Hamilton Community Foundation recently made 64 grants totalling $811,411 to charitable and non-profit organizations in Hamilton. The funding supports a wide variety of programming including access to nature, safe spaces for LGBTQ+ youth, music education for seniors, clothing and baby essentials, and subsidized moving services for families escaping domestic violence.
Most of the funding came from The Edith H. Turner Foundation Fund[1] which supports evidence-based programs and services that help children/youth; families, adults and seniors in Hamilton who are experiencing marginalization, with a focus on stable homes and families, healthy bodies and minds and educational/learning support across ages.
| Organization | Project title | Project description | Grant Amount |
| A Rocha Canada | Operation Wild 2025 | Provides accessible, guided nature experiences for people living with disabilities, thereby promoting well-being, environmental stewardship, and social inclusion. | $10,400 |
| ABRAR Trauma and Mental Health Services | Youth Wellness Through Art and Storytelling | Offers free one-on-one counseling to youth struggling with mental health challenges, alongside weekly mental health support groups that incorporate art therapy, and storytelling. | $15,600 |
| Adult Basic Education Association | Educational Planning Services | Provides adults in our community with objective, goal-oriented educational planning services. | $12,960 |
| Ancaster Community Services | Youth Engagement Program – The Net | Strives to empower and engage young people (aged 13 to18) to become stakeholders in their community through volunteering opportunities and community events. | $8,000 |
| Art Gallery of Hamilton | Breaking Through the Vault at the Art Gallery of Hamilton with Hamilton You Poets | Provides students, youth and community members with meaningful opportunities to build literacy and language skills and social connections through spoken word. This program is inclusive to all with a focus on serving those who identify as Black, Indigenous, racialized, newcomers, or ESL learners, of all ages and stages. | $12,000 |
| Cancer Assistance Program | Drive Programs | Improves health equity by providing free practical supports to cancer patients including drives to cancer-related appointments and doorstep deliveries of home-safety equipment, nutrition and personal care items. | $10,000 |
| Catholic Children’s Aid Society of Hamilton | Community Youth Housing Project | For youth, ages 16 to24, who are accessing shelter for the first time, at imminent risk of becoming homeless, couch surfing or experiencing family conflict; a preventative approach to youth homelessness, shifting the focus from an emergency response, to taking proactive measures to prevent or intervene in the early stages of youth homelessness. | $21,500 |
| Centre de santé communautaire Hamilton Niagara Inc. | Francophone Elders Crossroads | Reduces social isolation among French-speaking seniors in minority situations and enhance their social, psychological, and cognitive health. | $5,000 |
| Circle of Friends for Newcomers (Hamilton) | Towards Closing the Technology Gap: Digital Literacy Coaching Project | Equips ESL newcomers of all ages with basic digital literacy skills. | $9,588 |
| City Kidz Ministry | Youth Leadership Development including Junior Leadership and RoadMaps 2024-2025 | CityYouth is a program for graduates of the CityKidz Saturday program. It prepares youth, aged 12 to 18 to achieve beyond expectations, provides mentorship, encouragement and relationship. | $5,000 |
| Compass Community Health | Fruits and Vegetables Prescription Box (FVRx) | FVRx (produce prescription) program empowers healthcare providers to write prescriptions for clients to receive fresh produce. Participants are enriched through a bi-weekly market box filled with fresh and locally sourced fruits and vegetables. | $10,000 |
| Culture for Kids | After School Arts Program 2024-2025 | Provides quality performing and visual arts experiential learning for marginalized children/youth. | $15,000 |
| Dundas Youth Chaplaincy | Routes Youth Centre Drop-In, Programming, Workshops & Food Security | Routes Youth Centre is dedicated to providing a welcoming space for learning, growing, building relationships, and supporting youth ages 8 to19 in the greater Dundas and West Hamilton area. | $15,000 |
| Elliott Heights Baptist Church | Larch After School Program | Encourages and enhances the healthy development of children; academically by providing customized support and socially by helping children deal with everyday life issues. | $20,000 |
| Essential Aid and Family Services of Ontario Inc. | Infant and Toddler Food Bank Program | Ongoing emergency Infant & Toddler Food Bank service providing free access to emergency supply of infant formula, diapers, and food for children aged 0to3 years. | $12,140 |
