Foundation plowing grants into community

By: ADAM KAYE - Staff Writer | Monday, December 3, 2007 6:27 PM PST ∞

NORTH COUNTY -- You don't need to be a multimillionaire to be a philanthropist.

The Coastal Community Foundation has demonstrated this point for 20 years, puts local donors' funds into their communities.

The Encinitas-based foundation, established in 1987, serves the north coast from Del Mar to Oceanside. Today, the foundation controls 22 funds with assets exceeding $1 million. Last year, $54,000 in grants went to a host of educational, social, civic, artistic and environmental causes.

"As I recall, we were awarding itty, bitty, tiny grants at first because we had no money," said Anne Omsted, a former Encinitas City Council member and one of the foundation's founders. "It was kind of hand-to-mouth in the beginning. Now I'm just astounded."

By working with the foundation, anyone with a minimum of $5,000 can establish an endowment. The foundation manages the funds -- its portfolio is pulling a 13 percent return this year -- and handles the paper pushing and administrative details that drive many would-be donors away, said Sharon Omahen, the foundation's executive director.

All this puts philanthropy within reach of the non-rich, she said.

"We really sit down with a donor and say, 'What do you want to accomplish?'" said Sharon Omahen, the foundation's executive director. "We're simple and flexible. You don't have to have the millions needed to set up a private foundation."

More good work

Just this week, the foundation issued $13,000 to four nonprofit groups providing mental health services for children. Those groups -- North County Lifeline, Hospice of the North Coast, Vista Hill and Voices for Children -- each received between $1,500 and $5,000.

The mental health grants stemmed from a $5,000 fund established in 1991 by a Solana Beach woman. The woman had told the foundation to research beneficiaries.

"She said later, 'I'm going to put more money in so we can do more good work in the community,'" Omahen said. "She wanted no recognition. I think her joy was every year we'd send her the thank you notes, and the joy that's coming out of these funds."

Last spring, the foundation spread the joy among 18 high school graduates, who received scholarships ranging from $300 to $1,100.

Three of the scholarship funds were established by former San Dieguito Union High School District administrators upon their retirement. Former Superintendent Bill Berrier awarded $500 each to four students; former assistant superintendent Eric Hall paid for a $500 scholarship; Roy Risner, the retired longtime principal at Sunset High School, awarded $1,000 to Sarah Burroughs, a student who was a single mother and determined to become a nurse.

"I'm going to eat some crow here and I want you people to understand it," Risner said during last spring's graduation ceremony. "She was the last person I enrolled and I pretty much told her she could not get it done. She has proven me wrong and I'm very, very proud of her."

In addition to scholarships, the foundation awards so-called EdPlus Minigrants.

With school budgets tight, as always, these grants support teachers who would be unable to pay for programs or who might end up paying for them with their own money.

Making learning real

Last spring, a $1,000 minigrant paid for a garden at Ditmar Elementary School in Oceanside. The fall harvest was bountiful, and now, the seeds of beets, lettuce, cabbage and cucumber seeds are in the ground.

On Thursday, fourth-graders took to the garden with rain gauges they made from paper cups.

Their mission: to determine how much water the sprinkler system was releasing on the plants.

That exercise ties to math curriculum, said teacher Dave Stephens. Identifying plants and bugs and what it takes for them to live correlates to science, and when students write their findings, they will gain language skills, he said.

"The whole idea that started the garden was to use it as an outdoor educational setting for math and science," Stephens said, "but it can cross into the curriculum in all aspects."

Joan Brown, a volunteer with Oceanside Coastal Neighborhood Association, poked a spade into the ground and little hands plucked away devil grass.

"This is my first garden," said one girl with pink and white striped socks.

Lynn Gonzalez, the second-grade teacher who wrote the grant, took in all this with a smile. She said Ditmar has many students who are learning English as a second language.

"Hands-on activities make learning real for them," she said.

For more information about the foundation, call (760) 942-9245. or visit www.coastalfoundation.org

-- Contact staff writer Adam Kaye at (760) 901-4074 or akaye@nctimes.com