Frey Foundation: Using Advocacy to Enhance One's Grantmaking
Date Published: February 7, 2007
The Frey Foundation is a small family foundation, but its voice on the issue of affordable housing is clear and loud. James Frey, president and CEO, said the foundation decided two years ago that "rather than just respond to requests, we would take a more strategic approach and try to address a major issue." Partly because family members had been longtime volunteers in homeless shelters, affordable housing rose to the top of the priority list. "We had 100 percent internal agreement," Frey said.
Minnesota was just embarking on its first initiative to end homelessness by 2010, and Frey wanted to see it work. He doesn't pretend to be an expert on the issue, so the family board sat down with representatives from the Family Housing Fund, Minnesota Housing Finance Agency and the Corporation for Supportive Housing. Supportive housing — supplying basic services that can help people overcome problems that might otherwise put them back on the street — seemed like a perfect fit.
"That led us to kick off an affordable housing initiative that has an emphasis on supportive housing," Frey said. Over five years, the foundation will contribute $5 million first to housing. The grant is considered instrumental in bringing other funders and the Minnesota Legislature to the table.
"The process has been slow, but we've been encouraged by the fact it continues to receive public attention," Frey said. "And it did change the ways we look at other grants that have nothing to do with housing." For example, the foundation decided that, rather than wait for an application, family members who saw a need would take the initiative to go out into the community and learn the facts to find out how they could participate.
Frey doesn't think of the foundation's activity as advocacy so much as it is common sense. "If I'm doing any kind of advocacy work, it takes the forms of talking about the urgent need for individuals, foundations and the public to step up and play their parts," he said.
This profile originally appeared in the Winter 2007 edition of the Minnesota Council on Foundation's Giving Forum newsletter.
