Grant given by Lilly Endowment Inc.
(GREENSBURG, Ind.) – The Decatur County Community Foundation has received a $5,000,000 grant from the Lilly Endowment Inc.
DCCF is one of 30 projects to be awarded the grant which is through the Community Leadership Implementation Grants initiative. It is designed to support community foundations and partners working to strengthen the quality of life for the people they serve.
With the grant, DCCF will partner with local entities to address the serious lack of mental health resources in the community.
The Decatur County Sheriff’s Department and Jail Commander Mike Eggleston have already begun implementing an internationally recognized Crisis Intervention Training (CIT) program, and now Eggleston will lead a grant-funded effort to identify additional existing mental health resources and determine what can be enhanced through the generosity of this award.
He leads a committee of partners including the Community Healthcare Clinic, Board of Health, schools, Decatur County Memorial Hospital, Court Services and a handful of others.
“This is such a huge blessing to our community. Working with Mike and the other people around the table to develop readily available resources to address the broad spectrum of mental health issues has been eye-opening. Knowing we’ve been awarded $5 million to use towards getting these measures in place is a game-changer,” said DCCF executive director Tami Wenning.
The Decatur County Community Foundation, established in 1992 with help from a challenge grant from Lilly Endowment Inc, was excited when thi opportunity was announced because of the opportunities it presented.
“We were excited about the match opportunity and the response of the local community to meet that challenge,” said Wenning. “Receiving notice that we were being awarded the opportunity to pursue our mental health project is just the best possible icing on the cake!”
In 1990, Lilly Endowment launched the Giving Indiana Funds for Tomorrow (GIFT) initiative to help establish and further develop community foundations throughout Indiana. Lilly Endowment hoped that Indiana’s community foundations could enhance the quality of life in their communities by convening conversations among people of diverse ages, socioeconomic backgrounds, occupations, races and cultural traditions about their communities’ most compelling needs and opportunities as well as the best ways to address them.
