Wean gives $228K to 7 Valley groups

Staff report

WARREN

Seven area organizations committed to the needs of low-income women, job training and early education have been awarded grants totaling $228,000 by directors of the Raymond John Wean Foundation.

The latest round of grants, approved at a meeting this month, reflects the foundation’s overall mission of improving the lives of residents of the Mahoning Valley by strengthening existing organizations and urging collaboration.

“We know that there is incredible potential in the Mahoning Valley, and we are delighted to be in a position to help forward-thinking organizations try to meet some of the Valley’s needs,” said Jeff Glebocki, foundation president.

The YWCA of Warren received the largest grant of $100,000 to help relocate Planned Parenthood of Northeasten Ohio’s Cortland location to the YWCA building in downtown Warren.

About 2,500 Trumbull County clients received services at the Cortland location in the past year. Planned Parenthood of Northeast Ohio is the only subsidized provider of comprehensive, voluntary and confidential family planning and contraception services in the Mahoning Valley.

Planned Parenthood’s move to the YWCA is part of a restructuring and rebuilding of the aging downtown Warren structure. The total building project is expected to cost $3.4 million.

The foundation’s next largest award of $40,000 went to the Western Reserve Land Conservancy for its urban Thriving Communities Initiative, which will help land banks operating in Trumbull and Mahoning counties to use best practices and pursue self-sustainable business models.

The Western Reserve Land Conservancy, formed in 2006 as the merger of eight organizations in Northeast Ohio, strives to revitalize Northeast Ohio’s cities through land reuse.

“Vacant properties are an enormous problem for the Mahoning Valley,” Glebocki said, noting that Warren and Youngstown have more than twice the national average of such properties.

Mahoning County had 1,819 foreclosure filings in 2010, a 466 percent increase in the last 15 years and Trumbull County had 1,413 filings last year representing a 456 percent increase over the last 15 years.

Neighborhood Ministries of Campbell, which will celebrate its 100th year of providing a wide range of services to low-income children and families, will receive $25,000 to help hire support staff to manage its growing operations.

The organization’s work, which started as Bible studies for newly arriving immigrant families in Mahoning County in 1912, has changed over the years and now includes offering people assistance with health needs, tutoring, after-school programs, life skills programs and drug abuse prevention.

Others grants awarded this month include $13,000 to Someplace Safe for a shelter expansion project, $25,000 to Tru-Mah-Col for helping three different early childhood education initiatives, $15,000 to Voices for Ohio’s Children for advocacy work throughout the state and $10,000 to the Trumbull Metropolitan Housing Authority for its Youth Build program, which includes job training.