| Eva Rothwell Centre | QWEER (Queer Welcoming Evenings @ Eva Rothwell) | Provides a safe, inclusive space for LGBTQ+ youth to discuss their experiences and concerns openly. Led by the youth with guidance from the Program Co-ordinator, the program seeks to empower participants, offer support and guidance, build a sense of community, educate about LGBTQ+ issues, and encourage youth-led initiatives. | $6,750 |
| Fit Active Beautiful Foundation | FAB 5K Challenge Program | Helps youth girls in Grades 6-8 living in lower income communities of Hamilton to develop the skills and confidence needed to live an empowered life through sport. | $5,000 |
| Food for Life Canada Charitable Corp. | Rescuing Food. Impacting Lives – Hamilton Supporting our Most Marginalized Communities with Healthy Fresh Food. | Provides food through our agency partners across Hamilton provides stabilizing food support for agencies and neighbours in need, while increasing health, social and financial outcomes. | $10,000 |
| Free Laundry Access | Free Laundry Access – Hamilton Expansion | Free Laundry Access is the only organization in Canada which provides individuals and families experiencing financial challenges with access to clean laundry in self-service laundromats. | $20,000 |
| Glanbrook Home Support Program, operating as Glanbrook Community Services | Meals on Wheels Program | Meals on Wheels program provides subsidized essential nutritional support to seniors, particularly those in rural and mobile-limited areas. | $10,000 |
| Green Venture | Eco Education Afterschool Programming for Equity-Deserving Hamilton Youth | Environmental Afterschool Programs provide meaningful, authentic, immersive learning opportunities to Hamilton youth. | $20,000 |
| Hamilton Conservation Foundation | Environmental and Cultural Education for Hamilton Youth | Introduces and connects children and youth with nature, cultivating a lifelong appreciation and love for their environment and outdoors. | $7,500 |
| Hamilton Festival Theatre Company | HFTco Education & Artist Development 2024/25 – ALERT & Spark | The Spark Teen Performance and ALERT (Artistic Leadership and Entrepreneurial Training) education programs assist aspiring and emerging theatre professionals as they navigate the unique challenges faced by artists who wish to make careers in Hamilton – and to give them the necessary tools to ply their craft here in the region. | $15,000 |
| Hamilton Foundation for Student Success | Student Support Grants | Student Support Grants respond to emergency or extraordinary needs of HWDSB students. They support a student’s basic personal needs, contribute to a student coming to or staying in school or support a student who wants to participate in a school activity where cost is a barrier. | $20,000 |
| Hamilton Music Collective | An Instrument for Every Child – Program Growth | Provides students with instruments and instruction and cultivate partnerships with community organizations ensuring that that youth in the AIFEC program have access to barrier-free instrumental lessons on the instrument of their choice. | $20,000 |
| Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra | Music Education for Youth and Seniors | Provides social connection, learning and intellectual stimulation for people at all stages of life in Hamilton. | $10,000 |
| Healthy Youth Network | H.E.A.R.T. (Healthy Education About Relationships Team) | Works to reduce gender-based violence in youth through a student led approach that promotes healthy relationships within the school and community. | $12,390 |
| Helping Hands Street Mission | Empowering Volunteers to Engage in Resource Provision | Prioritizes staff capacity towards creating, training and supervising volunteer positions for diverse people who engage corporations and community groups to assist in meeting needs. | $5,000 |
| Immigrants Working Centre | Settlement and Mental Health Support for Refugee Claimants | Offers essential short-term crisis counselling support to newcomers, including individuals and families, with refugee claimant status, delivered by a Registered Social Service Worker. | $22,116 |
| Interval House of Hamilton | W.E.A.R.S. – Women’s Education and Rural Support Program | W.E.A.R.S maintains and strengthens current safe pathways in rural communities, builds interagency collaboration, engages in public education, provides professional education, and provides therapeutic individual and group supports, and wrap-around services. | $16,526 |
| James Street and Hill Park Alternative Education | Kids Rock the Kitchen 2 | Provides students, diagnosed with severe mental health issues, with a lunch and “grab and go” breakfast while educating them on purchasing and preparing meals using healthy choices. | $11,100 |
| Junior Achievement South Western Ontario | Planting the Seeds of Financial Health for Hamilton Youth (in underserved, high priority schools in Hamilton) | Builds relationships with Hamilton teachers, principals and school boards to deliver JA learning experiences to students in Grades 4 to 12 in schools with underserved student populations. | $5,000 |
