CFO names second incubator recipient

Community Foundation of the Ozarks selected nonprofit I Pour Life as the second recipient of the Glenstone Square Big Idea Program grant.

The award includes a $4,000 grant and one-year lease at office space in the Glenstone Square shopping center. Including in-kind donations of office space, utilities and furniture, the grant is valued at $20,000, according to a CFO news release.

Ozark-based I Pour Life, whose representatives typically meet in volunteers' homes and coffee shops, will use the 1,000-square-foot office space on South Glenstone Avenue north of Sunshine Street to grow its Hand Up to Leadership program. The initiative is designed to bring out leadership abilities in homeless and at-risk youth.

I Pour Life works as a facilitator, identifying students and connecting them with leadership coaches from local businesses, churches and schools. The nonprofit also operates programs in El Salvador and Ethiopia, allowing Pipkin Middle School students to study social-response leadership, according to the release.

"We were so impressed by I Pour Life’s programming, and we strongly support their mission,” said Jana Funk, whose family owns Glenstone Square and established the Glenstone Square Big Idea Program through CFO, in the release.

During the first year, nonprofit Girls on the Run of Southwest Missouri was selected for the award.

Local Girls on the Run Director Trish Hopkins said the organization will continue to operate in its 1,100 square feet of space at Glenstone Square, 1722 S. Glenstone Ave., Ste. JJ, under a lease agreement at a reduced rate with the Funk family.

"I went to the property manager and just said, 'Hey, we really like our space. If we don't get this grant again, is there any way we can stay?'" Hopkins said.

Hopkins said the year of free rent and utilities through the CFO program gave the nonprofit the distinction of having a brick-and-mortar location, which she said is preferable to the coffee shops and other unofficial meeting spots before it won the incubator award.