General Mills Helps Twin Cities Nonprofits Serve Communities of Color

The General Mills Foundation in Minneapolis has awarded new grants to help a variety of Twin Cities nonprofits meet the needs of diverse communities of color, including new Hmong immigrants and Somalis. The foundation awarded new “Celebrating Communities of Color” grants of $10,000 each to 25 nonprofit organizations, including schools, community centers, health care clinics, social service agencies and arts groups.

The 5 grant recipients include a Hennepin County Medical Center program that monitors hunger and malnutrition in children and will link 20 families of color each month with housing, food, employment, health care and other resources; a Centro Legal project that will offer bilingual community education programs that teach immigrants about democracy and public policy as well as provide information about how to become active in their communities; a Department of Indian Work program that helps American Indian families in the east metro area manage diabetes through education, nutrition, diet and exercise; Youth Frontiers, which will expand a program that uses community service projects and leadership workshops to help bridge the gap between young people of diverse backgrounds and experiences; and the St. Paul Urban League’s “A Healthy Start” program, which is designed to educate children of color about the benefits of good nutrition and exercise as well as expose them to higher education opportunities.

The Celebrating Communities of Color grants are a new initiative announced by General Mills Foundation president Chris Shea last January in conjunction with the foundation’s 50th anniversary. Last spring the foundation awarded its first round of Celebrating Communities of Color grants. Through both grant rounds, the General Mills Foundation awarded a total $500,000 in Celebrating Communities of Color grants to 50 nonprofits in the metro area in 2004, serving more than 57,000 people of color.

“These grant recipients reflect the depth of innovative and creative programming that targets the metro area’s increasingly diverse population,” said Shea. “We’re honored to support nonprofits as they continue their work in enriching the lives of people of color whether it’s new Hmong families recently arrived from refugee camps in Thailand or the African American, Latino and American Indian communities.”

As a unique feature of the program, General Mills employees of color are recruited to volunteer in the program's grantmaking process by participating in site visits to organizations and helping in the evaluation process.

For a complete list of the General Mills Foundation’s second round of 2004 Celebrating Communities of Color grants (PDF, 7 pages), click here.

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