In this article, Elena De Carandini, President of Raimat Lleida Community Foundation, shares the community foundation's role in setting up, convening and lead a participatory initiative, Lleida Alimenta, a territorial agrifood movement strengthening community resilience.
Officina Badoni offers a compelling example of how a community foundation can redefine impact investing by transforming a disused industrial landmark into an open, collaborative civic hub. The Fondazione Comunitaria del Lecchese chose to invest a quarter of its endowment not for financial return, but to regenerate a shared space where young people, organisations and citizens can work, connect and imagine new futures together. Through a co-design process involving local actors, the building has become a platform for social innovation rather than a real-estate project, already fostering new partnerships, daily community use and a shift in how the Foundation relates to its territory. Ultimately, Officina Badoni shows how investing in places can strengthen community life, turning an “asset question” into a “community question” where the real value lies in people and relationships.
In 2019, Community Foundation Wales initiated a community consultation process to better understand the needs of its grantees. The results were strikingly consistent: the main concern was short-term, project-related funding, which prevented them from focusing on and delivering their mission. The foundation responded swiftly by reviewing its funding strategy to include support for core costs and for multi-year funding. In this interview, Andrea Powell, Director of Programmes (and Deputy Chief Executive), shares the organisation’s journey, the challenges it has faced, and the opportunities ahead.
Kathrin Dombrowski
Coordinating Director
ECFI
The European Forum Alpbach is a unique place where reflection meets action. It brings together young people alongside leaders from politics, business, civil society, and science to shape ideas for a stronger democratic Europe. At this year’s forum, Kathrin Dombrowski, Coordinating Director at ECFI, contributed the perspective of community foundations. In this article, she shares her key takeaways from a two-day workshop exploring how philanthropy can embrace system change approaches.
The 2025 Spanish Community Foundations Meeting in Madrid brought together foundations, universities, support organisations and international guests to exchange ideas, strengthen networks and celebrate impact. Over two days of dialogue, reflection and workshops, participants reaffirmed the growing movement in Spain, highlighted the power of collective intelligence, and welcomed the launch of the country’s tenth community foundation —the first in Madrid, the Hortaleza Filanda Community Foundation.
In this blog Lydia Bökelmann from Halle Community Foundation, Germany, reflects on the experience and lessons from their Youth Participation project.
It set out to test various ways of connecting with
and involving young people. Having explored how to find and connect with young people, the next step was to turn ideas into reality. Lydia concludes
‘Ultimately, it’s about empowering them to navigate these systems and take meaningful action in shaping their community’.
Viktoriia Zablotska
Fundraising consultant & Partnership manager
Despite the ongoing war, Ukrainian community foundations continue to play a crucial role in supporting local populations, adapting to new
challenges, and fostering resilience. Viktoriia Zablotska from the National Network of Local Philanthropy Development shares insights into their efforts, highlighting the experiences of three foundations operating under extreme conditions.
Jersey is one of the Channel Islands and a British Crown Dependency, with its own parliament, government and laws. Established in 2020, Jersey Community Foundation is the newest edition to the UK Community Foundations network. From launching the foundation during the pandemic to tackling critical issues like climate change and the cost of living to supporting migrants, Anna Terry, CEO of Jersey Community Foundation, provides a glimpse into the challenges and aspirations of a uniquenisland-based foundation.
In the midst of chaos following the devastating flash flood in Valencia the Horta Sud Community Foundation offered a beacon of hope. Fortunately, because of its particularly close working relationship with the Association of Spanish Foundations it was able to count on essential technical and financial support, as well as reach to experience from across Europe, that helped it deal with emergency and the aftermath of the catastrophe. Here Valentina Ferrara, coordinator of the Spanish Association’s community foundation programme, reflects on the action taken by both organisations, drawing lessons for others.
A study visit delegation of 12 delegates from North Macedonia had a recent excellent learning experience in Romania. Led by Konekt, the support organisation for the community foundation movement in North Macedonia, representatives from 5 local action hubs (LAHs) and their leadership groups had the chance to be inspired by the Romanian experience in development of community foundations and to transfer the knowledge acquired in their own communities. Irina Hadji Mitova, Project Manager, Konekt, summarises what participants took away from their time in Romania.
