The Community Foundation partners with other community organizations to bring people together to discuss, plan, and implement strategies that meet the needs of the entire community and that take advantage of opportunities available to the community. These collaborative partnerships help optimize all the financial and other resources in our community.

Local and Regional Partnerships

We seek to use our resources to strengthen our area through community and economic development initiatives.

Economic Development

• HomeTown Competitiveness Partner
  The HomeTown Competitiveness (HTC) initiative is a framework that joins a variety of approaches and multiple community organizations into a cohesive force for developing and sustaining a vital, prosperous community. HTC recognizes that although small towns and rural communities sometimes may struggle, they have significant local resources and resolve that, when focused, can create a sustainable plan for community and economic development.
  
  The Community Foundation has created a fund to help gather charitable assets and is working with local leaders to implement a county-wide "hometown" vision for all of our futures. Through the HomeTown Competitiveness Fund and HTC initiatives we can support entrepreneurship and help maintain thriving farms and small businesses; create flexible charitable assets and retain local wealth; engage youth in positive ways and give young people a reason to return to their hometown to work and raise their families, and strengthen local leadership capacity. Learn more about HTC by visiting the Branch Area Chamber website.
  
  
• Member Branch County Area Chamber of Commerce
  
  
• Member Barry-Branch-Calhoun Workforce Development Board connecting people to jobs through the Michigan Works! system.

Community Development
Member Family Services Network (FSN). FSN is a coalition of educators, employers, service providers and others that help coordinate health and human services for Branch County families and re-allocate state and federal block grants aimed at strengthening Branch County families. We also serve on the community funding re-allocation and monitoring committees through FSN.

Health Initiatives

Currently we are working with the Family Services Network and other community organizations to improve the health of local citizens.

Housing and Education Initiatives

We seek to help individuals and families through education and community support that leads to self-sufficiency.

• Member of the 10-Year Plan to End Homelessness steering committee and the Continuum of Care Allocation Committee.
  
  
• Member Early Childhood Investment Corp /Great Start Collaborative-Branch
  The results of a Columbia University's Teachers College study, released in May 2008, estimated that those who drop out of high school cost Michigan taxpayers about $2.5 billion a year. Every student who drops out of high school costs the public $127,000 in tax revenues, public health costs, crime, and welfare payments. By investing in early childhood care, education, and development you can prepare a child to succeed in school and avoid some of these costs.
  
  Research has shown that early childhood education increases lifelong earning potential, achieves better academic outcomes, lowers rates of teen pregnancy and incarceration, and improves the community's ability to recruit and retain parents who work---all of which provide long-term positive results and cost savings to the community.
  
  The Early Childhood Investment Corporation (ECIC) is a statewide initiative that recognizes education begins at birth (not when a child enters school) and works to effectively focus early childhood efforts and leverage public and private support to expand the availability of high-quality early education and child care, including parenting education.
  
  A small investment for a lifetime of returns!
  
  
  The Community Foundation believes that early childhood education can improve children's chances for success in later life, thereby providing benefits to children, their families, and society as a whole. We recently created the Early Childhood Investment Fund to support the Branch County ECIC initiative and to provide a further giving opportunity for those with similar values.
  
  For more information on ECIC - Great Start Branch, click on the heading above to visit the website; or contact Amy Galliers at (517) 278-5600 or agalliers@branchareachamber.com.
  
  If you would like more information regarding Early Childhood Investment Fund please contact us.