Community Health Workers, Home Health Aides, Personal Care Attendants, and Nursing Assistants are among the direct care workers on the front lines of the Pandemic. COVID-19 spotlighted both an incentive towards accelerating the delivery of care directly in communities and the inequities experienced by direct care and community health workers.  During this program, we will have a discussion with David Rodwin of the Public Justice Center and the Maryland Regional Direct Services Collaborative, Dr. Chidinma Ibe, of the Johns Hopkins Schools of Medicine and Public Health. We will learn from our speakers how we can support, advocate, and sustain community health workers and direct home care programs to meet the increasing need to change the delivery of healthcare from institution-based to the community. 

To kick off 2022, the Arts Funders Affinity Group is pleased to welcome Eddie Torres, president & CEO of Grantmakers in the Arts. In late 2020 and again in mid-2021, Grantmakers in the Arts (GIA) surveyed their members about recent and upcoming changes in arts grantmaking practices in response to the pandemic and the movement for Black lives. Eddie will share his national perspective of arts grantmaking and discuss the findings from GIA’s latest survey. We’ll then bring it home with a brief update from Nicholas Cohen from Maryland Citizens for the Arts and have a whole group sharing session about our grantmaking practice and if it reflects the national trends in increased giving, flexibility, support for individual artists, and support for BIPOC organizations. Will also identify opportunities for collaboration and continued learning.

Join Maryland Philanthropy Network and our speakers for an overview of the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) to contextualize the ways funds are being disbursed, including the $350 billion in State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds (SLFRF). Drawing on ideas found in this Philanthropy News Digest article by Darius Graham of the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation, we’ll discuss how a greater understanding of priorities and processes in a community can help with allocating SLFRF in ways that inform grantmaking. We will conclude with a dynamic panel discussion with our partners on how funders can support nonprofits, provide community input about public dollars, and address any potential funding gaps.