Holiday Fund raises $27,600 for 6 local agencies Holiday Fund raises $27,600 for 6 local agencies (February 06, 2004)

By Sterling Speirn

At Peninsula Community Foundation, we think a lot about trust.

Philanthropy is a business based on it -- trust that resources will be effectively utilized, trust that support will be available when promised, and trust that by giving back today, we are making a difference for tomorrow.

For 40 years, Peninsula and Silicon Valley residents have trusted Peninsula Community Foundation to support and enhance this community, and local nonprofits have turned to us as a source of financial, in-kind and moral sustenance. One way Peninsula Community Foundation helps is by partnering with local newspapers to promote charitable giving.

During the month of December, you probably read about the Voice's Holiday Fund, a new way readers can support critical nonprofit organizations in our community. In its first year, 77 generous readers -- people like you -- contributed $13,800 to this fund. That money will go directly back to a group of core nonprofits supporting the Mountain View community. But the magic of the Holiday Fund is that Voice readers aren't acting alone. Through the generosity of the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, Krause Foundation and Wakerly Family Foundation, this total was doubled to $27,600.

The Holiday Fund will be shared between six nonprofit beneficiaries: the Community Services Agency of Mountain View & Los Altos, Community Health Awareness Council, Mountain View Rotacare Clinic, the Society of St. Vincent de Paul of Santa Clara County, the Support Network for Battered Women and the Community School of Music & Arts.

This was the first time Peninsula Community Foundation and the Mountain View Voice partnered to provide funding for local health care, job training, housing and arts programs. But the Holiday Fund is just one way in which we are working to make this community a better place today and for generations to come. To learn more about Peninsula Community Foundation's other services, from scholarship funds to charitable estate planning, please visit www.pcf.org.

A strong community is built on trust, neighbor by neighbor. Thank you for supporting the 2003 Holiday Fund, and thank you for caring.

Sterling Speirn is president of the Peninsula Community Foundation.

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