Basic Needs
Human thriving can occur after basic needs for food, shelter, and safety are secured. We try to find niche areas of support in this extremely large arena of need, with a focus on increasing capacity of key organizations that meet these needs. The following is a representation of recent grants in the area of Basic Needs in which The Mayerson Foundation is involved.
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Freestore Foodbank
The Freestore Foodbank (FSFB) is Ohio’s third largest foodbank and the region’s primary provider of food, personal products and services to help people move toward self-reliance.
In 1991 The Mayerson Food Distribution Center was established to enable the expansion of food distribution throughout the region.
Since that time The Mayerson Foundation has supported on-going building maintenance needs of the Food Distribution Center and technology upgrades. Most recently the Foundation provided support for a training center to aid food pantries across the region in learning important skills and techniques unique to food preparation and distribution.
Legal Aid Society of Greater Cincinnati: Cincinnati Child Health-Law Partnership
The Legal Aid Society of Greater Cincinnati is a nonprofit law firm dedicated to reducing poverty and ensuring family stability through legal assistance.
The Mayerson Foundation supported Legal Aid’s establishing of a best-practice, medical-legal partnership with Cincinnati Children’s Hospital designed to improve the health and welfare of low-income children and their families through proactive legal assistance provided in a health care setting.
The partnership provides patients and their families with on-site legal assistance for problems that have been identified as barriers to improved health. In addition to legal services, the partnership also provides training to clinical staff, residents, nurses and social workers.
Cincy Smiles (McMicken Dental Clinic)
CincySmiles, established in 1909, plays a critical role in the oral health of those who live in poverty in Greater Cincinnati. Its programs serve over 15,000 men, women and children every year.
The Mayerson Foundation provided lead funding for the creation of a dental clinic serving indigent individuals and families in Cincinnati's Over-the-Rhine neighborhood and a mobile dental clinic serving school children and early childhood education centers.
CincySmiles helps to ensure that all members of our community have access to oral health education, disease prevention, and treatment services with a special emphasis on those who are at-risk due to poverty.
Lighthouse Community Services
Operating since 1969, Lighthouse is nationally recognized as an innovator in services for families in crisis, for homeless youth and young adults, and for youth learning to become self-sufficient. The agency provides early childhood services; behavioral health and psychiatric services; home-based services to families; services to youth engaged with the juvenile justice system; community residential treatment facilities; foster care and adoption; independent living services; and opportunities for education.
The Mayerson Foundation provided many years of support to Lighthouse Youth Services including capital support for the Bob Mecum Youth Shelter and the Sheakley Center for Youth - a multipurpose facility designed to provide a seamless system of care for youth and young adults experiencing homelessness. The facility’s design includes permanent supportive housing and a shelter.
Lighthouse is part of a community-wide effort to end youth homeless in Cincinnati by the year 2020.
GreenLight Fund & Family Independence Initiative (FII)
GreenLight Fund Cincinnati searches from coast to coast to bring the most promising, ground-breaking answers to some of Cincinnati’s most challenging poverty-related issues. Initial Mayerson Foundation support of GreenLight Fund was for capacity and in their first operational year and since expanded to support one of their portfolio organizations: Family Independence Initiative.
Organizations in the GreenLight portfolio represent the best in their fields – in innovation, measurable results and ability to scale. The second GreenLight Fund portfolio organization, Family Independence Initiative (FII), brings an asset-based approach to changing the way low-income families are perceived, and therefore, engaged in the social service system. The Mayerson Foundation supported the launch of FII as they continue to support the creativity, resourcefulness, and initiative of families striving to move beyond poverty for good.