Royals Youth Hockey Fund
This fund provides financial support for youth to participate in ice hockey lessons, camps, clinics, or leagues.
Berks County Angel Funds
The Community Foundation manages several funds that provide grants of $25 to $1,000 for specific needs of children (under 18) in Berks County.
- The Berks County Parrot Head Club Angel Fund provides grants for children (under 18) who are in an extraordinary situation where a nominal amount of intervention is likely to yield life-changing outcomes. Preference is given to Berks County children who have a physical or medical need that the family is unable to afford.
- The Emmanuel ‘Manny’ Dimitriou Memorial Fund provides grants for children (under 18) with critical medical, social, or educational needs that will enhance their ability to achieve their full potential. Distributions also support the needs of individuals in the Berks County Treatment Courts.
- The Camella Maggs Client Memorial Fund provides grants for children (under 18) who have learning and physical disabilities.
A parent, guardian, teacher, social worker, caseworker, or court official may complete the application on a child’s behalf to be considered for a grant. If a parent or individual applies, these applications must be substantiated by a caseworker, school, medical, or court official. Decisions are generally made within 14 days of receiving application and the referral.
Bill Woolworth Memorial Fund for Berks Teens
This fund support’s Co-County Wellness Service’s Berks Teens Program.
Berks Teens is an education and outreach campaign that engages young people to work with their peers. Armed with reliable, well-accepted information and data about the impact of teenage pregnancy and medically sound information about avoiding unwanted pregnancy, the campaign fanned out across the city through social media, youth ambassadors, and outreach to parents.
Reading Pride Celebration Gives Back Fund
This fund supports projects and programs that affirm and enhance the lives of LGBTQ youth in Berks County.
Created with a portion of the proceeds from the annual Reading Pride Celebration Festival, this fund will allow educators and community organizations to develop or expand programing that directly impacts the lives of LGBTQ+ students in Berks.
FUND FOR EDNANNIA
Emergency Fund for Ukrainian Community Foundations
The Fund for Ednannia collects and distributes donations to community foundations in Ukraine.
All funds raised are distributed to ISAR Ednannia for its Emergency Fund. ISAR Ednannia is a Ukrainian national network for the development of local philanthropy.
This fund was established at Berks County Community Foundation in the spring of 2022 to help Ukrainian community foundations address the most pressing needs in their communities.
Examples of initiatives that have so far been supported by the Fund for Ednannia:
- Food packages were delivered to 910 households made up of the most vulnerable populations in southern Ukrainian town and 10 nearby villages. Among those assisted were senior citizens who cannot access their pensions during the war, families with children, and people with disabilities. Pictures of this operation are featured below.
- New medical equipment — fetal monitors, pulse oximeter monitors, neonatal pulse oximeters, children’s heated mattresses — was delivered to a maternity hospital in in northern Ukraine where other nearby hospitals have been destroyed. The hospital expects the equipment to assist in the delivery of 350 children over six months.
To learn more about the projects and programs that have been funded, read the People to People Impact Report.
Forest Crigler, Jr. Memorial Fund in Support of Youth Swimming
The Forest Crigler, Jr. Memorial Fund in Support of Youth Swimming awards grants to programs that develop, encourage, and promote youth swimming in Berks County.
Embracing Aging Fund
This fund provides grants to address the needs of Berks County’s older residents by removing barriers to aging well.
Home Health Care Foundation Fund
The Home Health Care Foundation Fund provides grants for organizations and programs that serve Berks County and/or those counties that are contiguous to it (Chester, Lancaster, Lebanon, Lehigh, Montgomery, and Schuylkill). Preference will be given to organizations or programs that train or support family caregivers providing home health care to kin.
One or more of the following purposes must be met to be considered for a grant:
1. Organizations and programs that help residents recover from illness or disability at home to prevent them from needing in-patient medical care;
2. Programs and activities that support preventative healthcare for residents and overall community health to reduce the need for in-patient medical care;
3. Organizations that provide health-related charity care to residents.
Preference will also be given to organizations and programs that help individuals remain at home. Maximum grant available to an organization per grant cycle is $40,000.
History
On January 1, 2019, Tower Health assumed the operations of Home Health Care Management, Berks Visiting Nurse Association, the Visiting Nurse Association of Pottstown and Vicinity, and Advantage Home Care.
For years, each of these organizations provided compassionate and much-needed care to the communities they served. In that spirit, the Home Health Care Foundation was created as part of the merger to support charity care and other programs for the good of the community.
The Home Health Care Foundation became an affiliate of Berks County Community Foundation in 2020.
Home Health Care Foundation Board
Kim R. Berry
Jim Gierlich
Robert R. Kreitz, Esq.
Rabbi Brian I. Michelson, Chair of the Home Health Care Foundation Board of Directors
Kevin K. Murphy, President, ex officio, of Home Health Care Foundation, and President, Berks County Community Foundation
Mike Paolini
Karen S. Thacker Ph.D., RN, CNE
Frances A. Aitken, CPA, Treasurer, ex officio, of Home Health Care Foundation, and COO and Treasurer, Berks County Community Foundation*
*Serves as an officer, not a board member.
All About Children – Reach out and Read Fund
This fund promotes literacy by providing age-appropriate books to children during their office visits to Penn State Health – All About Children or its successor.
Fund for Science Research Institutes
This fund supports Science Research Institutes serving students in Berks County schools.
