Sponsors and Funders

The Travelers Companies, Inc. (NYSE: TRV) is a leading provider of property casualty insurance for auto, home and business. A component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average, Travelers has approximately 30,000 employees and generated revenues of approximately $32 billion in 2019. For more information, visit www.travelers.com. Travelers is ensuring opportunity by contributing to efforts that create strong, vibrant communities and offer pathways to success. Through corporate funding and the Travelers Foundation, Travelers targets its giving to three key outcomes: academic and career success, thriving neighborhoods and culturally enriched communities.

As one of Connecticut’s leading law firms for more than 100 years, Carmody Torrance Sandak & Hennessey LLP has built its reputation on a commitment to excellence, highly personalized, cost-effective client service. We put your goals first. On every engagement, we partner with you through communication and collaboration to deliver successful results. Steering clear of over-lawyering, our proactive approach enables us to anticipate client needs and provide effective and efficient service. The result is smart, practical, and personal legal counsel. Our lawyers have deep roots in the communities in which we serve. We serve on local boards, with charities, trade and industry associations and are heavily engaged in giving back to our community. We understand the issues and challenges of business, the legislative and governmental processes and have built trusted relationships across organizations.

SimplifyLLC is an independent publication providing a free database of guides for small business owners. From legal business help from accredited CPAs to business ideas and do-it-yourself guides on forming an LLC, SimplifyLLC is your go-to resource for simple, legal jargon-free guides.

Based in Westport, The CauseWay Agency (www.thecausewayagency.us) is a leading expert in cause communications, here in Connecticut and around the country. We work exclusively with non-profit organizations and government agencies to use the power of communications to help solve critical social issues. From look-alike modeling to TV PSAs, we reach target audiences and inspire them to act. Our clients include the Hartford Public Schools, CDC, Communities In Schools, National Crime Prevention Council, National Fair Housing Alliance,  U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), and U.S. EPA.

Waterbury-based Webster Bank is a leading regional bank in the Northeast with more than $30.4 billion in assets and 157 banking centers from greater New York City to Boston. We offer the full range of financial services, delivered by almost 3,400 employees.  We put people first — acting with responsibility, respect, ethical behavior, citizenship and teamwork. We call these principles The Webster Way. They bring us together, set us apart, and create an unshakeable core that is unique to Webster.

Owned by Mohegan Gaming & Entertainment, Mohegan Sun is one of the largest, most spectacular entertainment, gaming, dining, shopping and meeting destinations in the United States.  Situated on 185 acres along the Thames River in scenic southeastern Connecticut, Mohegan Sun is home to 1,600 deluxe hotel rooms, 2 world-class spas, a golf course, two unique casinos, over 80 shops, restaurants and bars, as well as three entertainment venues including the award-winning 10,000-seat Mohegan Sun Arena.

CT Realtors is the voice for real estate in Connecticut, promoting and advocating ownership of local real estate. CT Realtors proudly aspire to make our state a better place to live, work and play.

Express Strategies provides decision-driven public affairs consulting, with expertise in advocacy writing, project management and media relations.  We bring an acute understanding of the public implications of policy decisions made by an organization and first-hand experience with the relationship between policy development, news coverage and public interest.  Turn to the Express Strategies team for custom-designed problem solving and tangible outcomes aimed squarely at accomplishing complex communication and strategic objectives.  Words are the catalyst for action.

Delta Dental of Connecticut promotes oral health to the greatest number of people by providing accessible dental benefit programs of the highest quality, service and value.  Delta Dental of Connecticut writes dental coverage on a fully insured basis, and offers a full line of managed care, approved fee for service, PPO, and HMO-type programs, as well as a dental access program, and individual dental plans. They are a member of the national Delta Dental Plans Association, which serves more than one third of the estimated 212 million Americans with dental benefits, providing national dental coverage to more than 75 million people in more than 139,000 groups.  Each year, the Delta Dental Foundation awards nearly $1 million in grants in New Jersey and Connecticut to dental clinics, hospitals, and health centers that provide dental care to underserved children, developmentally disabled persons, veterans, and seniors.

The American Journalism Project is the first venture philanthropy nonprofit focused on local news.  Our work is grounded in an understanding of the severity, urgency and scope of the local news crisis as market forces continue to fail our communities.  Through transformative investments to Civic News Organizations, we are building a new public service media that is governed by, sustained by and looks like the public it serves.

Arnold Ventures, founded by Laura and John Arnold, is a philanthropy dedicated to tackling some of the most pressing problems in the United States. We invest in sustainable change, building it from the ground up based on research, deep thinking, and a strong foundation of evidence. We drive public conversation, craft policy, and inspire action through education and advocacy.

The Community Foundation for Greater New Haven is a philanthropic institution that was established in 1928 through a bequest. For more than 80 years, thousands of donors have built the community endowment by establishing permanent funds or making gifts to existing funds that distribute grants. These donors, past and present, make their gifts to ensure that programs and causes that matter most to them will be supported today and forever.

