Financial help for charities with less support

60 organisations to receive up to $50k a year for two years from new ComChest fund

Smaller charities and those with less financial support will be able to tap a new fund set up by the Community Chest (ComChest).

The money will go to 60 charities, from this year to 2021. Each charity will receive up to $50,000 a year for two years. If each charity gets the maximum amount, this works out to a total of $6 million.

The money is meant to run programmes that empower social service users and families, support their capital expenses to improve service quality and efficiency, and build their capability for community engagements to benefit service users, ComChest said yesterday.

It launched the Community Chest Charity Support Fund at its 35-year milestone celebration yesterday.

ComChest chairman Phillip Tan said: "This is true to the spirit of Community Chest, which was first set up to raise funds for charities, so that they can focus on delivering critical services to those in need."

Selection criteria include being a National Council of Social Service member, having an active Institution of a Public Character status and having less than $2 million in total operating expenditure, based on latest audited financial statements.

In the first grant call, 20 charities that are not currently supported by ComChest will benefit. They include Xin Yuan Community Care and Daughters Of Tomorrow.

Ms Carrie Tan, executive director of Daughters Of Tomorrow, said: "The work that we do includes helping low-income mothers with guidance and emotional support in their work search. The funds will help boost our general operational and programme capacity."

Mr Chee Kin Hie, executive director of Xin Yuan Community Care, which runs support programmes for the elderly, said: "The funds will help us continue the programmes we run, such as computer and smartphone literacy programmes."

Another 20 charities will receive the funding next year, as part of the second grant call. The final grant call will go out in 2020.

Yesterday, ComChest also launched its #StoriesOfCare campaign, a nationwide effort to encourage people to share their stories of what caring means to them.

Submissions can be in the form of a short story, essay or poem, or artwork, drawing, illustration or photograph. The top 35 entries will be curated into a commemorative book by ComChest to be launched later this year.

Members of the public can submit their stories through facebook.com/comchest and tag them #StoriesOf Care, or by e-mail to stories_of_care@ncss.gov.sg, by June 10.

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A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Straits Times on February 06, 2018, with the headline Financial help for charities with less support. Subscribe