The three co-tenants, sharing one floor of the four-story building, represent the primary nonprofit infrastructure organizations (NPIOs) serving the five-county Los Angeles region (Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura counties). Their coming together creates a new, centralized hub of nonprofit community activity, a model that has also found expression in other parts of the country.
Los Angeles County alone is home to more than 13,000 nonprofit organizations, a number that is growing daily. As the “backbone” of the nonprofit community, NPIOs provide the vital training and professional development, along with technical and management assistance, that enable such organizations to achieve their mission. The California Endowment has a long history of close partnerships with NPIOs, including involvement in regional associations and funding collaboratives sponsored by them, and sees new opportunities made possible by even closer cooperation in the future.
enhanced colaboration, efficiency, and synergy
Residing in the same building allows the Center for Nonprofit Management, Community Partners, and Southern California Grantmakers to more effectively plan together, collaborate on projects, and enhance efficiency by sharing operational and programmatic resources.
“Each of us contributes a different piece of the puzzle,” says Regina Birdsell, executive director of the Center for Nonprofit Management. “Community Partners is on the ‘incubator’ side. Southern California Grantmakers deals with funders. And for our own clients, there’s usually some change underfoot that the organization needs help dealing with on an infrastructural level.
“Being physically together on the same site makes a big difference for all of us,” she continues. “We run into each other in the cafe, in the elevator, in the copy room, so we’re constantly discovering shared connections and ways to help each other, on both a practical and a program level.”
fulfilling a promise to the community
Gwen Walden, director of the Center for Healthy Communities, describes the selection of tenants as part of a thoughtful, strategic process. “We wanted to bring stakeholders together to partner around community health issues,” she says. “And we asked ourselves, ‘What’s the promise we’re making to the community through this partnership?’ That’s where we started, with a focus on our objectives, and from there we looked for ways to use the space to achieve them. We could have rented the second-floor space to any number of nonprofits, but we chose these three as part of an integrated programmatic approach.” She adds, “Because our building is bond-financed, everything we do here has to be mission-focused. And so we chose partners whose clients include health organizations.”
community partners
Community Partners supports start-up nonprofits and civic initiatives “to accelerate ideas into action that advance the public good.” Since 1992, Community Partners has provided a wide range of services to more than 550 projects and civic leaders, including comprehensive fiscal sponsorship, consulting, professional development, administrative assistance, training, and network building to help nonprofit organizations address community needs more strategically and effectively.
“A community is a living organism, like the human body,” says Paul Vandeventer, president and CEO of Community Partners, “and it has the capacity, given the right conditions, to regenerate its own health. We work with folks who are at that regenerative edge of the community—people rooted in their neighborhoods and influential in their local systems, capable of inciting an organized response to a problem. We offer a welcome mat for social entrepreneurs and a solid foundation of business-like, back-office services such as accounting, budget, personnel, and risk management. We also provide program office support and other services for foundations undertaking new initiatives. We want to make sure that project and initiative leaders have all their concrete needs met as they focus on advancing the causes and addressing the needs that animated them in the first place.”
Community Partners’ staff of 18 moved into their new offices a year ago, where five of the nonprofit community organizations they work with share their office at any given time. “The physical location itself has been a spark to my staff,” says Vandeventer. “It’s teeming with problem solvers, innovators and hard-working, mission-focused folks from all over Southern California. A lot of paths lead here from many places. Working at the center of that vitality has inspired and energized my team.”
the center for nonprofit management
Established in 1978, the Center for Nonprofit Management fosters healthy neighborhoods and communities by helping organizations that address critical needs and issues facing underserved populations to more effectively fulfill their missions. It offers a wide range of management workshops and seminars, a resource library, publications, a helpline, and consulting services. Each year the Center serves more than 5,000 board members, staff and volunteers representing more than 1,000 nonprofit organizations.
“We provide training in all the essential aspects of running a nonprofit—how to build a board, raise money, manage a staff, focus projects, market your organization, plan strategically, and get results.”
In its new location, the Center has seen capacity attendance in most of its classes. “Our old office was in a highrise, difficult to get to and expensive to park,” says Birdsell. “Here, parking is free, and the facility is beautiful, open, and accessible. It’s so much more convenient for our clients.”
southern california grantmakers
Southern California Grantmakers (SCG) is a nonprofit regional membership association for funders in the fivecounty region. Founded in 1973, SCG currently serves more than 140 members, from corporate, public, community, family and independent foundations to individual philanthropists. Services include skills-building and issue briefings; connection to the local philanthropic community through gatherings, communications, and collaborations; and educating public policymakers and the media.
“Like The Endowment, SCG works to build healthy communities,” says Sushma Raman, executive director of SCG. “We do this by nurturing the institutions and individuals who support the on-the-ground work of Los Angeles’ nonprofit organizations promoting access to health services, helping children to combat obesity, creating recreational space in underserved communities, and cleaning up polluted neighborhoods.”
In addition to improved office space and a centralized new meeting place for its members, Raman looks forward to the benefits of ongoing contact with professional colleagues. “As a service provider to L.A.’s nonprofit sector, like the Center for Nonprofit Management and Community Partners, we will be able to learn from our co-tenants and share strategies, techniques, and resources, which will help us reach our full potential,” she notes.
for more information
Center for Nonprofit Management
www.cnmsocal.org
Community Partners
www.communitypartners.org
Southern California Grantmakers
www.socalgrantmakers.org
Shared Agenda Brings Nonprofit Resources Together Under One Roof
“We asked ourselves, ‘What’s the promise we’re making to the community through this partnership?’ That’s where we started, with a focus on our objectives, and from there we looked for ways to use the space to achieve them.”
— Gwen Walden,
Director, Center for
Healthy Communities
Focus On Paul Vandeventer
Paul Vandeventer, founding president and CEO of Community Partners, grew up in Southern California’s Antelope Valley. From a young age, Vandeventer was fascinated by stories and “how they made their way to the page or the stage.” He majored in literature at UC Santa Cruz, and went on to participate in Coro’s prestigious civic leadership development program, which anchored his focus in public affairs and public service. In the 1980s he served on the staff of the California Community Foundation, becoming executive vice president. In 1992, he led the start-up effort that established Community Partners as an incubator for social and civic entrepreneurs and community initiatives in Southern California.
“Sometimes I worry that my background is heretical,” he says, noting his nontraditional path to a career in social justice. “I have strong humanitarian values that come out of my humanities training, and these now get expressed through my work for Community Partners.” Vandeventer also has a longstanding interest in theater and serves as chair of the nonprofit, Pasadena-based Furious Theatre Company, where he works with young actors “constantly pushing the edge” in their daring performances and the stories they tell.
For Vandeventer, powerful storytelling is at the heart of Community Partners’ mission. “We are at the center of Southern California’s constantly unfolding story of place, of change and conflict, of tragedy and triumph,” he says. “The entrepreneurial people with whom we work are reshaping the way other people understand what’s happening around them. You couldn’t ask for a more dynamic, engaging story.”
