What community means.

Dear community,

The lives of members of our community have been devastated due to flooding over the last few weeks. Several apartment parking garages flooded in East Palo Alto, for example, completely ruining peoples’ vehicles, laundry facilities, and storage areas.

Many of those affected were without savings, insurance, or simply the time to deal with such an emergency. Our community rallied to provide resources to help our neighbors. The Palo Alto Community Fund provided immediate funds and was able to amplify the story of the neighborhood’s plight, resulting in many people and organizations stepping up to help.

This is what a functional, meaningful, kind community does. It rallies in an emergency. The Palo Alto Community Fund, I am proud to say, steps up in emergencies – from the recent flooding, to our extensive local COVID-19 Relief Fund, and even smaller-scale emergencies like keeping a youth group from being evicted.

But what we are also able to do is invest in the nonprofit organizations that work every day so our community can respond to emergencies and can provide long-term solutions and services to all of us, especially to those most vulnerable.

How do we invest? We have a growing group of donors from our community—people like you and me—who step up every year and donate. By pooling our money, we are able to invest in our local nonprofits that are doing the hard work on the ground day in and day out to uplift the vulnerable, provide education opportunities, support families and our elders, and improve the lives of all us in Palo Alto, East Palo Alto, and Menlo Park. Because of the generosity of our donors, we can also invest in innovative long-term local solutions to issues such as housing, hunger, and mental health.

Please check out our work and see how far your donation to the Palo Alto Community Fund can go to help. We believe giving where you live makes a huge difference. It’s what community means in action.

As we approach our annual grantmaking season, can we count on you to dig deep in support of our neighbors in times of crisis, and for the long term?

With hope and heartfelt gratitude,