Nonprofits Providing Services Related to Mental Health, Cancer and Basic Needs Receive Funding.
Portland – The John T. Gorman Foundation is awarding $1 million to 60 Maine nonprofit organizations through its annual Direct Services Grant Program. Through this support, the Foundation will partner with nonprofits who are working to meet the immediate needs of some of Maine’s most vulnerable people.
The Foundation is awarding the funding to a diverse and wide-ranging array of organizations throughout the state. Mental health and cancer have been core issues traditionally addressed by the Direct Services Grant Program. This year, in recognition of the increased pressure placed upon many low-income Maine families, the Foundation also has allocated a portion of the program’s resources to organizations providing essential services such as housing, food, and crisis supports.
“Each year, we’re moved by the stories of resiliency we hear from disadvantaged people around the state,” says Tony Cipollone, President and CEO of the John T. Gorman Foundation. “We are honored to be able to support organizations that serve them, and hope that these grants help improve the lives of many people in Maine.”
John T. Gorman, known as Tom, established his namesake foundation to help disadvantaged Mainers. In recent years, the independent, statewide Foundation has moved to focus strategically on four key areas: improving educational achievement for children, promoting successful transitions to adulthood for vulnerable older youth, helping struggling parents to support their families and enabling low-income seniors to remain in their homes as long as possible. In 2016, the Foundation expects to distribute a total of $7.8 million across all its grant programs and initiatives across the state.
For more information about the John T. Gorman Foundation, visit www.jtgfoundation.org.
The full list of 2016 Direct Services Grant Program recipients:
Organization | Project Description | Grant Amount |
| American Cancer Society | To provide ongoing funding to support the Patient Navigator Programs at Maine Medical Center and Maine General Medical Center and for the Road to Recovery transportation program. | $25,000 |
| Amistad | To address the needs of individuals with mental illness and other life challenges, and to develop peer services. | $15,000 |
| Androscoggin Home Health Services | To provide bereavement services for hospice patients and their families who are affected by cancer. | $25,000 |
| Area Interfaith Outreach | To provide food and emergency aid to economically distressed people of Knox County. | $20,000 |
| Aroostook County Action Program | To support the Energy Crisis Intervention Program, a program that helps individuals and families manage crises such as homelessness or eviction in Aroostook County. | $25,000 |
| Avesta Housing Development Corporation | To provide support for people transitioning from homelessness to affordable housing in Portland. | $25,000 |
| Child and Family Opportunities | To provide support for the Early Education Access Fund, which helps parents who need help affording quality childcare. | $15,000 |
| City of Westbrook | To provide support for newly arrived families as they navigate their initial months of relocation. | $20,000 |
| Community Clinical Services | To support patients whose out-of-pocket expenses are not covered by insurance. | $10,000 |
| Community Financial Literacy | To provide support for financial education courses and counseling sessions. | $15,000 |
| Cultivating Community | To provide support for programs that increase access to healthy food. | $15,000 |
| Day One | To help homeless youth and other vulnerable young people obtain stable housing. | $25,000 |
| Dean Snell Cancer Foundation | To provide financial assistance to cancer patients being treated at New England Cancer Specialists in Brunswick. | $10,000 |
| Down East Hospice Volunteers | To provide cost-free compassionate care for terminally ill cancer patients, their families and their caregivers. | $15,000 |
| Eastern Maine Healthcare Systems | To provide support for the Patient Assistance Fund to help cancer patients in Aroostook County with travel and lodging, and financial help for medication co-pays. | $20,000 |
| Freeport Community Services | To support staff and programs that serve the most vulnerable residents of Freeport and Pownal, including low-income seniors and children. | $15,000 |
| Friends Of Aroostook | To provide funding to grow, maintain, harvest and deliver fresh produce to people in need living in Aroostook, Washington, Piscataquis and Penobscot counties. | $10,000 |
| Gathering Place | To provide general operating support for the only daytime shelter for the poor and homeless in the Midcoast Region. | $5,000 |
| Good Shepherd Food-Bank | To provide general operating support for those trying to overcome food insecurity in Maine. | $15,000 |
| Grahamtastic Connection | To provide laptops, tablets and internet access for children in Maine who are battling cancer. | $15,000 |
| Greater Portland Charitable Furniture Center | To provide donated furniture to people in the Greater Portland area who lack basic home necessities. | $10,000 |
| Hand In Hand / Mano En Mano | To provide a drop-in resource center, home-based services, case management, referrals and transportation services for immigrants and farmworkers in Milbridge and surrounding towns. | $15,000 |
| Immigrant Legal Advocacy Project | To provide general operating support for legal services to Maine’s low-income immigrants. | $15,000 |
| Intercultural Community Center | To help low-income immigrants access housing, education and employment. | $5,000 |
| Irene Chadbourne Ecumenical Food Pantry | To provide for children, young parents and the elderly living in Washington County, the Passamaquoddy Indian Township and Pleasant Point with basic services such as food, fuel and transportation. | $15,000 |
| Jewish Community Alliance Of Southern Maine | To support the food and diaper pantry, which serves those in need in the Portland area. | $15,000 |
