We are excited to share a short video with you about Sewall Foundation. This video introduces you to who we are, the legacy of Elmina B. Sewall and offers a few glimpses into how the foundation supports work in Maine to improve the well-being of people, animals and the environment while fostering equity and centering community voices. You can check out a longer version of this video on our homepage!
This is our second annual report, and we have a lot to share with you. 2021 was quite a year…so much so, that it took us into 2022 to wrap it up! In many ways, 2021 felt like a continuation of the existential challenges and hectic pacing that Maine and the world faced in 2020.
In this report, we will be sharing with you not just the grants we made in 2021, but also the explorations and changes we went through internally. We believe that it is our responsibility not only to support change through funding and other available tools and strategies, but to also commit in real and concrete ways, to change ourselves.
In 2021, our staff team experimented with a new organizational structure that we presented to you in our 2020 annual report; and our board worked tirelessly to bring us updated bylaws and a re-imagined governance framework. We learned from the organizations working in the communities we strive to serve, and refined our programmatic work based on community and grantee input. Our program areas engaged in community listening and conversation in various ways, and we are eager to continue the conversations for continued learning (and unlearning).
If we were to summarize 2021, I think we at Sewall might say it was something like a marathon roller-coaster. As we closed the year, we re-committed to our values, recognizing that we are part of the system that needs changing and we are also part of the communities that we must treat humanely, with empathy, respect and empowerment. We enter 2022 more grounded in the why of our values and commit to practicing the values we hold so dear in our relationships with all people, animals, the environment, and ourselves.
In Solidarity,
Rotha Chan
Board Chair
M. Gabriela Alcalde, MPH, DrPH
Executive Director and CEO
Sewall’s Emergent Approach
In 2021, we continued our emergent process of aligning what we do, internally and externally, to our values in service of our mission. We believe how we work should communicate our vision for interconnected and sustainable wellbeing in Maine for people, animals, and the environment. While applying an equity lens, we work through six reinforcing strategies:
We continue to lean into the values and vision of trust-based philanthropy, recognizing that philanthropy is not just about grants, and that funding alone cannot create the transformative change we are committed to, we apply a full set of tools to our work:
It’s impossible to talk about our work and our values without acknowledging the context within which we have all existed in the past couple of years and the critical threads of this moment: COVID 19 pandemic, Climate justice, Racial justice (in Maine, this includes the continuing struggle for Wabanaki and indigenous self-determination and sovereignty).
As a sector, we must commit to translating our values into action and recognize our work is part of a broader national movement to change philanthropic practices to advance equity, justice, and our missions. In this spirit, and recognizing that we have much work still to do, we share some of the changes we made in 2021:
Our board approved our first multiyear budget in December 2021, providing 3 years of approved grants budget at an amplified funding level of 8.5% of our endowment. Our operations budget is brought to our board annually. Concretely, this will allow us to meaningfully expand multiyear funding and general operating grants.
We adopted a new set of bylaws and governance framework that decentralize power and clarify roles and responsibilities. In 2021, we also conducted our first open call for board members and are honored to have added 6 fabulous new members to our talented and committed board of directors.
We adopted a set of equity principles that provide parameters and guideposts for translating our commitment to equity into action, internally and externally.
We got more specific in our grant application guidance, increasing transparency in our grant size, review criteria, and community-informed programmatic priorities.
We continued to explore ways to engage with and learn from the communities we serve through community engagement and learning efforts across our program areas.
We continued to shape our organizational pod structure to better manifest our values and support the work of our staff team.
From Triage to Transition and Transformation in the Wake of Covid-19
During most of 2020, Maine’s philanthropic community responded to hundreds of requests for emergency support as non-profits struggled to meet urgent challenges brought on by the pandemic. By the end of 2020 and all through 2021, Sewall was seeing shifts, both in how non-profit partners were pivoting in their work, and in the kinds of grants we were making – from mainly emergency, “triage-level” grants in 2020, to more “transitional” and “transformational” grants in 2021.
Through our emergent approach, Sewall is learning with our non-profit partners how a local, regional, and global crisis can inspire positive change for organizations and communities who are rising to the challenge to build resilience together. In effect, the response to COVID-19 fueled constructive energy across the state, as groups of organizations pivoted from triage measures to transition toward new ways of working that have been transforming all sectors, and creating a new reality that is fairer and more just.
2021 Grantmaking at a Glance
In 2021, we approved 137 new grants totaling $4.9M. In addition to making payments on existing multi-year grants, we amended 132 grants, adding new payments for 2021. In total, we made $10.2M in grant payments in 2021. Payments ranged in size from $3,000 to $200,000, and include payments to new grants approved, and payments to existing multi-year grants. View all of our 2021 grants.
Program Areas
All of our work, across program and focus areas, strives to change systems that don’t work and support the creation of systems that are equitable and designed to support a healthy, just, and sustainable Maine for people, animals and the environment. We work with partners to affect the conditions necessary for sustainable change, as we strive to better ourselves, our processes, and how we allocate resources.
