California

The Silicon Valley Community Foundation has announced that the Caltrain Holiday Train will make nine stops on December 3 and 4 to help raise awareness of and funds to address needs in the region. As in years past, this year's Holiday Train will be decorated with thousands of lights and make nine twenty-minute stops, with families able to enjoy live entertainment at each stop prior to its arrival. Food trucks also will be on site in Mountain View, Santa Clara, Menlo Park, and Sunnyvale. Since the event’s debut fourteen years ago, Bay Area residents have brought more than fifty thousand toys to Caltrain stations.

The San Francisco Foundation has named Nigel Poor of San Francisco and photography collaborators Nate Larson of Baltimore and Marni Shindelman of Athens, Georgia, as the winners of the 2016 John Gutmann Photography Fellowships. The annual award, which includes $5,000 for each recipient, is given to an emerging artist who exhibits professional accomplishment, serious artistic commitment, and financial need in the field of creative photography.

Colorado

The Community Foundation Boulder County has announced that the 2016-17 Leadership Fellows Program — a joint effort of the foundation and the Boulder Chamber of Commerce — is engaging thirty-two participants from all sectors in dialogue on the past and future economic, civic, and cultural drivers at work in Boulder County. The eleven-month curriculum includes topics such as business and the local economy, collaboration among for-profits and nonprofits, critical human needs, education funding and systems, and Government 101, as well as roundtable discussions on a range of timely issues – including affordable housing, immigration, criminal justice, and creative placemaking.

Indiana

The Efroymson Family Fund, a donor-advised fund of the Central Indiana Community Foundation, has announced the recipients of the 2016 Efroymson Contemporary Arts Fellowship. The five fellows were awarded $25,000 each in support of their continuing artistic development. Over the past ten years, the fund has awarded fifty fellowships totaling more than $1 million to contemporary artists in Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, Kentucky, Ohio and Wisconsin.

Louisiana

The Greater New Orleans Foundation has announced grants totaling $421,000 to eight organizations working on long-term recovery efforts in Louisiana communities affected by historic flooding in August. Recipients include All Hands, the Center for Planning Excellence, Save the Children, and Together Baton Rouge. The grants were made in partnership with DentaQuest and the W.K. Kellogg, Razoo, and Annenberg foundations.

Michigan

The New Economy Initiative, a special project of the Community Foundation for Southeast Michigan and a consortium of a dozen philanthropic organizations, has awarded two $100,000 prizes and thirty $10,000 prizes to existing small businesses in Detroit, Hamtramck, and Highland Park as part of the NEIdeas competition, the Detroit Free Press reports. The winners of the largest grants are the Detroit Training Center, a workforce training program that plans to use the funds to purchase new tractor-trailers and expand its commercial driver license certification program; and Louisiana Creole Gumbo, a restaurant/catering business that will use its funds to buy mobile food trucks with built-in hot and cold facilities.

New Hampshire

The New Hampshire Charitable Foundation has announced a gift from the Couch Foundation to boost opportunity for children in the state. NHCF will use the gift to hire Christina Lachance as director of its early childhood and family initiatives, responsible for leading its work in the areas of policy, advocacy, convening, and grantmaking. Improving early childhood care and education is a major component of the foundation’s ten-year, $100 million New Hampshire Tomorrow plan to increase opportunity for youth in the state.

Texas

The San Antonio Area Foundation has announced that it awarded grants totaling more than $3.2 million in 2016. Grants were awarded in the areas of animal services ($569,228), arts and culture ($735,635), the community at large ($442,132), seniors ($402,531), children and youth ($521,050), and medicine and health care ($529,763).

Vermont

The Vermont Community Foundation has announced that funding is available from the Vermont Women's Fund for new or existing projects, programs, and organizations serving women and girls in the state between the ages of 12 and 25. Since its creation in 1994, the Women's Fund has awarded more than $2 million to organizations and projects in the state aligned with its mission.

Wisconsin

The Greater Green Bay Community Foundation has announced nine grants totaling $5,650 to area public schools through the School Spirit Educational Endowment Fund, a field of interest fund that supports initiatives led by Green Bay Area Public School District teachers, staff, parents, and students. Teachers will use the grants awarded in this round to explore creative ways to deliver innovative educational experiences in their classrooms.