A trusted resource for philanthropy serving the communities of Cape Girardeau, Bollinger, and northern Scott counties, including the communities of Cape Girardeau, Jackson, Marble Hill and Scott City.
Since our founding on August 26, 2015, Cape Area Community Foundation has distributed more than $1.6 million in grants to the community. We now hold assets totaling $1,200,459 as of June 30, 2023.
Skip Smallwood, President
July 17, 2024 — The Community Foundation of the Ozarks recently presented the Fred Lemons Achievement Award to Trudy Lee for her contributions to the Cape Area Community Foundation. In honor of Lee, the Cape Area Community Foundation received a $1,000 grant from the CFO and the Lemons family to supplement its annual grantmaking.
Lee was chosen for efforts to serve, support and initiate professional collaboration between the Cape Area Community Foundation and the communities it serves in Cape Girardeau, Bollinger and northern Scott counties. With years of experience in philanthropy with the Southeast Missouri State University Foundation, she was instrumental in helping to establish the Cape Area Community Foundation in 2015 and has served on its board since 2017. Since then, she has been actively involved in donor relations and education of the community about the role and impact of a foundation.
“Trudy brings such care and passion to her work in providing philanthropic focus in the community and has been a champion for CFO and Cape Area Community Foundation for many years,” said Alice Wingo, CFO’s vice president of affiliates. “We were thrilled to receive her nomination for the Fred Lemons Award as she exemplifies the qualities that distinguished Fred’s community leadership. We are grateful to benefit from her experience on both the affiliate board and as a longtime professional in philanthropic services.”
The Fred Lemons Award is named for the late president of the Lockwood Community Foundation, who demonstrated remarkable leadership during his 15-year tenure until his death in 2014. Trudy Lee is the 11th recipient of the award.
April 27, 2023 — During the Rural Philanthropy Summit on April 25, the Community Foundation of the Ozarks selected the Cape Area Community Foundation as an Affiliate of the Year. The award recognizes the CACF’s excellence in leadership in the CFO’s 53-member affiliate network and comes with a $2,000 prize grant. CACF Board Member Sara Gerau and Treasurer Shelly Kaiser accepted the award.
The CACF was selected because it created seven new charitable funds and distributed nearly $200,000 in grants last year. Additionally, the CACF has been actively engaged with city leadership to promote charitable causes, including the development of a disaster recovery funding program.
The Ash Grove Area Community Foundation, Barton County Community Foundation, Community Foundation of the Lake, and the Nevada/Vernon County Community Foundation were also recognized as Affiliates of the Year.
The affiliates were selected using several criteria — asset growth, new funds established, overall grantmaking and new Legacy Society members in the 2022 fiscal year that ended June 30, 2022 — along with examples of community leadership, collaboration and the promotion of planned giving.
In addition to grant prizes presented in honor of affiliate leaders, affiliate foundations received a total of $23,000 to supplement their annual grantmaking to the communities they serve. The awards mark 30 years of the CFO’s Affiliate Foundation program, which began in 1993 with the establishment of the Nixa Community Foundation.
“For 30 years, our regional affiliate foundations have done so much to improve the quality of life in many communities across our wide service area,” said Alice Wingo, the CFO’s vice president of affiliates. “Our foundation leaders work hard to build long-term, sustainable resources that will benefit all sectors of a community. With exemplary foundations and leaders like the ones honored today, these 53 towns, counties and regions have bright futures ahead.”
The awards capped off the Rural Philanthropy Summit, presented by the CFO and Philanthropy Missouri at the Oasis Convention Center. The event is believed to be the first statewide gathering of philanthropists and foundations focused on the development of rural communities.