| Kennebec Valley Community Action Program | To provide transportation services to individuals and families affected by cancer. | $15,000 |
| Kennebec Valley Mental Health Center | To provide support to youth in Central Maine who are experiencing homelessness. | $25,000 |
| Knox County Homeless Coalition | To provide support for mental health programs serving homeless clients in Knox County. | $25,000 |
| Lake Region Senior Service | To provide support for programs that provide transportation to low-income seniors, disabled citizens and cancer patients. | $10,000 |
| Leukemia & Lymphoma Society | To provide assistance with travel and other expenses for Maine patients undergoing cancer treatment. | $15,000 |
| Mid-Coast Hunger Prevention Program | To support programs that provide food to low-income families. | $15,000 |
| Mid-Coast Health Net | To increase the number of patients receiving mental health counseling. | $20,000 |
| Milestone Foundation | To provide support for the Milestone Homeless Outreach and Mobile Engagement (HOME) Team and Emergency Homeless Shelter. | $25,000 |
| New Beginnings | To provide program support for the only 24-hour shelter for runaway and homeless teens in Maine. | $15,000 |
| Oasis Health Network | To provide more free mental health services. | $20,000 |
| Oxford County Mental Health Services | To provide mental health services and intervention when law enforcement has become involved in a mental health crisis. | $25,000 |
| Penobscot Community Health Center | To provide mental health services to clients in the Hope House Health and Living Center. | $25,000 |
| Penquis CAP | To provide transportation assistance for individuals who do not have or cannot afford transportation to cancer treatment or support. | $15,000 |
| Pine Tree Hospice | To assist clients and families experiencing the challenges that accompany end-of-life and bereavement. | $15,000 |
| Portland Education Foundation | To support a universal breakfast program at the Fred P. Hall School in Portland. | $20,000 |
| Preble Street | To provide support for Preble Street’s Emergency Food Programs at the Resource Center Soup Kitchen and Food Pantry, the Florence House Soup Kitchen, and the Teen Center Soup Kitchen. | $20,000 |
| Progress Center | To provide support for a community kitchen program serving children, youth and families in Norway. | $15,000 |
| Rockland District Nursing Association | To provide affordable in-home and community health nursing services to low- to moderate- income seniors. | $21,000 |
| Rosscare | To support the monthly subsidy given to low-income subscribers of EMHS LiveSAFE, a service which allows seniors to continue to live independently and safely in their own homes. | $12,000 |
| Rumford Group Home | To serve children who need crisis stabilization services. | $25,000 |
| Rural Community Action Ministry | To support programs aimed at alleviating hunger and homelessness for the most vulnerable residents in 13 central Maine towns. | $15,000 |
| Safe Voices | To support direct services such as emergency housing to men and women fleeing domestic violence situations. | $15,000 |
| Sexual Assault Prevention And Response Services | To provide mental health services to children who have been sexually abused in Androscoggin, Oxford and Franklin counties. | $25,000 |
| Sexual Assault Response Services Of Southern Maine | To provide funding to support sexual assault education and services specific to homeless and at-risk youth. | $20,000 |
| Shaw House | To provide mental health support services for homeless at-risk youth throughout five counties in Maine. | $20,000 |
| Southern Maine Agency On Aging | To provide support for the When In Need (WIN) Fund, a discretionary fund designed to support the basic human needs of older and disabled adults in southern Maine. | $10,000 |
| St. Mary’s Health System | To provide general operating support funds to the St. Mary’s Nutrition Center, which improves food access to those in need in Lewiston/Auburn. | $15,000 |
| Tedford Housing | To provide mental health services for clients at the Cumberland Street Emergency Housing Shelter in Brunswick. | $15,000 |
| The Center for Wisdom’s Women | To support a drop-in center for low-income women which provides food, clothing and personal hygiene products. | $10,000 |
| The Maine Sea Coast Mission | To provide support for the Weald Bethel Food Pantry, which serves low-income residents within a 700-mile radius of Washington County. | $15,000 |
| The Opportunity Alliance | To provide support for Morrison Place, which provides transitional housing and treatment for homeless individuals diagnosed with co-occurring major mental illness and substance use disorders. | $15,000 |
| Unitarian Universalist Association | To purchase non-food items for Sanford’s Corner Cupboard, such as batteries for smoke detectors, trash bags and personal hygiene products. | $7,000 |
| Upper Valley Economic Council | To provide support for the Upper Valley Economic Council’s Food Pantry, serving food insecure families in Aroostook County. | $5,000 |
| York County Community Action Corp | To provide mental health services such as assessments, behavior and treatment planning, and whole-family interventions for children in Head Start. | $20,000 |
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The John T. Gorman Foundation advances and invests in innovative ideas and opportunities that improve the lives of Maine’s most vulnerable people. The independent, statewide Foundation focuses on four key areas: Improving educational achievement for children, promoting successful transitions to adulthood for vulnerable older youth, helping struggling parents to support their families and enabling low-income seniors to remain in their homes as long as possible. The Foundation’s work is guided by data, evaluation, national best practices and lessons from the initiatives in which we invest. We also seek to inform and influence practice and policy on issues affecting disadvantaged children, youth, families and seniors.