When two long-established health foundations joined forces with the Community Foundation, it marked the beginning of a new era of collaboration, expanding our ability to improve health outcomes and meet the evolving needs of local residents.
The two health foundations – Western Reserve Health Foundation serving Mahoning County and Trumbull Memorial Health Foundation doing the same in Trumbull County – came to the Community Foundation in 2012, following the bankruptcy of Forum Health three years earlier. As part of the health system’s sale to a for-profit entity, the charitable funds were spun off to continue operation.
It was in their role as supporting organizations of CFMV that they came together to establish a new method of grantmaking for their organizations: setting priorities based on the community health improvement plans that are created by the two county health departments.
“Because of the Community Foundation bringing all of us together to say, ‘These are the issues and here’s what we can do,’ we can all work on things and multiply our impact. Instead of one foundation giving $10,000 or $20,000, there’s three or four giving that amount,” says Phil Dennison, long-time chair of the Western Reserve Health Foundation board. “That’s what makes a difference on these issues. Unless each foundation gave all of their money to one organization, we aren’t going to make that difference alone.”
Dennison’s counterpart at the Trumbull Memorial Health Foundation, who led it through the bankruptcy proceedings and movement to CFMV, was Attorney Patrick Wilson. He termed off the TMHF board in 2021.
While the two health foundations make their own grant award decisions independent of one another, having them move in the same direction has been a boon to local health-focused projects.
“When I started in government and public health, I saw so many gaps in services and gaps in funding. The question was always ‘How am I going to get this done?’” says Jenna Amerine, current board chair of the Trumbull Memorial Health Foundation and grants coordinator for the Trumbull County Combined Health District. “It’s all about providing resources to residents and improving things for them. We can make it so they can get healthy food and have that be more reliable. … Even just OKing the funds to keep people doing the work makes things that much better for Trumbull County residents.”
Since coming under the umbrella of the Community Foundation in 2012, the two health foundations have awardednearly $9 million in grants to organizations working to improve the health of the Mahoning Valley.
“We want to help everyone to the point where they don’t need us. That’s the goal. While a single person may not need us any more, we’re never going to get out of the business of helping people,” says Doris Bullock, current board chair of the Western Reserve Health Foundation. “Everyone should be working with the community, whether it’s giving your input like this board does or you’re volunteering to get people the food they need.”
Both health foundations are led by people doing frontline work to address health disparities and poor outcomes. Amerine is grants coordinator for Trumbull County Combined Health District and Bullock is the coordinator for Mercy Health’s Stepping Out community health program. Having that proximity, both say, is vital to ensuring the foundations’ work is truly responding to the needs of the community.
“If you don’t know how people are living or what people need, how can you make decisions that are getting them what they need?” Bullock says. “When you remember where you started and what you needed, then seeing people today needing those same things, you realize how important it is to give back to the community.”
Amerine and Bullock have both been involved in the leadership of the Healthy Community Partnership, an initiative of the Community Foundation to unite local partners in addressing health outcomes. Since its creation in 2018, the Partnership has been funded by the two health foundations, as well as the William Swanston Charitable Foundation (another supporting organization of the Community Foundation) and other local funds and philanthropic institutions.
The creation of the Partnership – both to convince the philanthropic boards to fund it and the partners to join in its work – required a change in the mindset of many partners. Organizations of all sizes and all varieties of missions, along with the theories of change that come with those differences, are at the table. One of the biggest challenges, Dennison recalls of the early days of the Healthy Community Partnership, was getting everyone to commit to working together.
“We had a lot of organizations that didn’t want to cooperate. They knew what they wanted to do, but they didn’t necessarily want to embark on a joint venture. … Even within the healthcare systems, the organizations had their own work they wanted to focus on that we had to pull together,” Dennison says. “It took a while to get started, but looking it at it today, I believe it’s one of the most successful things this community has ever done.”
In the six years since, the Healthy Community Partnership has grown into an effort that’s vital to the work of the organizations that join it. Its three action teams – parks and greenspaces, active transportation and healthy food – bring together residents, organizations and public officials in both Mahoning and Trumbull Counties to tackle projects that are aimed at creating systemic change.
“When everyone’s at the table, it helps make the whole system great because then no one is distanced from the issues. All of those voices and positions start working together to make things better,” Bullock says.
Adds Amerine: “At some of our state meetings, when I explain what the action teams are doing, people are amazed that we can get it done. Both being in those [action team] meetings to get work and to be in the board meetings to decide what we’re funding, it makes it very easy to know that the work will get done the way it needs to be done.
“It’s the benefit of working so close with these partners all the time.”
Pictured: A young shopper at the Warren Farmers Market.