Membership, which means a commitment to making quarterly donations, provides a consistent amount to all of our donation recipients and prevents "stuffing the ballot box" (someone nominating an organization and bringing a bunch of people to vote for it at that one meeting but who never attend again). This is standard practice for 100 Who Care groups. 

Just commit to making donations for the remaining meetings of the year. For example, if you join in June, you will make donations for our July and October meetings since our collective donations for January and April have already been sent to the nonprofits. We hope all members will continue their membership the following year(s)!

YES. We love that we're an all-gender giving circle, and we welcome couple memberships. Couples can share one membership, meaning they make $100 donations quarterly and receive one vote at the meetings, but can both attend. 

NO. Members need to be individuals, though they can be affiliated with a nonprofit. Please ignore that option on the Community Foundation's donation page. 

NO.  We welcome members who live outside of the area part-time or even full-time but have a connection to it and a desire to preserve its beauty and resources. We hope such folks could attend a meeting or two, but in any case, we appreciate their support for deserving local nonprofits.

The project that the donation will support has to have a Southwest Colorado connection. For example, we made a donation to the Sierra Club, a national organization, but it was earmarked for a beaver education project by the Sierra Club's Southwest Colorado Group. Another example is a donation made to Fort Lewis College's Village Aid Project, which does work in other countries, but our donation went towards its Solar Initiative project on the nearby Navajo Nation. While the work is not in Colorado, it is in the Four Corners region and it's being done by local FLC students and staff. 

Complete the nomination form. You have to be a member to make a nomination. For more information, please go to our Nominate a Nonprofit page. 

If we receive more than 3 nominations, we do a random "fishbowl" drawing to pick the 3 finalists that will be pitched at the meeting and 1 alternate. This happens about a week before the meeting so that we can inform the nominating members and they have time to prepare their pitch. The finalists are announced at the meeting.

YES. Being present for the nonprofit pitches is key. We've gone into a meeting thinking we'd vote one way, but after hearing the pitches, we vote differently. Also, part of our goal is building a community of people who care about the earth, and we need to get together in person to do that! We know schedules are busy and time is precious, which is why we keep our quarterly meetings to 1 hour. We appreciate your presence!

We need to track our donations for our membership roster. Please do not select this option on the Community Foundation donation page. The Community Foundation will not make your donation public.