?
• Developing a Unified Voice to Advance Public Policy. While the nonprofit sector is comprised of many subgroups, we all share the same vision of healthy thriving communities. Focusing on commonalities and a shared message that focuses greater understanding about the sector is the goal.
• Fostering Greater Civic Engagement. Nonprofits are uniquely positioned to act as convener and educator, a liaison among citizens. In working together, organizations have the unique capacity to expand citizen leadership to traditionally disengaged groups.

Resulting from those discussions, The Forbes Funds awarded one-time Advancing Priorities grants, to find answers to these questions. In support of this goal, grants were awarded in the range of $15,000—$25,000 to organizations to develop projects based on one or more of the three themes outlined above. Priority was given to cohort or collaborative proposals.