🎵 We Wish You a Merry Christmas and a Healthy New Year

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A Holiday Message from Our Executive Director

The Christmas season is a wonderful time to reflect on the many gifts we enjoy. At Nantahala Health Foundation, we have many gifts to be thankful for.

Some of the gifts you will read about below include the gift of healthier homes some of our most-needy citizens will receive due to the Healthy Homes initiative we facilitated in partnership with Highlands Cashiers Health Foundation and supported financially by the Dogwood Health Trust.

Likewise, the Advantage Andrews project, supported by the Duke Energy Foundation, is providing grants to small businesses as they recover from COVID impact.

What a privilege it has been to partner with amazing organizations across our region through our grantmaking, including the CHIP projects that will be announced in early January. Last, but certainly not least, I am thankful for the partnerships that are enabling our Now + Next Leadership Program to launch in 2022. Alumni of the program will be better prepared to advance our collective efforts toward solving our region’s most pressing health and well-being challenges.

What I hope you come to realize as you read these stories is how much we value the gift of partnership with each of you. Through partnerships, we have enjoyed another great year of progress toward improved health and wellbeing in Western North Carolina. We are proud of what we have accomplished and humbled that we are able to help facilitate innovative collaborative projects and leverage funds beyond our own grantmaking capacity.

We define “partnerships” very broadly at Nantahala Health Foundation:

- Our partners include our donors and other grant-makers who have invested in our work. We obviously couldn’t do what we do without you.

- Our partners include the organizations we have provided funding to or helped to facilitate other investments. You are the hands and feet that enable us to accomplish our mission.

- Our partners include the individuals who have taken time to participate in listening sessions, invited us to an event or a tour to learn about your work in the community, talked with us on the phone, completed an online survey, and even those that have applied for grants we were not able to fund.

These relationships help to inform our work by providing us with vital information about what is working and not working to improve the health and well-being for all who call Western North Carolina home.

As we continue to grow and better serve our region, broad-based public support is vital to our continued work. Generous financial support from individuals allows us to demonstrate the public support required to qualify for additional external investment and maintain the designation needed to support our grantmaking efforts.

The good news stories you’ve been reading from us for nearly three years are the direct result of our collective impact. If more stories of improved health and well-being are to be written, strong financial partnerships must be established, nurtured, and grown. That’s why I call upon you now to support the healthy future we all envision with a donation today.

Thank you in advance for stepping up to this additional level of partnership. We are thankful for each of you and wish you a very Merry Christmas and the happiest of New Years.

Lori Bailey,

Executive Director

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Thank You to our #GivingTuesday Supporters

Nantahala Health Foundation joined thousands of other organizations across the globe on #GivingTuesday by inviting our supporters to join us by making a commitment to our work, whether with monetary donations, gifts of time and talents, or by sharing ideas that could make our organizational goals even more impactful for all in Western North Carolina.

While we have not yet reached our monetary goal, we are certainly on our way with multiple gifts received from throughout the region and beyond. Our amazing board of directors (including Clay County Manager Debbie Mauney, pictured here) have been busy, as well, sharing their own personal stories of commitment to the work we are doing in support of better health outcomes for WNC.

Fun Fact: Nearly one-third of all annual giving occurs in December, and 12% of all yearly donations are made in the last three days of the year, which means you are not alone if you have not yet made your year-end donations. Because public support for our work is vital to our continued success, we ask that you please consider joining our Healthy Future Movement in 2021.

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Healthy Homes Grantees Are Set to Assist Low-Income Homeowners

Five regional nonprofits and one unit of county government have been awarded Healthy Homes investments provided by Nantahala Health Foundation and Highlands Cashiers Health Foundation. This funding, which was made possible thanks to support provided by Dogwood Health Trust, is designed to increase these agencies' capacity to offer home repair and modification assistance to low-income homeowners across our service area.

Chosen to receive a Healthy Homes investment and the counties in which they anticipate concentrating their efforts are:

Hinton Rural Life Center, Clay and Cherokee
Macon County Housing Department, Macon
Macon Program for Progress, Macon
Mountain Projects, Jackson
Rotary Club of Highlands, Macon and Jackson
Restoration House, Swain

While some of these agencies plan to apply these funds to their client wait-lists, others will be accepting applications from new clients. If you are aware of potentially eligible homeowners in need of home repairs or modifications designed to improve the health and safety of all occupants, please reach out to one of these agencies for more information.

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More Regional Investment News Coming Soon

Advantage Andrews

More than 25 Andrews-based businesses negatively impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic are in line to receive grant funding to support their recovery efforts, thanks to a partnership between the Town of Andrews, Nantahala Health Foundation and the Duke Energy Foundation.

Recognizing that the pandemic challenged many small businesses across their service territory, Duke Energy Foundation developed a $700,000 grant program to provide Hometown Revitalization Grants to almost 50 communities across the state. Nantahala Health Foundation was awarded $25,000 to administer support for small businesses in Andrews.

An announcement from the Andrews selection committee detailing grant recipients and their projects is expected early in 2022.

CHIP Award Announcement

Expected in January

At about the same time as Advantage Andrews awards are made, look for an announcement from us detailing our 2021 Collaborative Health Innovation Program (CHIP) awardees. Some 13 nonprofit agencies and their nearly 30 partners/collaborators are in line to receive capacity investment grants in support of their work to meet community needs from Nantahala Health Foundation in January.

NEW in 2022: Elevating Leadership

Nantahala Health Foundation's Board of Directors has unanimously approved an expansion of our program portfolio to include the development of a leadership growth opportunity for our region's current and next generation of vital human service agency leaders.

Before we launch in summer 2022, we are asking regional leaders to share their perspectives considering the critical leadership role they play in WNC. Responses to our 5-question survey will go a long way toward helping inform the development of our Now + Next Leadership Program.

A little background: Nantahala Health Foundation has partnered with Dr. Frederick Buskey of Strategic Leadership Consulting to design a unique leadership model and training program focused on enhancing the quality of social services in WNC by training diverse, inter-generational cohorts of current and future leaders who are (or will be) working for or with non-profit, public, and governmental agencies that are focused on addressing negative determinants of health that affect a wide range of health, functioning, and quality of life outcomes and risks.

Our premise is that a unique set of leadership skills is required to successfully lead any human service organization in our region. That's why we need to hear from those currently in these positions about your experiences, including what works, what the challenges are, and how leadership development could prove beneficial to those you serve.

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TAKE OUR SURVEY

Partners Making Progress

Nantahala Health Foundation was privileged to partner with Blue Ridge Health through our 2020 NIMble grant program to support their effort to expand access to fetal nonstress test services for expectant mothers in Jackson and Swain counties.

Program Impact: With funding from the Nantahala Health Foundation, BRCHS was able to purchase two fetal nonstress test monitoring systems to measure fetal heart rate and response to movement in mothers in their third trimester to ensure the baby is doing well and receiving enough oxygen. This test is generally ordered when an expectant mother has a complication like gestational diabetes or pre-eclampsia or needs a procedure like an amniocentesis. An NST may also be ordered if a baby is measuring small for his/her gestational age or is not very active. During the project period, 65 NSTs were administered to 29 unique patients, exceeding the project goal of 50 encounters. Photo provided by Blue Ridge Health.

About NIMble 2020: More than 30 WNC nonprofits and public service agencies were awarded Needs Immediately Met, or NIMble, grants in support of programs designed to achieve better health outcomes. Nantahala Health Foundation's investment in health and well-being during this grant cycle was nearly $273,000.