Technical Support for Community Causes: Our Partnership with Fremont Area Community Foundation
The Fremont Area Community Foundation is one of Michigan’s most established community foundations, founded in 1951 and now marking its 75th anniversary. Based in Fremont, it serves Newaygo County along with geographic affiliates in Lake, Mecosta, and Osceola counties, working to improve quality of life across the region by connecting donors’ generosity with local need. Its grantmaking concentrates on three priorities: community and economic development, education, and poverty reduction. Beyond writing checks, the Foundation invests in the strength of the organizations it funds. Through its nonprofit capacity building work, it treats grantees as long-term partners, backing not only their programs but their ability to deliver them, funding the technical support and organizational development that help local nonprofits operate soundly and sustain their impact.
Katie and her team at Nonprofit Nav are truly amazing. They are helping our community supported Hospice House grow to our full potential so that we can better serve our communities. Not only is Katie and her team experts in her field and is passionate about helping those she works with and learning about how they are making a difference.
Laura Currie, Executive Director
The Roadmap
As a partner of FACF, Nonprofit Nav provides training and consultation to grantees in early development stages or in need of additional technical support. Our work to date has ranged from fund development strategy to board training and strategic planning. In every engagement, we focus on equipping the client to carry the work forward independently, with confidence and know-how.
The Journey
Working with FACF grantees is a constant reminder of how community organizations can lift an entire region. Here are two of our recent FACF engagements.
The Comfort Home
The Comfort Home serves as an extension of family, providing a home for people in their final days of life along with respite care. Knowing how difficult the subject of their work can be to talk about, we partnered with this remarkable board and team to build a three-year strategy rooted in their strengths: memorable, joyful fundraising events and lasting relationships across the communities they serve. We meet with this client regularly and have seen firsthand how a well-crafted strategy carries a mission forward.
Bellwether Harbor Animal Shelter
Faced with unexpected funding changes, Bellwether needed to take the reins on fund development fast. We worked with their board to strengthen governance structures and train on the fundamentals of community fundraising. Our engagement came together just ahead of their successful annual fundraiser.
The Destination
The through line of our work with FACF is independence. Each grantee arrives at a different stage, and each leaves better equipped to raise funds, govern well, and plan for what comes next without leaning on outside help. That is what capacity building is meant to achieve, and it is what the Foundation makes possible by investing in the organizations behind the mission. When a shelter steadies its funding or a hospice home sharpens its three-year plan, the whole community feels it. We are proud to help FACF turn local generosity into local strength that lasts.