Collaboration Is a New Mission for Some Supporters of Veterans

Some grant makers that support charities that aid military veterans’ causes are working to help weave a broader safety net for service members and their families.

Last year, the Iraq Afghanistan Deployment Impact Fund, a program of the California Community Foundation, in Los Angeles, released a report detailing the challenges that the roughly two million troops who have served in Iraq or Afghanistan face or will face at home, offering guidance to grant makers that want to help.

Among the top suggestions: Invest in efforts that tackle issues at a regional level, bringing local government and private organizations together to create a network of care for veterans, especially in regions far from military bases and established government services.

“Warriors don’t come home to federal agencies,” says Nancy Berglass, director of the fund. “They come home to communities and families, and that’s where philanthropy can make a difference.”

Chicago’s McCormick Foundation, which two years ago created a separate program area for making grants to charities that aid veterans, has been gathering grant makers in its metropolitan area to talk about a regional response to veterans issues and potentially to pool some grant making.

Working together can help foundations perform the critical role of identifying and plugging holes in the charity and government safety nets for veterans, says Jack Amberg, senior director of the grant maker’s veterans programs and himself a retired U.S. Army officer.

Already, McCormick encourages and sometimes demands partnerships among the organizations it supports.

In a pending grant-proposal request, the foundation has asked applicants—charities that provide mental-health services to veterans—to describe how they would link up with other service providers, such as local military hospitals or job-training programs, to better the chances that soldiers will get the full range of services they might need.

• The Lilly Endowment, in Indianapolis, wants to build a statewide network of charities that serve military personnel and their families. Already it has spent $30-million to help such groups in the past few years.
• The Dallas Foundation and the Gulf Coast Community Foundation of Venice, in Florida, are each looking into the feasibility of creating statewide groups of donors and grant makers, with the goal of focusing together on veterans issues.
• The Lincoln Community Foundation, in Nebraska, has applied to the Council on Foundations for a $20,000 “Idea Lab” grant.

The grant would enable the fund to explore ways to get more grant makers involved in supporting military-related giving.