NORTH COUNTY -- Debbie Ibarra and her neighbors have big plans for Orange Place, their middle-class cul-de-sac in central Escondido. The neighbors would like to start a best-kept garden program to spruce up the block, or even better, find some park space for children to play football, so they don't have to hold games in the street.

For either project, $1,000 could make a big difference, said Ibarra, president of the Orange Place Neighborhood Group.

Now, the San Diego Foundation, a philanthropic organization that typically works with local nonprofits, will try to make those dreams a reality by offering $1,000 grants to neighborhoods throughout the region.

This fall, the foundation plans to award $20,000 to inland and coastal neighborhoods throughout North County to help with grassroots efforts to improve communities through volunteerism. Eligible projects will receive $5 in matching funds for each dollar they raise, up to a maximum of $1,000.

Bob Kelly, president and chief executive officer of the foundation, said the idea is that the grants will help existing neighborhood groups with special projects, or provide seed money to new community endeavors, such as community gardens or soccer leagues.

"We're open to all sorts of interesting and new community ideas," Kelly said. "We don't know what's out there. That's what's fun about this."

Cleaner neighborhoods and new sports leagues are not the only anticipated outcomes of the grants.

"It's also about developing new leadership and getting more people to care about the community and become involved in our civil society processes," Kelly said, adding that he envisioned future city council members and other civic leaders emerging from the program.

The idea for the program, Kelly said, grew out of Robert Putnam's influential book "Bowling Alone," which documented the demise of participation in civic and volunteer organizations over the last four decades.

To keep the grants as local as possible, the foundation's coastal and inland North County alliances, each composed of about 20 local leaders and philanthropists, will decided which groups receive the grants.

The foundation -- which annually awards about $45 million to nonprofits and other organizations -- experimented with a similar neighborhood grant program several years back. But Kelly and others said it didn't take root because the grants were awarded from the foundation's San Diego headquarters.

Relying on the local alliances should foster more participation, they said.

"Who knows better than local people what's needed?" said Jack Raymond, an Escondido investor and philanthropist involved with the foundation's inland alliance.

The foundation plans to expand the program to the East County and South Bay, as well.

Jerry Van Leeuwen, director of community and neighborhood services in Escondido, said his city already offers its eight organized neighborhood associations materials for special projects, such as building a fence along their street.

But the foundation's program offers the possibility to try new programs the city can't help with, he said.

"Their matching dollars is a nice opportunity for these fledgling groups to try a project they think improves their neighborhood," Van Leeuwen said.

Raymond said one challenge facing the alliance will be getting groups further inland, such as Bonsall, Ramona and Julian, to participate, as they tend to be less connected to the core of civic leaders along Interstate 15.

"We would love to see some applications from those areas," Raymond said.

Contact staff writer David Fried at (760) 740-5416 or dfried@nctimes.com.