For two decades, the nonprofit Heart Gallery of Broward County has championed making life better for foster children.
That includes finding foster children permanent homes through adoption. Providing birthday gifts, school supplies, holiday parties and other opportunities to show foster children their community cares about them. Helping adoptive families thrive by connecting them to support services and other community resources. Through it all, Heart Gallery’s leaders and dedicated supporters have shown a steadfast commitment to enriching the lives of Broward’s foster youth.
Now, through an innovative partnership with the Community Foundation of Broward, the Heart Gallery’s critical mission to support foster children will never end – even as the nonprofit organization ceases operations.
By creating The Heart Gallery Legacy Fund at the Community Foundation, the Heart Gallery is using the power of endowment to establish sustainable, permanent support for shaping brighter futures for Broward’s foster children.
The Heart Gallery began as a traveling photography exhibit, featuring professional portraits and moving personal stories to showcase foster children awaiting adoption. Through the years, the organization transitioned to an online format to share those stories, while also pursuing other outreach efforts to raise awareness about adoption and to provide support for children and adoptive families.
In recent years, changes to state law added limits to the use of foster children’s photos. As a result, Heart Gallery’s leaders determined their organization’s photo-and-story-driven approach to helping foster children was no longer viable. So, while sunsetting the nonprofit’s operations this year, Heart Gallery backers partnered with the Community Foundation to ensure its mission would never end.
They did it by creating an endowed Field of Interest Fund – one of several types of charitable funds that philanthropists and nonprofit organizations can create at the Community Foundation.
Grants from a Field of Interest Fund are dedicated to supporting a specific issue or cause, in this case, support for foster children and adoption. The Community Foundation’s expert team will find innovative grantmaking opportunities to carry on the Heart Gallery’s mission to support foster children and adoptive families. We make sure those grants are always used as intended. And because it’s an endowed fund, our careful investment helps the Heart Gallery’s fund continue to grow, so this grantmaking help for children and families continues year after year, for generations to come.
“Heart Gallery’s new endowed fund at the Community Foundation is a powerful example of how a nonprofit’s mission can continue to thrive and make an impact for years to come, even after an organization sunsets,” said Community Foundation President/CEO Jennifer O’Flannery Anderson, Ph.D. “We are proud to carry on Heart Gallery’s enduring legacy of helping Broward’s foster youth.”
Find out how you can partner with the Community Foundation of Broward to make a lasting difference. Contact us at info@cfbroward.org or 954-761-9503.
