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On December 10, 1956, a group of approximately 125 citizens who had been convened by the Community Planning Council met and voted to organize the Greenville County Foundation. The Declaration of Trust was executed on August 10, 1957 with an initial contribution of $5,675. The Foundation’s seven founding Trustees were Ernest Patton, Eugene E. Stone III, Roger C. Peace, Francis M. Hipp, J.P. Williamston, Harold M. Taylor and Eugene Bryant. W. Gordon Bunch was appointed Secretary and Earle Sargent was appointed as the Treasurer of the Foundation. |
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The Foundation’s first grant was to fund a survey for the long-range water, sewer and fire protection needs of Greenville County. This survey and its subsequent implementation resulted in unified water and sewerage systems in Greenville County and led to orderly development of both residential and commercial areas during a period of tremendous economic and population growth in Greenville during the 1970s.
For its first twenty years, the Foundation operated with no paid staff and relatively little increase in endowment size. During these years, the Foundation concentrated on seed grants for community projects. These small, but crucial, grants helped establish the Greenville Urban League, the Greenville Blood Assurance Plan, the Greenville Council on Aging, the Senior Citizens’ Center, the Metropolitan Arts Council, Volunteer Greenville, the Community Food Bank, and Junior Achievement.
Critical support was also given by the Foundation over a number of years to totally fund countywide immunization of children against polio, measles, tetanus and other diseases. Ninety percent of area residents received the Sabin oral polio vaccine and children ages 12 months to 12 years were given tetanus immunization. This was the first mass immunization campaign ever conducted in Greenville County.
While local health needs continued to be important, the Foundation shifted and expanded its grantmaking in the mid 1970s and 1980s. Grantmaking included matching grants and youth scholarships to the summer music camps at Brevard Music Center, the Governor’s School for the Arts and for the Greenville County Museum of Art. Support was also given for the work of the Greenville Council on Aging, adult education programs at the Junior Chamber of Commerce, important research work of the Community Planning Council and for exciting developments such as the Roper Mountain Science Center and the Peace Center for the Performing Arts.
In 1981, the Community Foundation’s Board of Directors hired its first Executive Director to work with the Board and other volunteers to further enhance the Foundation’s grantmaking and development efforts. During this time the Foundation served as a conduit for private investments in the downtown revitalization initiative knows as Greenville Commons. This complex is composed of an office building, convention center, a city-owned and operated parking garage and a Hyatt Regency Hotel and has provided an impetus for the redevelopment and beautification of Greenville’s downtown business district.
In 1985, the Foundation’s Board of Directors established the Francis Hipp Founders Society. All 36 of the Society’s members provided gifts of $25,000 each to the Foundation to create an additional $1,000,000 in unrestricted assets.
In late 1986, the Community Foundation of Greater Greenville was selected as one of eight community foundations (out of 28 applicants) for the Ford Foundation’s Leadership Program for Community Foundations. To earn this honor, the foundation underwent an intensive written and on-site application process. Greenville was the smallest of the eight chosen cities. The others selected were Detroit, Miami, Memphis, El Paso, Rochester, Dayton and Phoenix. Under this program the Ford Foundation provided $500,000 to Greenville’s Community Foundation to fund a comprehensive community-wide effort to improve local childcare services over the next five years. The Greenville’s Child program was launched in July of 1987. (Greenville’s Child and Success by 6 merged in 2003. As one of the many endowment funds administered by the Foundation, it continues to provide annual financial support to high quality child care and education programs through Success by 6.)
In order to receive the Ford Foundation grant to improve childcare services, the Community Foundation was challenged to raise an additional one million dollars locally for its permanent endowment. Ford allowed two years for the completion of this specification. The Community Foundation of Greater Greenville achieved the goal in only nine months and became the first of the eight foundations to meet the local fundraising match requirement. The Community Enrichment Grants Program is now funded by the income from a $2,000,000 endowment seeded by the matching gifts made in response to the Ford Foundation grant.
In addition to making grants from its unrestricted funds, the Community Foundation continues to provide administrative and investment services to a wide variety of civic, cultural and charitable initiatives. Grants from its donor advised, designated endowment and special projects funds have totaled over $40,000,000 since 1996.
Many donors are making planned gifts which will serve to double the assets of the Community Foundation. These gifts will establish endowments that benefit a number of specific charities or fields of interest that have special meaning to the donor and their family. Several individuals are making unrestricted gifts in their wills to provide the Foundation with additional resources to meet future yet unforeseen needs in the place where they ran their businesses or raised their families. Donors have also made plans to create a fund that their children and grandchildren can use after their lifetimes to perpetuate the civic and charitable traditions of their families. Throughout its history the Community Foundation has served as a tax efficient and cost effective means for individuals, businesses and charitable organizations to provide the financial resources critical to improving the lives of Greenville County residents. |
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