| Let’s Talk Science | Empowering Students in Hamilton with STEM to Build Brighter Futures | Engages Kindergarten to Grade 12 students and teachers in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) in free, fun, evidence-based learning that encourages enjoyment and understanding of STEM while increasing desire to pursue STEM studies and careers. | $5,000 |
| Liberty For Youth | Bright Choices | Helps young people who require mentorship to overcome challenges related to their school experience. | $10,000 |
| LIVELab, McMaster Institute for Music and the Mind | LIVELab Science, Technology and Arts Outreach for Underrepresented Youth | Introduces young people to music, science and technology, while engaging their imaginations in ways that excite them about the possibility of pursuing careers in STEAM. | $15,000 |
| Living Rock Ministries | Rock Resources | Offers comprehensive support, including goal-setting, practical training, and incentives to build confidence and skills for personal development success. | $20,000 |
| Mishka Social Services | Sanad Program | The Sanad program provides culturally sensitive case management for newcomers, immigrants, refugees, and racialized individuals, addressing challenges like housing, employment, legal, and medical issues. | $20,664 |
| Neighbour-2-Neighbour Hamilton Community Food Centre | Middle East Outreach | Assists newcomer households, and households with ongoing systemic barriers to settlement, connect with services and programs to address income and health vulnerabilities. | $25,000 |
| New Hope Community Bikes | Ride Smart – Safe Cycling Education Expansion | Teaches cycling fluencies to new riders so they can be safe road users while experiencing physical and mental health benefits and obtaining affordable options for transportation. The expansion project is meant to create a model of program facilitation that is sustainable and allows more children to participate. | $15,000 |
| Niwasa Kendaaswin Teg | McQuesten Urban Farm | Engages community members living in the McQuesten neighbourhood and the broader community in land based farm activities, facilitation of preserving workshops and programming, school visits and services will reduce individual social isolation and support and provide work related skills to youth and adults. | $25,000 |
| Pathways to Education Canada | Keeping Students in Hamilton Connected to their Education | The Pathways program is a holistic model offering academic, financial, social and one-on-one supports to complement the school curriculum at no cost to students or their families. | $12,000 |
| Progressive Animal Welfare Services Inc. | Essential Veterinary Funding for Low-Income and In-Crisis Hamilton Community | PAWS provides a unique financial subsidy program to support low-income or crisis-affected people who require veterinary care for their companion animals. | $5,800 |
| Rafiki | Kusoma program- French & math tutoring | Supports students in French schools and French immersion schools in French and Math. | $20,000 |
| Shakespearience Performing Arts | The Shakespearience Classroom Experience | Develops character, confidence and communication skills for students in Grades 3 to12. | $5,000 |
| Shalem Mental Health Foundation | Mental Health Support for Marginalized Hamilton Residents | Gives low-income Hamilton residents struggling with mental illness access to subsidized and timely mental health services. | $16,700 |
| Shelter Movers Southwestern Ontario | Hamilton Upscaling | Provides moving and storage services at no cost to individuals and families fleeing abuse and is continuing its upscaling of services in the Hamilton area to support as many gender-based and intimate partner violence survivors in the local area as possible. | $4,977 |
| Shine Through the Rain Foundation | Hamilton Rainy Day Grocery and Shelter Program | Prevent evictions, utility disconnections and hunger when low-income Hamilton clients have life-threatening illnesses (up to $1,500 annually) so clients can focus on recovering in their own homes with their families. | $5,000 |
| Somali Community In Hamilton | Youth Social Services | Provides comprehensive one-on-one case management support for young individuals with a focus on enhancing educational outcomes, securing employment opportunities, and offering crisis intervention. | $17,250 |
| St. Joseph’s Healthcare Foundation | Youth Empowerment Fund at St. Joe’s Youth Wellness Centre | Provides youth clients the opportunity to apply for critical financial support to help them achieve their recovery-related goals, whether they be related to education, employment, gender identity, artistic pursuits, or overall health and wellness. | $5,000 |
