- St. Petersburg Foundation

Activating knowledge, collaboration and capital to accelerate social impact.

We are an engine for social good, leveraging business acumen and donations to fund a new type of philanthropic endeavor, one in which we create a platform to bring entrepreneurial thinking and execution to the nonprofit space.

6,167

Non profits in
Pinellas County

> 50%

report need for training & consulting to build capacity

4,866

were created in
the last 5 years

38%

report working collaboratively with other nonprofits

How do we, as a community, retain and attract citizens? How do we ensure that growth is enjoyed by all, and that our region is making progress toward economic competitiveness? And ultimately, what key issues impact the desirability of our area?

Why we're here

We believe that we can do better

Economic vitality and equity. Innovation and infrastructure. Civic quality.

Time and gain, data and reporting show that these are the critical challenges facing not only St. Petersburg, but communities across the nation. Immeasurable resources are spent analyzing the trends and inputs that drive these issues. And the recommendations to address these challenges are remarkably similar: convene community conversations. Identify national best practices. Develop online user experience. Seek opportunities to collaborate.

Yet convening, identifying, developing, and seeking do not solve these issues. Real work does.

We are launching the St. Petersburg Foundation to do the real work—lending hands-on business acumen, forming neutral collaborations, and implementing measurable tactics—that our community needs surrounding these and other big challenges. We will work with, within, and between nonprofits and civic entities to go beyond “developing” and “seeking.” We will improve nonprofits so they may improve our community.

What we're doing

We believe we can do the work

While other organizations exist in our area that train individual nonprofit leaders, perform research on our community’s most pressing needs, and fund individual nonprofits’ programs and initiatives, the St. Petersburg Foundation will lead collaborations across nonprofits, embed our services within the nonprofits that need them, mobilize individual and corporate philanthropists and their resources in a leadership capacity, evaluate what we’ve executed and share our results…all in a way that will change the landscape of how change happens in Pinellas.

We’ve gathered a core team of professionals and partners with the know-how to help our community tackle these critical issues. This talented stable of leaders is ready to help make change happen in this way: rolling up our sleeves to work on these problems not as outsiders but as experts wanting to drive change.

Here’s how we’ll do it:

We will tailor-make a roadmap for measurable success and connect each nonprofit with our network of advisor-activists.
We will foster collaborations across complementary nonprofits and lead these collaborations to results.
We will coordinate a catalog of shared professional services for nonprofits, keeping leaders focused on their mission.
We will train and assess nonprofit leadership in best practices through community-wide events, such as a community wide board retreat, on-site trainings, leadership coaching, and customized training programs.
We will tell their story far beyond their own limited reach through traditional and leading-edge communication channels.