Donor of the Month: The Morris and Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation

LISC is grateful for our longstanding partnership with The Morris and Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation to improve the quality of life for residents in the Washington, D.C. area.

We’ve received over $3.7 million from the Foundation to undertake neighborhood-based and people-based projects, programs, and initiatives. Our most recent grant from the Foundation supports two investment priorities:

• Investing in people-based projects and initiatives that help balance the income disparity. Central to our vision and the most definitive way to actualize this strategy is through preserving existing and developing new affordable housing for people with lower incomes so that they can maintain a home in a city of ever increasing housing costs.
• Investing in place-based neighborhood revitalization projects and initiatives that improve the quality of life and promote equity and inclusion. Central to this strategy is helping long-term and newcomer households afford to live in newly built communities and neighborhoods experiencing massive revitalization, revitalization that is not only bringing many improvements to the neighborhoods, but also pricing out people and families with lower incomes.

A key priority of these efforts is our Elevating Equity Initiative, a $50 million commitment to foster equitable and inclusive development in the neighborhoods within a one-mile radius of the future site of the 11th Street Bridge Park. One of the most catalytic projects the initiative has supported is The Commons at Stanton Square, which opened in June. The mixed-used development offers over 120 units of affordable housing as well as essential community services including early childhood education, nutrition programs, parental supports, emotional wellness, and out-of-school programs to children and youth in Ward 8’s Hillsdale neighborhood. The Commons will also be home to the new headquarters of Martha’s Table, also a grantee of the Cafritz Foundation.

“LISC does outstanding work to strengthen D.C. communities. We have been an active supporter of LISC since 1990, and we look forward to continuing our support of their important work,” said Mr. Calvin Cafritz, President and CEO of The Morris and Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation.

The Morris and Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation is the largest private, independent, local foundation focused on the D.C. metropolitan area and has awarded over $393 million to improve the quality of life for D.C. residents.