Grants

Café Esperanza

A novel pay-what-you-can café, Café Esperanza, received a grant from Visions Cares to purchase equipment and expand their efforts within the Reading, PA area. As a pay-what-you-can establishment, Café Esperanza helps alleviate some of the food insecurity that is experienced in many of our communities. The core values of Café Esperanza include pay-what-you-can pricing, volunteering your time in exchange for a meal, paid staff earning a living wage, and community volunteers working to run the organization. They have created a community gathering point in a restaurant setting, which provides space for art, music, education, and even job-training. They serve excellent, ethically grown coffee and locally sourced foods. Fresh, simple offerings, guest chefs from various styles of cooking, and sustainable practices such as recycling, composting, and low waste portions are central to Café Esperanza’s expanding mission.

The Kia Foundation

Visions Cares awarded The Kia Foundation with a grant to support their Furry Kisses Fund. This fund was started for low-income pet owners to assist with veterinary and spay and neuter costs. The grant funds will be used for their $100 monthly giveaways as part of this fund. In addition to the funding provided by Visions FCU, part of the proceeds from the local Pet Thrift Store and Pet Food Pantry are donated to The Furry Kisses Fund.

Flags of Gratitude

One of our dear members from Morris County, NJ has been spreading kindness to healthcare workers and first responders with her Flags of Gratitude. We were so inspired that we funded a grant to help her out with her project. In return, she gave us our very own flag. This goes to show that our members are truly what Make Visions Matter!

Center for Prevention and Counseling

Each year Visions awards the Center for Prevention and Counseling of Newton, NJ a grant for their Taking Flight to Change Summit. This event allows middle and high school students to develop coping skills and emotional management strategies to assist in improving their school climate and reduce bullying. Now more than ever, social-emotional learning opportunities focused on empathy and resiliency are critical, as teachers and students transition back to school after experiencing the collective trauma brought on by COVID-19.

Jewish Community Center of Lehigh Valley

Visions awarded the Jewish Community Center of Lehigh Valley, PA with a grant for new outdoor recreational space that will be known as Camp JCC. Camps play an important role in encouraging young people to increase movement and physical activity. The goal of Camp JCC is to provide campers with new opportunities to learn about and develop active, healthy lifestyles that they can carry with them into adulthood.

Centro Hispano Daniel Torres

Centro Hispano received a Visions Cares grant to support a nutritional breakfast program for senior citizens of Reading, PA. Their novel program, Healthy Start Senior Food Initiative, is the only breakfast program offered for free to senior citizens in the city of Reading that assures access to a nutritional breakfast five days a week. For some, the meals that are provided may be the only meals they have for the day.

Rochester Jewels

Visions presented a grant to Rochester Jewels Inc. for their year-end cotillion and the purchase of laptops for graduating seniors. The organization’s mission is to provide mentoring services to school-age girls in the Rochester, NY area to help them grow, learn, and become successful and independent young women. This grant will also aid in preparing these women for their academic careers in college.

Girls Who Code at Binghamton University

Our partnership with Girls Who Code at Binghamton University began with support of their 2019 Spring Graduation. We have since provided a grant to cover the $1,260 transportation cost to bring Binghamton High School female students to classes designed to teach the computing skills needed to pursue 21st century opportunities in technology and engineering sectors.

United Way of Northern New Jersey

Visions presented a $3,000 grant to the United Way of Northern New Jersey. The Northern New Jersey chapter supports education programs and ALICE (Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed) households which support community programs that prepare children to be successful citizens, employees, and adults.

Operation Homefront

When a Visions member chooses the Americana debit card design, Visions donates $5 to Operation Homefront. In 2019 that totaled to a grant of $25,135. Operation Homefront serves Veterans and their families by providing access to programs that aid with financial assistance, housing, support groups, meals, scholarships, school supplies, programs for new and expecting parents, and more.

Student-Athlete Academic Success Center

Being the official on-campus partner for Binghamton University isn’t enough for us – we want to give back to the students and faculty, too. Our donation to renovate the Student-Athlete Academic Success Center will impact all current and future student-athletes at Binghamton University.

Abilities in Motion

We gave $10,000 to support Abilities in Motion’s STARS Program in Reading, PA. The STARS program is a summer work readiness program that serves 45 individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder, Downs Syndrome, Mental Illness, and other disabilities.

John Mack Foundation

Our donation partner for the annual 4 on the 4th Road Race is the John Mack Foundation. They work to provide life-saving AEDs to community-based organizations throughout the Southern Tier region in Upstate New York.

Canstruction of the Southern Tier

We’re not only the title sponsor of “Canstruction of the Southern Tier”, but we also provide Broome-Tioga BOCES students with a grant to purchase the cans needed to create their structure. Our grant enables them to purchase and donate over $3,000 worth of canned goods for local food pantries.

Montrose Mobile Food Pantry

Our $3,000 grant to the Montrose Mobile food pantry provided much-needed relief to those suffering from food insecurity in Susquehanna County, PA.

Annual Visions Cup

Each year, we hold the annual Visions Cup between our regions’ two baseball teams – the Binghamton Rumble Ponies and the Reading Fightin’ Phils. The Phils took the second series, resulting in a $2,500 donation to the charity of their choice – Baseballtown Charities, an organization dedicated to keeping baseball alive for youth in Reading, PA.