This year, four Ypsilanti-based organizations received support from the Washtenaw County's Office for Community and Economic Developmentas part of its Mini Grant Program.
A total of $40,000 was distributed from the program to nine community organizations in Washtenaw County. The OCED’s New Human Services Partnership is a collaboration between Washtenaw County and the city of Ann Arbor. The Ypsilanti organizations that received funding are the Ypsilanti District Library, the Ypsilanti Housing Commission, Kayla's Kitchen and Our House.
Other grant awardees include Family Learning Center, Girls Group, Manchester Community Resource Center, Shelter Association of Washtenaw County and the Washtenaw Interfaith Council for Immigration Rights.
This is the fourth time the NHPS has given out these mini grants to non-profit organizations in the area. Washtenaw County partnered with Ann Arbor because the city saw a need for it, said Monica Bullock, the Human Services Division Administrator for the OCED.
To choose the recipients, there is a committee made up of community members that review the applications and select the awardees, Bullock said. The committee is given a template that has categories for each nonprofit in economic stability, education access, healthcare access, neighborhood and environmental benefits, Bullock said.
“The committee is given the template to make sure the grant is going to an organization that will enrich the community based on the social determinants,” Bullock said.
Each of these organizations fits one of the social determinants. For example, the Family Learning Center falls into the education access and quality category, as well as Girls Group because they offer an after-school program for tutoring. Whereas, Kayla’s Kitchen is in economic stability providing meals to seniors and the Ypsilanti Housing Commission is a housing provider and fits the neighborhood and environmental benefits, Bullock said.
The awardees from past years have helped the community by providing essential services, Bullock said.
“The mini grant assists them greatly with being able to provide them and perhaps hire additional staff or get additional resources to provide to the community,” Bullock said.
Although current awardees aren’t eligible for the grant, they can reapply once their grant cycle ends. One of this year's winners, the Manchester Community Resource Center, received the grant back in 2022. The MCRC is a community-based human services organization with food and financial security programs that serve Bridgewater, Freedom, Manchester and Sharon townships. Carol Wotring, the Executive Director of MCRC, said the organization has a food pantry and emergency utility bills to prevent eviction.
“Anything that's going to make people less food insecure or more financially stable, that's what we're going to work on,” Wotring said.
The grant the MCRC received is going to go towards staff salaries, rent and client records management. On their application this year, Wotring said they put in a goal of starting an outreach program to the local senior center.
“We want to make sure that seniors know that we're around, and we can provide that outreach to them so to get them connected to resources that they may not know about, whether that's the Medicare savings program or food benefit or whatever,” Wotring said.
Wotring said that community nonprofits exist because of government funding; community donations can only go so far. Because of inflation and other economic factors, the need for the resource center’s programs has increased.
“In the three years I've been here, our pantry visits have more than doubled,” Wotring said.
Bullock said she hopes the mini grants will continue and that more communities would come aboard and help fund the initiative because it helps the community members that need it the most.
“The more resources that each of these organizations receives, it then trickles down to the community and the individuals that we serve, the most economically challenged individuals within Washtenaw County,” Bullock said.