The Community Foundation of Eastern Connecticut is a family of hundreds of funds created by those generous people to serve their charitable goals. We also help people create charitable legacies. We provide guidance, investment vehicles, and other expertise to make giving an easy and joyful experience. Together, the funds entrusted to us provide between $4 million and $5 million each year in grants and scholarships in Eastern Connecticut and beyond.

Established in 1923, Connecticut Community Foundation was created by and for the people of Greater Waterbury and the Litchfield Hills. While serving this 21-town region, the Foundation provides leadership in addressing the community’s critical issues, strengthens local nonprofit organizations through grants and technical assistance programs, and works with individuals, families and corporations to steward charitable and scholarship funds.

The Connecticut Health Foundation (CT Health) is the state’s largest independent health philanthropy dedicated to improving lives by changing health systems. Since it was established in July 1999, the foundation has supported innovative grant-making, public health policy research, technical assistance and convening to achieve its mission – to improve the health of the people of Connecticut. It has funded over $41 million in grants. The foundation believes changing systems will produce the greatest impact over time.

Facebook Journalism Project partners with local newspapers, radio, broadcasters, websites, nonprofit organizations, and more to build programs with the goal of developing a more sustainable future for community-based news.  Working together with publishers around the world through trainings, programs, and partnerships, we can help strengthen communities by connecting people with meaningful journalism.

The Fairfield County’s Community Foundation promotes philanthropy to build and sustain a vital and prosperous community where all have the opportunity to participate and thrive. As the Fairfield region’s center of philanthropy, we provide personalized philanthropic advisory services and financial stewardship to donors and partners, visionary leadership and strategic initiatives to address key regional issues, and grants, counsel and leadership training to local nonprofits.

Since 1925, the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving has quietly helped make good things happen in the Capitol Region of Connecticut. We’ve been a reliable resource for the local charitable community, including donors, community leaders, and nonprofit organizations of all types and sizes.

The Knight Foundation is a national foundation with local roots. We choose, as the Knight brothers chose, to seek opportunities that can transform both communities and journalism, and help them reach their highest potential. We advance journalism in the digital age and invest in the vitality of communities where the Knight brothers owned newspapers. We focus on projects that promote informed, engaged communities and lead to transformational change. We believe that information is a core community need. We want to ensure that all citizens get the information they need to thrive in a democracy and act in their own best interest.

The Lenfest Institute was founded in 2016 by the late cable television entrepreneur H.F. (Gerry) Lenfest. Lenfest gifted to the Institute an initial endowment of $20 million, which has since been supplemented by other donors, for investment in innovative news initiatives, new technology, and new models for sustainable journalism. Lenfest also gifted his ownership of The Philadelphia Inquirer to the Institute.

The Melville Charitable Trust concentrates its efforts on finding and fighting the causes of homelessness. We support service and housing programs in Connecticut that can serve as models throughout the country. The Trust also funds educational, research and advocacy initiatives in Connecticut and on a national level. We collaborate actively with a growing network of individuals and groups, public and private, to build communities where every adult and child has a place to call home.

The Peter and Carmen Lucia Buck Foundation (PCLB) was formed in 1999, by Dr. Peter Buck and his wife Carmen Lucia as a private family foundation to manage their family’s philanthropy in a thoughtful and strategic manner.  PCLB’s work is anchored by its purpose statement, “giving motivated people the tools they need to help themselves.” These tools are about more than grants and include guidance, connections, convening, information, and other forms of assistance that the foundation and its grantees can provide. PCLB looks to support the highest‐quality organizations that show initiative, leadership, and innovation in solving issues that are meaningful to the family and the communities where family members live.

The San Francisco Foundation is a vehicle for change and a bridge to the future, a network of philanthropists and civic leaders bringing resources together to support and build on the strengths of community and make the Bay Area the best place it can be. For more than 60 years, we have been an incubator for community investment, original ideas, and passionate leadership. Learn about our origins and our vision for the future.

Seedlings Foundation supports programs that nourish the physical and mental health of children and families, and foster an educated and engaged citizenship.

The Connecticut Mirror received a potentially forgivable $156,250 loan funded by the U.S. Small Business Administration through the Paycheck Protection Program, as established by the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES Act).  The purpose of Paycheck Protection Program loans is to help small businesses keep their workforce employed during the COVID-19 crisis.

The mission of Solutions Journalism Network is to spread the practice of solutions journalism: rigorous reporting on responses to social problems. We seek to rebalance the news, so that every day people are exposed to stories that help them understand problems and challenges, and stories that show potential ways to respond.

The Tow Foundation was established in 1988 by Leonard and Claire Tow, and envision a society where all people have the opportunity to enjoy a high quality of life and have a voice in their community. We strive for this by supporting nonprofit organizations that serve vulnerable populations and help individuals to become positive contributors to society for the benefit of themselves and others.  We feel it is our obligation to help others achieve success in their own lives, to alleviate pain and suffering, and to offer opportunities for joy. We hope to provide leverage and make possible far greater things than we could achieve alone.