What is a community foundation?
Community foundations are the best way to help your hometown flourish, forever. Community foundations positively impact community well-being by investing gifts from donors, supporting local projects, and engaging in leadership initiatives.
How do community foundations work?
Community foundations are public charitable trusts, built by community, for community. Your gift to a community foundation is invested in an endowment fund and the interest earned is granted back to charitable projects and initiatives in the community each year. Learn more about types of endowment funds below.
Thousands of donors choose to support their communities through their local community foundations each year! Each community foundation is governed by a volunteer board made up of local representatives.
Quick stats about Manitoba’s community foundation network
The Canadian community foundation model began in Manitoba in 1921. Today, Manitoba has more community foundations, per capita, than anywhere in North America. Each one is committed to supporting its community’s unique needs and opportunities.
Manitoba’s Community Foundation Network a Glance
Statistics about community foundations outside Winnipeg for the year 2024.
Information is drawn from data shared by community foundations in the annual Endow Manitoba survey.
Grant Making
13,909
Grants disbursed
12,309,645.21
Value of Grants Disbursed
Finance and Administration
397,533,325.70
Assets at Market Value
Fund Development
15,663,129.30
Value of tax receipted Gifts
Governance
47
Staff Driving Manitoba’s 56 community Foundations outside of Winnipeg
Endowment Funds
Endowment funds are investments established by community foundations to provide grants to their communities.
Gifts to a community foundation are held in endowment funds and invested. A portion of the income generated by that investment is distributed as grants into the community each year. The initial gift is never spent so it will continue to support and benefit your community forever.
Types of endowment funds
Flow-through
Community foundations are able to accept gifts on behalf of other qualified organizations. Community foundations do not hold these gifts in endowment funds but transfer them directly to the qualified organizations.
Recipients of flow-through gifts must meet the requirements of a qualified organization.