Our Giving: 2026 Q2 Grants

🌟 Congratulations to our Q2 Red String Grantees!  We’re proud to support organizations that show up every day for their communities. Their work—whether helping homebound seniors stay healthy, safe, and secure, creating opportunities for youth to grow and succeed, or supporting neighbors in times of need—makes a real difference. We’re grateful for the care, connection, and heart they bring to the people and communities they serve.

At Red String, we see grantmaking as more than funding. It’s about building relationships, strengthening capacity, and helping organizations grow in ways that have lasting impact. We take time to understand each partner’s leadership, operations, and needs, stay engaged through volunteering and participation, and ensure our grants directly support the programs, participants, and communities they’re meant to serve. This approach sets us apart: we don’t just fund programs, we invest in the people and partnerships that help create opportunities for those they serve to thrive.

City Surf Project: San Francisco, California

City Surf was started because of a teacher’s genuine interest in sharing a lifetime passion with his students.  Built into this passion of surfing was a unique way of connecting with kids outside the traditional classroom, providing an opportunity to kids who rarely had this opportunity and teaching analogous life lessons of resilience, teamwork, addressing fears and challenges.  

2026 Grant Project: Red String's grant provides funding to sponsor City Surf Project’s 2026 Summer Program. City Surf 's summer camp offers week-long ocean access, providing at-risk Bay Area youth ages 8-14 with surf instruction, equipment, and transportation while fostering social-emotional skill development, physical fitness, and stewardship of the coast. 

Heart of Ida: Long Beach, California

​Heart of Ida is a small charity with big ambitions.  Heart of Ida, Long Beach’s only 501 (c)(3) dedicated exclusively to serving low-income seniors, helping their seniors stay connected, healthy, happy, and loved.  By partnering with local government, like-minded community organizations, and volunteers, their programs are designed to address both seniors’ physical health and mental wellbeing, including providing essential needs items; access to basic technology, training, and support; connections to dozens of critical resources; and ongoing, heartfelt, personal connection. 

2026 Grant Project:  Red String's grant provides funding for Heart of Ida's Essential Needs Pantry.  For mobility-challenged, housebound, and low-income seniors, obtaining basic essential items such as hygiene products, paper goods, cleaning supplies, warm weather gear, pet food, and more can be difficult.  HoI's Essential Needs Pantry program addresses these needs by allowing homebound seniors to request delivery of specific items, while seniors who are able can shop for these free essentials in person at HoI's Long Beach office. 

Heart of Ida and Jazz Angels Collaboration Project: Long Beach, California

​Last year, Red String created Collaboration Grants as part of a broader strategy to bring together complementary nonprofits to expand services, strengthen organizational capacity, and deepen community connection. One of our first forays into this was a collaboration project between Heart of Ida and Jazz Angels bringing HoI's seniors and Jazz Angel's youth musicians together in a free-to-the-public multi-generational mixer summer concert series in Long Beach.

2026 Grant Project:  Building on last year’s successes, our 2026 collaboration grant will again support a concert series—this time with thoughtful enhancements designed to deepen connection, encourage broader participation, and create an even more welcoming community experience.

Jazz Angels: Long Beach, California

​Jazz Angels help underserved youth find their passions through the art of music, and in the process, build their self-esteem, confidence and leadership skills and promote community involvement. Jazz Angels creates the opportunity for young people to hear and learn about jazz, encourages them to play an instrument, and provides opportunities for them to perform.  Much more than music lessons in Long Beach, this is a program that provides a rich life experience for a young musician.   Since 2006, over 3,000 students have gone through their program with over 90 percent graduating from high school and going onto secondary education.

2026 Grant Project:  Red String grant provides funding purchase needed musical instruments and instrument repairs. In order to ensure their underserved youth have access to music, Jazz Angels works to remove financial barriers, offering instruments to kids who otherwise could not afford them while expanding their educational music programs.

Jubilee Reach: Bellevue, Washington

​Jubilee REACH, a Bellevue-based non-profit, is continuously evolving its services to meet the rapidly changing needs of its community by focusing on a "Love, Listen, Learn" model. Originally established in 2006 to serve underserved families providing after-school programs for at-risk youth, the organization has adapted its programming to provide a holistic approach to support, growing from a community center into a comprehensive support system that includes school partnerships, grocery support, and housing assistance.  

Red String 2026 Grant and Project:  Red String’s grant provides vital support for several Jubilee Reach programs serving local low‑income families who continue to navigate significant uncertainties and challenges. Funding will help support:

• Groceries for Families: Purchasing essential groceries and household items not available through donations.  Bourne in response to the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, GFF continues to support at-need families.  Currently, the program is operated by over 150 volunteers and serves over 200 families. 

  
  

• Senior Lunches: Delivering nutritious meals to home‑bound elderly neighbors.

  
  

• ESL Library Project: Helping launch the new library by providing funds to purchase children’s books.

  
  

• Jubilee in the Community: Supporting minor home maintenance for at‑need families through the purchase of tools and building supplies.

​Together, these services help ensure that families and seniors in the Jubilee Reach community receive the essential support required to meet current challenges.