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Restoration > Funded
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Leadership for Ecosystem
Restoration - Funded Projects
The Fund continues to develop a portfolio of grants that
may lead to new, innovative ways to implement regional strategies
that restore ecosystem integrity and prevent losses where
the ecosystem's health is threatened. These "cutting
edge" projects do not fit our other Current Interest
categories, but have the potential to provide leadership by
exploring out-of-the-box solutions to problems or issues that
are only now just being recognized as threats to the health
of the Great Lakes ecosystem.
These grants explore management actions that target newly
recognized master variables - where minor changes significantly
affect ecosystem integrity; or, they may approach an existing
issue or problem from a completely new perspective, with the
potential for a "paradigm shift" that results in
significant improvements to the health of the Great Lakes
ecosystem.
For example, since 1996, the Fund has supported a multi-phase
project lead by the Council of Michigan Foundations to more
fully develop and utilize resources available though local
community foundations for environmental grant making in the
Great Lakes. Until recently, Community Foundations have been
an underutilized resource for environmental grant making in
the Great Lakes region. This investment has led to the formation
of the Great Lakes Community Foundation Environmental Collaborative
(GLCFC), which now includes more than 38 Community Foundations
in the Great Lakes region who are now making, or learning
how to make, environmental grants that find local solutions
to regional problems. To date the Collaborative has successfully
leveraged $173,000 into $4,945,944 (2860% increase) in support
of local community foundation development and implementation
of innovative restoration strategies addressing watershed
health, brownfield restoration, or land use issues in their
communities.
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