Grants Roundup: Wells Fargo and Sam’s Club Back Small-Business Development

Catarah Coleman and Shoneji Robison, co-owners of Southern Girl Desserts, benefited from a loan-education program that Sam’s Club and Sam’s Club Giving supports. Catarah Coleman and Shoneji Robison, co-owners of Southern Girl Desserts, benefited from a loan-education program that Sam’s Club and Sam’s Club Giving supports.

May 11, 2016 | Read Time: 1 minute

Here are notable new grants compiled by The Chronicle:

Wells Fargo

$22.3 million in loans and grants to 15 community-development financial institutions through the company’s three-year, $75-million Diverse Community Capital program.

One recipient is the Support Center, a nonprofit based in Raleigh, N.C. The center received a $1-million loan and a $500,000 grant to support financing and technical assistance for small businesses and expand its efforts to help more African-American-, Latino-, and veteran-owned firms qualify for loans.

Sam’s Club and Sam’s Club Giving

$8.8 million to organizations that run loan-education programs for women, veterans, and minorities seeking small-business financing. The commitment, made to mark National Small Business Week, includes $3.3 million to Accion, a nonprofit that supports microfinance institutions; $2 million to Community Reinvestment Fund, USA, which provides small-business loans; and $1 million to the Small Business Majority Foundation.

Southeast Michigan Early Childhood Funders Collaborative

$1.4 million to four Head Start organizations that serve 3,000 children in Detroit. They are Matrix Human Services, Metropolitan Children & Youth, the New St. Paul Tabernacle Church of God in Christ Head Start Agency, and Starfish Family Services. The grant will also support the work of a data manager who will coordinate collection and sharing of information.

JPMorgan Chase & Co.

$1 million to Hillsborough Community College in Tampa, Fla., for its regional Advanced Transportation Technology Center.

Simons Foundation

A $10-million challenge grant to the National Academy of Sciences to create an endowment.

The foundation also awarded $1.5 million over three years to the Rhode Island Consortium for Autism Research and Treatment, a group of autism experts. The grant will support the consortium’s autism patient registry.