View 2021 Grant Recipients, here.

Read Louisa Huftader’s full article in the Vineyard Gazette, here.

More than two dozen Island organizations will receive funds totaling $228,500 from the Martha’s Vineyard Community Foundation, which this week announced its annual grants.

While last year’s annual grant cycle concentrated on helping Vineyarders cope with the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic, the 2021 grants reflect a return to the foundation’s ongoing mission to back a diversity of Island causes.

“I think we’re getting back to a sense of, okay, how can we keep moving forward?” executive director Emily Bramhall told the Gazette Wednesday.

“The organizations out there were still doing their work, and it was pretty awesome.”

More than half the annual grant money — $121,400 in all — is going to programs that directly assist Island residents, including community suppers at the Congregational Church of West Tisbury, the animal shelter’s veterinary bill support for needy seniors and the West Tisbury Library’s community refrigerator initiative.

The foundation’s largest annual contributions, known as impact grants, will benefit three often-overlooked segments of the Island population.

Harbor Homes will receive $25,000 for a laundry room at the women’s house in Oak Bluffs that can also be used by other homeless people, and the foundation is granting $15,000 each to the Martha’s Vineyard Hospital, to support patients needing off-Island care for high-risk pregnancies, and Island Elderly Housing, to build accessible pathways for seniors at Woodside Village.

Read Louisa Huftader’s full article in the Vineyard Gazette, here.