| St. Matthew’s House | HOPES2Stay2: Eviction Prevention and Hoarding Management | The HOPES (Housing Outreach Preventing Eviction for Seniors) program assists older adults 55+ who are at risk of eviction or need help navigating complex bureaucratic systems. | $23,000 |
| Start2Finish Canada | Hamilton Running & Reading Club+ (“R&R Club+”) | Serves 300 children (Grades 1to 6) from six Hamilton neighbourhoods through both in-person and virtual sessions. | $10,000 |
| Student Open Circles | Community Volunteer Circles | Increases the capacity of Hamilton social service agencies to deliver their programs by recruiting, training, and coordinating weekly teams of volunteers on behalf of the agencies. | $12,000 |
| Telling Tales | Telling Tales’ Community Presentation Program: Author Visits for Hamilton Classrooms and Families. | Featuring Canada’s finest literary talents, this series of 35 presentations will provide Hamilton children with enriched arts programming to underserved locations through live streamed classroom and in-person visits. | $3,700 |
| Tetra Society of North America | Tetra Hamilton – Devices Breaking Barriers | Matches local volunteers with local people with a disability, in order to design, build and install a custom assistive device that removes a barrier from their life. | $5,000 |
| The Baby Depot | Project Dignity- 350 babies | Provides a year’s worth of clothing, baby essentials, and large items to each child. | $10,000 |
| The Children’s Garden Project Canada | The Children’s Garden’s 2025 Growing Season Workshops: Cultivating Young Minds | The Children’s Garden Project Canada(TCGPC) offers free, safe, and accessible outdoor gardening workshops for inner-city children and families in Hamilton. | $19,600 |
| Theatre Aquarius Inc. | Arts Education Programs at Theatre Aquarius | Year-round arts education programs for children taught by professional artists experienced in both professional theatre and arts education. | $5,000 |
| Threshold School of Building | Ready to Work (RTW) Job Developer/Program Administrator | Assists 123 youth overcome multiple barriers to employment, and develop the skills and knowledge necessary to make a successful transition to the labour market or return to school. | $25,000 |
| United for Literacy | Free Literacy Programming for Hamilton Children and Youth | Helps children and youth from underserved, low-income, and newcomer communities improve their literacy and numeracy skills, complete schoolwork more often, increase self-confidence, and become more engaged in learning. | $15,000 |
| Welcome Inn Community Centre | Learning and Fun | For children living in poverty, the Learning and Fun program is a place of belonging and an opportunity to grow academically. Working in partnership with the staff at the two local elementary schools, Welcome Inn invites 50 children (Grades 1-8) who would benefit from the one-on-one academic support of a mentor. | $10,000 |
| Wellwood Resource Centre of Hamilton | Evidence-Informed “Toolkits” for Newly-Diagnosed Cancer Patients | Supports a part-time Navigator to focus on helping patients and caregivers identify needs and accessing resources. | $5,000 |
| Wilma’s Place Alternative Education | Multipurpose Technology Classroom | Provides an alternative education program designed to re-engage at risk students who have endured multiple barriers to their education by establishing a dual focus classroom that integrates cosmetology and construction technology. | $10,000 |
| YMCA Hamilton| Burlington| Brantford | Beyond the Bell | Addresses the achievement gap experienced by low-income children by instilling positive social and emotional skills through an interactive after-school program. | $20,000 |
| YWCA HAMILTON | Safe Homes and Stable Families: Parent and Child Supports for Survivors of Violence | Combines two key evidence-based supports: 1) Supervised Parenting Services on-site at YWCA Hamilton; and 2) Specific parenting programming (based on the proven SELF and Strengthening Families curriculum) for mothers and children as means of early intervention for children exposed to violence/trauma and healing for families as they rebuild their lives after violence. | $12,150 |
[1] With additional funding from the following field-of-interest funds: Angel Fund, The Hamilton Arts Endowment Fund, Barbara Bethune Fund, Board Leadership Fund, Marguerite M. Cino Memorial Fund, Giovanni & Grazia Criminisi Literacy Fund, James Walker Culhane Trust Fund, Community Fund/Environment Endowment Fund, Barbara Farnan Fund, Betty & Jack George Family Fund, Lillian & Marvin Goldblatt Family Fund, Everard Hambro Fund, Fund for Underprivileged Children, Jane C. LeWarne Fund, John Dennis Holmes Fund, Antonina Lombardo Fund, The Malloch Foundation Fund, Marchese Health Care 50th Anniversary Legacy Fund, McCallum McBride Fund, Note-Able Music Fund, School Sisters of Notre Dame Legacy Fund, Jeanne Scott Fund, Bill & Tina Seale Fund, Lillian M. Shaw Fund, Vera & Percy Tomlinson Fund, Women 4 Change Fund.
