Eight groups receive CFO grants for rural aid

Community Foundation of the Ozarks presented more than $100,000 in grants to eight organizations Tuesday to help combat rural poverty.

The grants were part of the Louis and Dorothy Coover Regional Grantmaking Program, a partnership of CFO and Commerce Trust Co. Dorothy Coover was a longtime Commerce employee, according to CFO Executive Vice President Brian Fogle.

The Coover program supports groups addressing regional needs, and Fogle said this year the program focused specifically on rural poverty because of the impact of the recession in rural areas.

"Organizations were selected based on need, leverage, (and) the recipient's ability to get things done," Fogle said.

Eight organizations are receiving a total of $109,475 in funding:

• Boys & Girls Club of the Ozarks received $14,000 to provide access to daylong youth development opportunities in rural Stone and Taney counties;

• Cabool Development Foundation Inc. received $13,000 to start a rural primary health care clinic for a four-county region;

• Care to Learn received $15,000 to expand its student health, hunger and hygiene services to Ozark, Nixa and Bolivar;

• Hope's Bridge received $14,500 to fund temporary care for children with families in crisis;

• Ozarks Resource Group received $13,950 for teenage substance abuse prevention programs in Hickory County;

• Ripley County Caring Community Partnership received $9,025 to provide evening meals for impoverished students in the southeast Missouri county;

• Samaritan Outreach Center received $15,000 to fund emergency homeless shelters; and

• The Samaritan Center received $15,000 to provide food and clothing distribution in Henry, St. Clair and Benton counties.

Fogle said the need for aid provided by these services is stronger now than it has been in a long time. He pointed to a Nov. 17 study from the U.S. Department of Agriculture that shows 17 million households have trouble getting enough to eat, up from 14 million last year.

"It's just heart-wrenching - the poverty, lack of food and clothing and basic needs that people are struggling with right now," Fogle said. "Even here in Greene County, the unemployment rate has doubled, and we're seeing in the rural areas that it's just as bad if not worse."