COVID response shows S.A. backs its own
Stronger together.
To some it may sound a bit cliché, particularly with these ongoing pandemic times requiring us to rally to help our great city keep making progress despite being tested like never before.
At the San Antonio Area Foundation, we say “stronger together” for good reason — we truly believe it. We live it.
Looking back, there was no way we could have mobilized the financial resources and human capital to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 without the collaboration of a multitude of philanthropic partners.
San Antonio’s altruistic spirit has been on full display during these tumultuous times, and we are humbled and grateful to serve as our community’s trusted philanthropic partner when it comes to helping our neighbors in need.
Here are some of the stories our nonprofit partners shared with us.
Merced Housing Texas, which focuses on affordable housing, kept its resident services program funded, as well as provided $250 gift cards to tenants to help them cover basic needs such as groceries and bills.
“Our residents are working families that, quite often, live paycheck to paycheck and don’t have savings for emergencies,” Kristin Davila, Merced’s president and executive director, told us. “The immediate and immense support from the COVID-19 Response Fund allowed us to respond to their emergencies instantly.”
The House of Neighborly Service, which has served San Antonio’s West Side for over a century, was able to deliver meals and groceries to their older adult clients, including Adelpha Ochoa.
“I lost my job and my husband’s work was cut down to part time,” Ochoa said. “That helping hand really helped us get by — God bless you.”
The much-needed charitable grants came from the COVID-19 Response Fund launched on March 20, 2020. Hosted by the San Anotnio Area Foundation and jointly managed with the United Way of San Antonio and Bexar County, the effort raised $6.4 million through the generosity of hundreds of individual donors and dozens of businesses and civic institutions.
An additional $7 million in grants from the foundation’s donor-advised funds benefited nearly 250 additional nonprofits as donors recognized their opportunity to offer support. That raised the total for the response fund to more than $13 million.
Response fund grants were distributed to more than 200 nonprofit organizations in our region in a rapid-cycle process, prioritizing those serving San Antonio’s lowest-income ZIP codes. The primary focus was to provide immediate relief in social services, employment, food security and shelter.
That’s why our work is not done helping them recover from the pandemic. The virus is not gone, and there’s still great need in San Antonio.
Toward that end, we launched efforts such as the Recovery Fund for the Arts, which provided additional funding to nearly three dozen cultural arts nonprofits, including many that rely on volunteer staff to keep going. We also provided Youth Leadership Development grants to 15 youth-serving nonprofits through a $2 million grant we were awarded by Blue Meridian, a national philanthropy organization.
We continue to take such deliberate action to close the opportunity gap for those who need it most in San Antonio. We can and must do our part toward forging a truly fair and just community — one where who you are or where you come from doesn’t determine how you advance in your life and career.
We welcome you to join us. Anyone interested in opening a philanthropic fund to help nonprofits is encouraged to reach out to us. Together, we can make a difference.