A year after its introduction, the San Diego COVID-19 Community Response Fund has granted more than $58 million to organizations countywide, supporting pandemic-related services ranging from child care to education technology, The San Diego Foundation announced Tuesday.
The foundation collaborated with The Nonprofit Institute at the University of San Diego to study the impact of the fund. The resulting report found that 79% of people served by CRF-funded programs were living in poverty.
The people served by the fund were 42% Latino, 22% white; 15% Black, 6% Asian and 3% Native Americans. Age groups served were 7% infants/toddlers, 24% school-age children, 51% age 18-55 and 18% age 55+.
Among the CRF programs was a partnership with the county that provided funding to 3,355 childcare providers across 90 ZIP codes in the county, serving 81,000 children.
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The fund also worked to close the digital divide for 9,600 K-12 and community college students by providing them with computers and internet access to continue their classwork and mitigate learning loss.
Overall, more than 200 nonprofits were awarded CRF grants.
"San Diegans are resilient, generous and visionary," said Mark Stuart, president and CEO of the foundation. "Together, we will invest in sustainable solutions that address the systemic issues that have led to many of the hardships from this past year.
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"And we will continue to rely on our community leaders and local nonprofits whose heroic efforts have been the backbone of our pandemic relief," he said.
On March 16, 2020, in response to the coronavirus crisis, a coalition of philanthropic, government and business partners joined to create the San Diego COVID-19 Community Response Fund at The San Diego Foundation.
To date, the fund has raised more than $66 million thanks to donations from more than 3,700 individuals, foundations, government, donor-advised funds and businesses.
San Diego Gas & Electric, Qualcomm, Illumina, the Hervey Family, MacKenzie Scott, San Diego County and The San Diego Foundation have each contributed $1 million or more.
According to a survey by the Community Foundation Public Awareness Initiative, U.S. community foundations granted billions of dollars to nonprofits through relief funds in 2020, aiding in the battle against COVID-19.
