COVID-19 Nonprofit Hardship Fund
Through our COVID-19 Nonprofit Hardship Fund, we are providing grants ranging from $500 to $50,000 to small to medium-sized non-profit organizations serving the basic needs of vulnerable people and families significantly affected by COVID-19.
Our fund is focused on providing:
Support for an increasing volume of services being provided to clients as a result of the pandemic (e.g., meals for homebound seniors; meals or other supplies for those who are sheltering in place due to age or medical conditions; medical or other necessary supplies for those servicing increasing volumes of sick people, etc.);
Support for the unexpected expenses associated with fulfilling these services (e.g., the hiring of additional workers or drivers; the increased purchasing of meal ingredients or necessary medical supplies); and/or
Support to help sustain basic services to people and families impacted by COVID-19 amid the pandemic-related cancellation of major fundraisers that would have otherwise sustained operations.
Guidelines
In order to qualify, organizations must:
Have a charitable status under section 501(c)(3) and be in good standing with the IRS;
Be currently providing critical services to individuals and families significantly affected by COVID-19; and
Be providing health, education, welfare or social services in response to COVID-19 in the areas of the U.S. where Sempra Energy and its family of companies operate, including California, Texas and Louisiana.
Exclusions
The Sempra Energy Foundation Nonprofit Hardship Fund will not provide funding to:
Individuals;
Private foundations, endowment funds or for-profit organizations;
Large community foundations, nonprofit organizations or institutions that have established their own COVID-19 related response funds;
Groups that practice discrimination based on age, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, physical or mental disabilities, race, color, religion, national origin, or ancestry;
Sectarian or denominational religious groups, except for programs that are broadly promoted, available to anyone and free from religious orientation;
Political parties, candidates or partisan groups; or
Groups that don’t meet the giving policies and guidelines of Sempra Energy or the Sempra Energy Foundation.
Applying for a Grant
Since the Hardship Fund’s inception on March 23, we’ve received over 1,500 applications. To date, we have already distributed nearly $700,000 to critical organizations across three states helping to meet COVID 19-related basic needs for vulnerable populations. We are now reviewing the next tranche of applications and prioritizing the requests that best match our funding guidelines.
We will also assess unmet COVID 19-related needs and factor those considerations into the Sempra Energy Foundation’s future planning.
Our online application process is closed. With so many requests already in the queue, we expect to exhaust the funds shortly.
If you have applied, thank you for your application, and for all you are doing to help others during this difficult time.