Donations to the Foundation are invested for the long term in public markets and in alternative investments. Investment income is then allocated annually to support granting, community leadership and operations. The summary and charts presented here provide both a financial snapshot and a history of recent activity that underlies the grants and community leadership activities represented in this annual report, made possible by remarkable donors.
Donations to the Foundation are from individuals, corporations and other charities. Donors may contribute to named endowment or flowthrough funds, to the Board-directed Community Fund, or to HCF’s community leadership projects.
The $35.1 million in donations this year is the second highest total in HCF’s history. Annual donations are influenced by the timing of the realization of donations in wills and significant one-time donations like the $27.7 million in donations of property and private equity. As illustrated in Chart 1, annual donations have ranged between $3.2 and $35.1 million over the past eight years. The five-year rolling average of donations ranges from $5.0 million to $13.3 million over the past eight years.
The five-year rolling average number of donations is 1,787 with 2019-20 at 1,853. The number of donations fluctuates based on “in memoriam” donations and the number and nature of events sponsored by donors to raise money for their funds.
Chart 1
Grants are made annually from both endowed and flowthrough funds. Because flowthrough fund balances are distributed in a shorter time period, granting from these funds can materially influence HCF’s total annual amount granted.
As illustrated in Chart 2, grants and community leadership project spending over the past eight years has ranged from $4.7 million to this year’s historic high of $11.5 million. Granting from endowment funds was reduced in 2013 as a result of the decline in investment returns in 2012 which a) lowered the asset base used for the granting calculation (currently four percent of the fund balances), and b) resulted in less income available to grant. Flowthrough granting and expenditures on community leadership projects has ranged from 22 to 56 percent of total granting in any given year and is dependent on the timing and nature of flowthrough and project activity. At 893, the number of grants for this year is 37 percent higher than the eight-year average.
Chart 2
Investments traded in active markets are reported at fair market value. Investments not actively traded are recorded at their cost less any impairment of their value.
To support our strategy of aligning our assets with our mission and to provide a more diverse and robust portfolio, HCF has committed to investing in alternative asset classes including loans to charities and not-for-profits, private debt, real estate, infrastructure and private equity. These alternatives are consistent with the Foundation’s long-term investment horizon and liquidity requirements. Since these investments are not actively traded, they are valued at cost in the investments. These alternatives total $25.8 million.
HCF invests according to policy guidelines established by the Board of Directors. Two committees of the Board oversee investments to ensure compliance with the policy:
As an endowment builder, HCF’s policy focuses on long-term investing and is supported by reserve accounts that are currently at their policy maximum.
The investment policy sets out a total portfolio target asset mix, as well as a range around these targets. The public market investment managers have mandates within this targeted asset mix and use their discretion to invest the portfolios within this range. Chart 3 reflects the current and target asset mix. Note: $25 million of private equity relates to a fund established by a donor and is not part of the asset mix or the consolidated portfolio results.
Chart 3
Two long-term portfolios are invested in the public markets with Jarislowsky Fraser, and Connor, Clark & Lunn. Chart 4 compares those portfolios against benchmarks as follows:
Benchmarks reflect the performance of each market index based on HCF’s specific target asset mix. Comparing actual results to the benchmark measures the value added by investment managers compared to the average market performance. HCF’s investment policy target is a long-term investment return in the 6.5 to 7.5 percent range.
Chart 4
The effect of the global pandemic has materially affected investment returns, resulting in a -8.4 percent public market return for the year. The seven-year annualized return at 6.8 percent is within the targeted investment policy range and is 1.2 percent higher than the 5.6 percent benchmark. As noted in the financial highlights, the current 10-year annualized return of 7.0 percent is in the target range and is higher than the benchmark by 1.2 percent.