Healthy People Healthy Places
Four years ago, we began an assessment and refinements process of our Healthy People Healthy Places initiative, transitioning from the original, broad Healthy People Healthy Places program, to working more strategically and deepening our equity lens in a more focused approach. Not wanting to stop making grants during our refinements process, we instead paused bringing new applicants in and held invitation only grant rounds for existing Healthy People Healthy places grantees. 2021 marked the first year of focus area specific grantmaking.
Emphasizing that relationships are at the heart of our work, we designed our grant rounds to provide grantees and new applicants with the opportunity to connect one on one with focus area lead staff members. The first round, held in early spring, was for existing grantees whose work continued to align with focus area priorities. Rather than require a new application, we made amendments to their 2020 grants, extending the term by a year and adding a new payment. The second round, held in late spring, was open to new applicants. New applicants had conversations or email exchanges with focus area leads prior to starting their applications to discuss their alignment with focus area priorities, receive guidance for completing the application, and to build relationships. We had a large number of restricted grants in the second round because of fiscally sponsored organizations, restrictions to work in Maine, and restrictions to collaborative work where one organization served as the applicant.
Maine Coast Fisherman’s Association. Photo credit: Collin Howell
Food Systems
In 2021, we supported two collaborative efforts in Maine’s food system: The Maine Food Convergence and Ending Hunger by 2030. These broad-scale collaborative efforts helped to create new goals and visions for the food system and beyond. These efforts along with many individual conversations with grantees helped shape the goals and strategies of the Food System Focus Area at the Sewall Foundation with a new focus on climate, racial and economic justice. In 2021, we also helped launch the Maine Food Funders network bringing together funders to explore shared learning and collaboration in the food system. Contact: Jonah Fertig-Burd
Katahdin Gear Library. Photo courtesy of Millinocket Memorial Library and the Katahdin Learning Project
Katahdin Region
Guided by the Katahdin Gazetteer: A Roadmap to the Future, we are supporting several collaborative initiatives in the region to build strong institutions, tackle Katahdin Gazetteer goals, and support healing and prosperity. In 2021, the Boston Fed’s “Working Communities Challenge” provided a design grant to partners across the region to advance their vision of a thriving outdoor economy that delivers lasting prosperity for residents and creates career paths that help attract and retain younger workers. Contact: Tom Boutureira
Maine Youth for Climate Justice at the rally Youth Day of Action, April 12, 2022. Photo credit: Julia St. Clair
Keystone
Through the Keystone focus area we support organizations working on critical policy, advocacy, field and movement building, and strategic communications efforts with an emphasis on work happening regionally or statewide and that uplifts the inherent interconnections of human, animal, and environmental well-being. In 2021, Sewall continued to make grants to long-time partners working on policy and advocacy while welcoming in a limited number of new groups as we further refine strategy. New investments focused on climate change, accessible broadband access, and collaborative work to build momentum and capacity for lasting change. Contact: Megan Shore
Lewiston-Auburn
Sewall made a record number of grants supporting organizations in L-A that are addressing one or more of the community’s priority areas: equitable municipal systems; workforce access and economic development; community health and wellness; healthy affordable housing; and a healthy local food system.
Building on the 2020 co-design process, Sewall convened over 80 organizations for a systems-mapping process to help L-A organizations identify how their work was impacting systems, explore gaps in systems impacts, and brainstorm together about how to address those gaps. Participants also affirmed two strategies – supporting collaboration and building capacity – for shifting the systems they are working in, and they affirmed the importance of applying an equity lens that centers youth and Black, Indigenous, and People of Color in all their collective work.
Input from the systems-mapping process, along with feedback from L-A funders, is reflected in a three-year workplan to pilot a Systems Approach that will support collective work in Lewiston and Auburn beginning in 2022. Contact: Lauress Lawrence
Advocacy in Augusta for Climate Change. Photo courtesy of the Maine Environmental Education Association and the Maine Environmental Changemakers
Nature-Based Education
We are supporting efforts that build a strong sector, create networks that address complex systems change and racial equity, and advocate for policies that result in sustained funding and more equitable access to outdoor learning for all Maine students. In 2021, organizations and networks advanced advocacy and policy actions related to climate change education funding, began design of a 2nd census of Community Based Environmental Learning in Maine, and launched the early stages of a Maine Outdoor Equity Fund. Contact: Tom Boutureira
Wabanaki Communities and Tribal Governments
Through the Wabanaki Communities and Tribal Governments focus area, Sewall seeks to be a good partner to Wabanaki-led community organizations and tribal governments. This focus area collaborates with Sewall’s other focus areas to integrate awareness and participation of indigenous perspectives and organizations across all our work. Sewall’s work in this focus area is critical to our commitment to racial equity and to our mission’s focus on the interconnectedness of people, animals, and the environment.
