Cashiers Community Fund

Written By: Luke Osteen | Issue: Whats News

If you’ve been keeping up with the accounts of Cashiers History that Jane Nardy and Carol Bryson bring to our pages each month, you know that the community has always been generous and caring.

That’s why it shouldn’t surprise you that The Cashiers Community Fund has just awarded $151,780 in grants to nonprofits serving Cashiers and the surrounding region. 

Since 1992, the Cashiers Community Fund has awarded $1,694,290 to projects serving the Cashiers community. These grants also received funding from the Lyn K. Holloway Memorial Fund.

“These awards are possible because people who care about this community built a fund over time,” said Advisory Board Chair Lisa Bates. “Nonprofits have faced so many challenges over the past year. We are pleased to award these grants to help important community organizations address the needs of those continuing to suffer from the pandemic and to aid in our community’s recovery.”

The 2021 grants are:

$5,000 to Big Brothers Big Sisters of Western North Carolina to grow its mentoring program on the plateau to 35 matches over the next fiscal year.

$12,500 to Blue Ridge Mountains Health Project to increase access to free, preventive dental services and dental education to residents of Cashiers.

$4,570 to Blue Ridge School for window treatments to improve campus safety for all staff and students.

$10,000 to Boys & Girls Club of the Plateau to support operations associated with its expanded new facility that may host 160 members per day, more than double its average daily member participation.

$12,000 to Cashiers Valley Preschool to paint the exterior of the building.  

$6,210 to Cashiers-Highlands Humane Society to support its low-cost or free spay/neuter program.

$10,000 to Community Care Clinic of Highlands-Cashiers to support general operations for the free clinic that provides health care services to uninsured, low-income residents, primarily from southern Jackson and southern Macon counties.

$10,000 to Friends of Panthertown to support ongoing forest stewardship and conservation work and trail workdays and to add capacity by hiring a part-time trail crew leader and stewardship assistant.

$12,500 to Hampton School to provide high-quality childcare for children ages twelve months to twelve years. This facility is the only early childcare program that cares for children as young as twelve months in southern Jackson County and its immediate vicinity.

$9,000 to Highlands-Cashiers Land Trust to support the Stewardship Director, who oversees all aspects of caring for and monitoring over 60 properties annually, and its Education Coordinator, who oversees all aspects of the Kids In Nature programs.

$12,500 to International Friendship Center to cover part of the costs associated with opening and operating a Cashiers social services location. The satellite office will be staffed two days a week at the Church of the Good Shepherd to meet the many needs of the large and growing immigrant population in Cashiers, Glenville and Sapphire.  

$12,000 to JAM Blue Ridge for its after-school community music program for children. 

$7,500 to Mountain Projects/Circles of Cashiers-Glenville to enable Cashiers-area families currently living in poverty to become financially sustainable through education, job opportunities, and community support.

$9,000 to Pisgah Legal Services to support free civil legal assistance to, and advocacy for, low-income people who live and work in and around Cashiers.

$10,000 to Summit Charter School to make two character development programs, LEAD and PEAK, available to all of its middle and high school students.

$9,000 to The Bascom to support its Cashiers Community Outreach and Education Initiative, which  provides scholarships, instructors, and materials for Cashiers area programs.

Among the area’s longest standing charitable funds, the Cashiers Community Fund’s distinction as an endowment positions it to provide support in perpetuity. The local volunteer Advisory Board works to raise awareness of the Cashiers Community Fund and to build assets for the future.  The board members are Ms. Bates, Trace Baker, Lisa Bates, Jeanne Builder, Bill Canby, Paiden Hite, Melissa Hudson, Carol Hunter, Harriet Karro, Laura Moser and Jeff Sikes. For additional information about the Cashiers Community Fund, contact Chair Lisa Bates at  (828) 508-2047.

The Cashiers Community Fund supports projects improving the quality of life in greater Cashiers and benefitting the broad community and its residents. CCF provides grants between $2,500-$12,500 to nonprofit organizations and public agencies for charitable purposes, including programmatic needs, capital campaigns and operating expenses.