The Harold K.L. Castle Foundation in Kailua, Hawaii, has announced nearly $3 million in grants to local nonprofit organizations in support of projects and services in the Windward Oahu community.

The grant recipients include the Waimanalo Health Center, which was awarded a $2 million challenge grant for a $13 million campaign to raise funds for a much-needed two-story facility. The new facility will allow the center to serve an additional twenty-five hundred patients a year, nearly half of whom are Native Hawaiian.

"The Waimanalo Health Center works hard to prevent and reverse chronic diseases such as diabetes that are overrepresented in the Native Hawaiian population," said Castle Foundation president and CEO Terry George. "The center helps uninsured patients get health insurance and other federal and state benefits. In addition, its youth-mentoring program is well known for building resilience in at-risk young people. It's remarkable what the center has accomplished when you consider that 55 percent of its patients are below the federal poverty level and it has seen a nearly 30 percent increase in patients over the past five years."

In addition, the foundation awarded $10,000 to Catholic Charities of Hawaii to help meet the academic needs of students in the Pahoa area of Hawaii Island affected by the Puna lava flow; and $118,000 to the Ho'okua'aina cultural learning center in Maunawili to provide at-risk youth with opportunities to gain important life skills through paid farm work under the guidance of mentors.