Barbara’s Funding Forum
The Foundation helps to promote funding for rural non-profit organizations through Barbara’s Funding Forum (BFF). BFF sponsors a grant writing workshop at no charge to the non-profit. BFF provides a trainer who demystifies the grant writing process by taking the attendees through a grant application.
The attendees then submit a grant request to the Foundation. Grant request size is usually about $1000. The Foundation board members then hold an in-person group critique of all grants and then awards grants to some or all the non-profit organizations.
Fifteen Coos Bay area non-profit organizations participated in the forum. These included:
Friends of Coos County Animals; SW Oregon Veterans Outreach; Cous County Friends of Public Health; Hollywood Dreams; Friends of Langlois Public Library; Coastal Family Relief Nursery; Coos County Foster Parent Program; Community Coalition of Empire; Myrtle Point Senior Citizen Center; Myrtle Point Public Library Foundation; Wild Rivers Animal Rescue; Flora M. Laird Memorial Library; Bandon Community Youth Center; Coos Bay School District; and Devine Nature Academy.
BARBARA FUNDING FORUM – 2024
Held in Coos Bay Oregon February 3, 2024
The Foundation hopes that this process encourages rural non-profits to apply for other grants, obtain additional resources for rural communities and help build cooperation and familiarity among the non-profits in the community.
Madras – 2022; Grant’s Pass – 2020; Burns – 2018
Our Next Funding Forum – 2026
We need another community to hold our 2026 funding forum. We are looking for a community that has ten to fifteen non-profit organizations that would like to attend the grant writing class and have the feed-back about the grant requests submitted by the group. We need a local “champion” who will help us organize the presentation and be the local point of contact to provide local guidance for a suitable location, catering and ensuring a rewarding event. If you are interested, please contact us by email through the website.