Grant Stories

Rancho Santa Fe Foundation is funding an innovative program to provide food security and socialization for vulnerable seniors in three North San Diego County communities. The Thyme Together food truck serves nutritious lunches to seniors five days each week (except holidays) at four mobile home parks and one faith center in San Marcos, Oceanside and Vista.

“We’re providing a mobile senior center,” said Paula Powers, RSF Foundation Grants and Projects Committee Chair. “Our research told us that a lack of adequate transportation would be an obstacle to seniors traveling to a central location for food and socialization, so we’re bringing those necessities to them.”

As a result of the Rancho Santa Fe Foundation grant, The Tomorrow Project employed extra help so that the Production Manager could engage a future employer to discover the value of The Tomorrow Project trainees and prepare the women to be work-ready, specifically for the fast food industry. Their partner employer is Firehouse Subs in Point Loma.

One year later, the Firehouse Subs owner, Charlie Glanding, reported: “ I‘ve had the pleasure of working with two associates from The Tomorrow Project, Bernice and Gabby, who have been a part of the Firehouse Subs crew since opened for business on December 29, 2012. They continue to be an asset to our team and have largely contributed to our growth and success. They happily welcome each guest as they enter the restaurant and are a huge help with opening and closing the restaurant each day. I believe the two of them also play an important role in the stability of our employee retention rate. Their engaging personalities and impressive work ethic is contagious among other crew members. We haven’t had to hire a single new employee since the initial orientation we held more than 13 months ago.

I look forward to the future when the need arises to hire new associates so I can again call on The Tomorrow Project for quality employees. We’ve had a wonderful partnership experience and are thankful to be involved with such a great cause.”

Sue Reynolds, President/CEO of Community HousingWorks (CHW), described the far-reaching impact of a multi-year grant from the Rancho Santa Fe Foundation. The grant made it possible for the Los Robles property to weather the Economic Recession of 2007 – 2009.

“This investment more than doubled Community HousingWorks’ impact on child and resident stability and mobility in this very low income, mostly Latino community,” she said.

CHW upgrades the properties it buys and provides learning programs for children and financial education programs for adults by raising money from the community to match money from rent paid by the residents.

When CHW purchased Los Robles in Vista, California, the property required deep renovation, just when the recession hit and both fundraising and rent payments were constrained. The Rancho Santa Fe Foundation’s three years of grants, from 2007 to 2009, provided money for programs to continue during this time when the rental income was only able to cover the maintenance of the apartments.

“The RSF Foundation has provided support for preschool and Operation Hero after school programs, mothers suffering from depression, young Marine students at the School of Infantry, and emergency food and basic necessities to families suffering from financial crises,” said George Brown, Executive Director, Camp Pendleton Armed Services YMCA.

A multi-year grant totaling $100,000 from the RSF Foundation helped make possible the completion of the Performing Arts Center at Rancho Santa Fe. Located at the center of the R. Roger Rowe campus, the Performing Arts Center provides the school and community a venue in which to present plays, concerts and other cultural events.

The history of what would eventually become the R. Roger Rowe School began in 1905, with a wood-framed schoolhouse and nearby cabin for the hardy teacher who made the weekly trek from San Diego.

The school was housed in two more locations in Rancho Santa Fe over the years, growing into a two-room adobe schoolhouse and then a larger building that would hold the growing student body.

Workshops for Warriors provides training, certification and placement in manufacturing careers for veterans and wounded warriors. However, during 2013, the first year of the program, the training facility in San Diego was not ADA-accessible. Many veterans have suffered serious disability, including the loss of limbs, and ADA access is essential for them to participate in the training program.

A $15,000 grant from The Patriots Initiative provided funding to build and install ADA access, making the computer lab available to every veteran and wounded warrior.

RSF Foundation donors, Laverne and Blaine Briggs, are known as “The Angels of Rehab” at Scripps Memorial Hospital Encinitas (Scripps).

The Briggs’ established the Rehab and Neurosciences Fund at Scripps in 2004. The fund provided seed money that allowed for expansion of the Rehabilitation Center’s Brain Injury Program to become the Military Brain Injury Program.

The original program had seen exceptional clinical outcomes with head injuries sustained after incidences such as a fall or stroke. But the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq created new victims of traumatic brain injury. A partnership between Scripps and the military (primarily Camp Pendleton) was a natural collaboration to help rehabilitate our locally-based, wounded soldiers.

In 2008, Scripps provided the only full-service outpatient program between the military and a private healthcare provider for traumatic brain injuries of active-duty military patients. Since those early days, the Scripps Rehabilitation Center’s Brain Injury Program has become a national model for brain injury rehabilitation and research.