Impact investments enable donations to endowed funds to drive positive change beyond granting, because they represent investments of capital that deliver financial returns coupled with positive social and/or environmental outcomes. In addition, these investments provide a pool uncorrelated to the public markets which, in turn, buffers the portfolio from the volatility currently experienced.
More than 15 percent of our long-term assets are in impact investments. Chart 5 illustrates HCF’s impact investing progress over the past five years, with $25 million currently placed or outstanding and another $15 million committed. This brings the total commitment to $40 million, up from $34 million last year. Impact investments cover areas including affordable housing, arts, environment and sustainable development.
Chart 5
Local loans since inception total $9.7 million with $7.1 million outstanding at year end. Chart 6 shows the impact areas our loans have supported. Since the loan program’s 2012 inception, $2.6 million in loan principal has been repaid and recycled as new loans. In addition, the interest from these loans supports HCF granting.
Chart 6
IRP is a Government of Canada program being delivered nationally by partners including Community Foundations of Canada. As the first phase in the government’s long-term investment in social finance, the IRP’s goal is to make social-purpose organizations “investment ready” so they can make a difference in new and innovative ways through their participation in the social finance market. HCF has partnered with community foundations in London and Niagara, and the McMaster Innovation Park to manage the program regionally on behalf of Community Foundations of Canada. The first request for proposals for funding in January created enormous interest nationally and garnered 65 submissions to our regional partnership. Approved funding is expected to be released in June 2020. As an additional benefit, the IRP brought a growing number of potential opportunities for local loans to HCF’s attention.
These investments include private equity, private debt and real estate investments. Many of these investments are long term in nature, are maintained at cost and do not have a regular income stream. As these investments are maintained at cost, their results include interest income and realized gains, but not unrealized gains. Results for these investments are closely monitored and are reported when realized. Chart 7 identifies the investment areas, with $18.0 million placed and a total commitment of $33 million across 21 investments.
Chart 7
Operating expenses for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2020 total $2.5 million and were 2.5 percent higher than last year. Staffing costs related to the Foundation’s 22 employees represent 70 percent of HCF operating costs.
In addition to breaking out cost by type, operating costs are allocated to each of the Foundation’s operating areas: grants administration, community and philanthropic leadership, community relations and knowledge dissemination, development activities, and administration and governance. Examples of community and philanthropic leadership include convening around the city’s critical issues and fostering the growth of philanthropy by sharing staff time and knowledge to support other charities. Charts 8 and 9 illustrate these costs by operating area and by expense type.
Charts 8 and 9
The Foundation’s annual development expenses are not necessarily attributable to the donations received in that year. The nature of donations to the Foundation can result in costs preceding the receipt of the donation by several years (for example, donations through wills). As a result, consistent with the community foundation sector, operating costs are evaluated by a ratio of total operating expenses to average total assets. Ratios fall within a range depending on the size and stage of the community foundation’s development.
Management considers the ratio of 1.26 percent (1.25 percent in 2019), as illustrated in Chart 10, to be within an acceptable range for a foundation of HCF’s size, stage and level of community leadership, compared against benchmarks established in the community foundation sector. We continue to monitor both the actual results and the benchmarks on an ongoing basis.
Chart 10
Hamilton Community Foundation’s total assets of $201 million at March 31, 2020 include balances of HCF funds and funds held on behalf of others at $1.7 million.
Hamilton Community Foundation’s fund balances, illustrated in Chart 11, represent accumulated donations plus the net investment earnings on these donations, minus granting and operating costs. Funds include both endowed and flowthrough funds. Endowed funds are held permanently and grant from investment earnings. Flowthrough funds are fully distributed as grants over a pre-determined term.
Chart 11
The fund balances have grown 55 percent to $198 million at the year ended March 31, 2020 from $128 million in 2013. Donations of $35.1 million included $4.4 million in flowthrough donations that were largely distributed as grants in the year and, as a result, do not remain in the fund balances at year end. This results in a modest total funds balance growth of 4.8 per cent for the year. The number of funds has grown 19 percent to 377 from 318 in 2013.
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