ConnCAT students graduate with skills that are in demand in Greater New Haven's robust healthcare sector.

Job-ready Skills

The Community Foundation was a founding investor in Connecticut Center for Arts and Technology (ConnCAT) and the pioneering program continues to be one of our largest investments, totaling more than $1 million since its opening in 2012.

ConnCAT provides education, training and placement services to under- and unemployed adults in job-available fields. To support the health sector, it offers certified classes in medical coding and phlebotomy. The ConnCat culinary institute is run in a state-of-the-art commercial kitchen with a recently opened cafe. ConnCat also offers afterschool and arts enrichment programming for children.

Located in New Haven’s Newhallville neighborhood, ConnCAT is modeled on the acclaimed Manchester Bidwell facility in Pennsylvania. Learn more about ConnCAT's results.

Women Receive Second Chances

Public speaking exercises help prepare STRIVE-New Haven students to succeed in the job market.

A recent Community Foundation grant supported Women Investing in in Second Chances, W.I.N.S. The program helps women facing job barriers resulting from involvement in the criminal justice system.

W.I.N.S. is a program of STRIVE-New Haven/Career Resources, Inc., a longtime grantee of The Foundation that offers intensive job-training programs for individuals with multiple barriers to employment. Since 1998, the STRIVE-New Haven has had a job placement rate of more than 70 percent.

Continue reading about women gaining the skills to succeed at W.I.N.S.

Neighborhood Housing services turns blighted properties into attractive affordable housing. Photo credit: Neighborhood Housing Services

Affordable Housing Developed

The work of three grantees added more than 100 units of affordable housing during a recent grant period ending in 2016. The housing expanded opportunity and provided greater paths to financial stability for over one hundred individuals and families.

Neighborhood Housing Services of New Haven (NHS) increased the affordable housing options in the Newhalville and Dwight neighborhoods in New Haven. NHS completed 29 single- and multi-family properties, encompassing a total of 52 units of affordable housing during a three-year grant term.

Capital for Change received a capacity building grant to support the merger of Greater New Haven Community Loan Fund with the Connecticut Housing Investment Fund and the Community Capital Fund. The merger created the largest full service Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) in CT serving people, nonprofits, businesses and public institutions in need.

Since its creation in the fall of 2015, Capital for Change has financed 46 affordable units in the Community Foundation’s 20 Town region from May-Oct. 2016, more than triple the output of the Greater New Haven Community Loan Fund.

Habitat for Humanity of Greater New Haven produced 8 new family units in the Fair Haven, Quinnipiac Meadows, West Rock, and Dixwell neighborhoods of New Haven enabling 8 families to become homeowners.

Dive Into The Issues

Access to Healthy Food and Food Start-ups Expands with Nonprofit Merger ›

11.04.2019

As a combined organization, New Haven Farms and New Haven Land Trust will make green space more accessible to all city residents, thereby creating a healthy environment that will promote community social connections, physical activity, and positive health outcomes.

Ability Beyond Empowers Independence ›

10.28.2019

Longtime nonprofit helps adults of all abilities live and work in the community.

Junta Turns 50 ›

09.16.2019

Latino advocacy and services organization continues to evolve.

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Recent Grant Awards

  • Beulah Land Development Corporation, Inc - $30,000 to provide general operating support to expand staff capacity for project development and management to revitalize neighborhoods in New Haven and Hamden.
  • Capital for Change - $18,750 to support a program that provides technical assistance and loans to Greater New Haven nonprofit organizations.
  • Career Resources Inc.- $85,000 to support the STRIVE job-readiness program in New Haven.
  • Connecticut Association for Human Services - $75,000 to support the Family Economic Success suite of programs, including Volunteer Income Tax Assistance, Connecticut Money School and Youth Money School, one-on-one financial coaching, and Bank On New Haven.
  • Connecticut Fair Housing Center - $30,000 to support the investigation of how affordable units are marketed and made available to people of color and whether illegal discrimination prevents people of color and families with children from obtaining existing affordable units.
  • Emerge CT - $220,000 to provide general operating support to assist formerly incarcerated persons to return to their families as responsible members, and to their communities as law-abiding, contributing citizens.
  • Habitat for Humanity of Greater New Haven - $25,000 to provide general operating support for the creation of homeownership opportunities for low-income families.
  • Neighborhood Housing Services of New Haven - $65,000 to provide general operating support for the revitalization of New Haven's disadvantaged neighborhoods through affordable homeownership development, homeownership counseling and education, and community engagement.
  • New Haven HomeOwnership Center - $50,000 to provide general operating support for homebuyer education and financial assistance to individuals and families who are purchasing homes to stabilize and revitalize Greater New Haven neighborhoods through increased homeownership.
  • Public Allies Connecticut - $25,000 to provide general operating support for leadership development programs that advance the skills, networks and work experiences of individuals while increasing the capacity of nonprofit organizations.
  • Rebooting New England - $20,000 to support regional long-range strategy to rebuild the economy of Southern New England and its mid-sized older industrial cities, including New Haven, by creating a high-performance, high-speed, state-of-the-art, inter-city railroad network.