Dear Friends and Supporters,
Over the past three years our community has faced adversities we never imagined having to face. Through these experiences we’ve developed resilience, a collective sense of hope, stronger connections and drive to make change together for good.
As I reflect on our impact, I want to thank you - we are grateful for you, our supporters who have continued to help us build a sustainable funding base that allows us to invest in innovative solutions to our community’s most pressing issues during these times of great need.
As a community foundation we recognize how complex some of these issues are and tackling them requires community-wide collaboration and bold solutions. This year, with your help, we are projected to grant almost $4 million into our community! But we can’t stop there - there’s more work to be done. As we begin to emerge from the pandemic and start to rebuild, I urge you to think about our community’s future.
This year’s Vital Signs report, Be the Change, includes a renewed focus on the environment, challenging LCF and citizens of London and Middlesex to embrace sustainability and take action to make ours a greener community. Social needs took precedence during the pandemic and we responded by prioritizing issues such as housing, food security, well-being, gender equity, racial equity and education. Nevertheless, the environment has always and continues to be important. We felt strongly about the need to draw attention to this area as the environment has such a significant impact on our quality of life. The problem is, our environment is in crisis, however, it’s often not perceived as such.
Our 2022 Vital Signs report points to issues critical to the current and future health and well-being of our community such as climate change, clean water and greenhouse gas emissions. It has also highlighted the intersectional nature of these issues and how the environment and access to natural resources such as trees and clean drinking water is an equity issue.
With the impact of the pandemic, our Vital Signs report is telling us that things have gotten worse. Many deeply entrenched inequities have been exacerbated and too many people in our community are being left behind. But while this report paints a picture of serious problems we’re facing, it’s a call to action encouraging us all to do our part and make a change.
I encourage you to lean on and trust LCF as your community knowledge broker - connecting people and organizations to create a stronger community is what we do. Vital Signs acts as our roadmap, identifying priorities and enabling you to make powerful and informed granting decisions.
For example, several years ago our Vital Signs report identified affordable housing as a key issue in London and Middlesex. As a result, we made this a priority issue for the Foundation and created our Social Impact Fund to help address this need by providing financing for affordable housing projects. Since its inception, we have invested $18,880,000 in a total of 18 affordable housing projects, supporting the creation of 813 affordable housing units, earning over $1 million in interest to reinvest into our community. Today, we are proud to have convened the Vision SoHo Alliance - a first of its kind housing development in Canada that will create over 680 mixed rent units on the former Victoria Hospital Lands at South and Colborne Streets.
During the Vision SoHo groundbreaking event, LCF Housing Action Committee member Greg Playford said something that struck me, “Vision SoHo is an example of how we can address some of our community’s most pressing issues through collaboration. Not one single group could achieve this alone, but by working together we’re able to make a significant impact and increase the availability of affordable homes in our community.”
If the pandemic illustrated one thing to us it’s that together, we can rise above challenges and support our community’s most vulnerable during times of great need. We’re much more powerful when we collaborate. It also reinforced the importance of our model - taking the longview and ensuring that our community’s needs are supported today and in the future.
In a similar way, I hope this year’s Vital Signs report sheds light not only on the issues our community is facing today, but how we can invest in our future to improve our community for tomorrow.
As you read through our Vital Signs report and consider how you can Be the Change, I encourage you to consider making a year-end gift to London Community Foundation. We thank you for your ongoing support. We can’t do this alone - let’s work together to build a strong, resilient and compassionate community.
Sincerely,
Martha Powell
President & CEO
London Community Foundation