In 2021, Sewall met with and listened to more than 35 Wabanaki community members, representing 15 Wabanaki-led and Wabanaki-serving organizations through individual and small group sessions. Our approach was to listen, reflect and share back what we heard. The document that captures this virtual listening can be found here. “We collectively help each other thrive” and “sovereignty, self-governance and self-determination” came through in every conversation we had, and these important concepts serve as framing for the themes we had during the listening sessions. The two most common themes from the listening sessions were community culture and community-building and indigenous leadership and resourcing across communities.
There were many other themes that we invite you to read about in our listening sessions report. We are deeply grateful to everyone who shared their time and conversation with us and we look forward to continued listening and learning. Contact: Gabriela Alcalde
Map of Wabanaki Territory
Communities Adapting to Climate Change in Fisheries. Photo courtesy of Downeast Institute and the Downeast Fisheries Partnership
Washington County
We are supporting several collaborative efforts in the region that bring together service providers, nonprofits, and other stakeholders to address systems change in social services, fisheries, and food systems and to tackle complex demographic and climate change trends in the region. In 2021, nonprofit organizations and the Passamaquoddy Tribe utilized a Boston Fed “Working Communities Challenge” design grant on how to better invest in young people and parents to expand the number of living wage careers and reduce rates of child poverty in the county. Other partners organized around federal and state COVID relief funds to help position the region for climate change impacts and build resilient communities. Contact: Tom Boutureira
Animal Welfare
True to Mrs. Sewall’s passion for animal welfare, in 2021 the Elmina B. Sewall Foundation awarded 20 grants totaling over $1.5M to organizations focused on animal shelter capacity and addressing the cat population control issues.
Foundation staff, alongside colleagues at the Maine Community Foundation, met with nonprofits and other experts in the field over the past year to help review our program and guide its future direction, while working to increase visibility of the ties between human, animal, and environmental well-being resulting in new guidelines for 2022. The image below shares a conversation from the convening about trends in the sector. Contact: Megan Shore
Legacy
Sewall Foundation honors Mrs. Sewall’s interests and lifetime of philanthropy by supporting a small number of organizations with whom she had personal relationships and affinity. Last year, nine organizations were awarded three-year Legacy grants totaling $785,000.
During 2021, the first full year of the COVID-19 pandemic, Legacy organizations did extraordinary work to respond to a broad range of needs, often with a deepening commitment to equity and justice as the pandemic laid bare inequities across the state and nation. For example, last spring The Nature Conservancy supported efforts by Passamaquoddy Tribe’s reacquisition of 140 acres of Kuwesuwi Monihq (Pine Island) in Big Lake, Maine. MaineHealth Care at Home, Sweetser, and other health and social service providers were called upon to respond to critical needs as COVID-19 cases rose dramatically during the year. And the Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine initiated a community medicine internship program to recruit and equip new veterinarians to New England – helping to address a critical shortage – while providing high quality pet care services for families with limited incomes. Sewall Foundation is pleased to continue supporting these organizations in honor of Mrs. Sewall’s legacy. Contact: Lauress Lawrence
Rapid Response Fund
In 2021, we held one grant round of our Rapid Response Fund grants. The majority of grants were for $10,000, supporting emergency and/or time sensitive needs. For this program, all staff are invited to participate in grant review, recommendations, and decision-making.
Capacity Building
Supporting the capacity of partners and the nonprofit sector is a critical strategy for advancing our mission. This takes many forms including grants and targeted support for learning and field building efforts, leadership development, and opportunities for organizations to network and collaborate. The Sewall Foundation supports all these types of efforts and more. 2021 highlights include:
Support for the Investing in Leaders of Color Program hosted by the Maine Community Foundation, increasing the amount of coaching support available to each participant.
Support for the Leadership Learning Exchange for Equity program hosted in partnership by the Maine Community Foundation and Thomas College and focused on building a community of leaders who are ready to be allies in work to raise awareness of and increase racial equity.
Support for First Light Learning Journey - a year-long program for the conservation community working to build awareness and understanding about Wabanaki land loss in Maine, to develop and practice equitable principles for Native engagement, and to create new tools to share land and resources.
Support for the Wabanaki Leadership Institute Fellowship Program - a two-year fellowship program that provides intergenerational leadership training for Indigenous Peoples living and working within Wabanaki Territory. This program is a partnership of the Land Peace Foundation and the University of Maine’s Native Studies Program.
Additionally, the Sewall Foundation partners with Catchafire to provide individualized organizational capacity support to 200 nonprofit partners. Following strong results and considerable positive feedback in its initial year, Sewall renewed its partnership for 2021 and 2022.
“Catchafire has been a fabulous resource to connect us with caring, capable, and highly skilled volunteers for our projects. We have utilized Catchafire volunteers for website development, translations, and graphic design. It has saved us innumerable hours and money and allowed us to focus our energy on what we do best- working with and supporting educators!” - Alexandria B., Research Associate, Maine Math and Science Alliance
The Maine Math and Science Alliance has benefited from tens of thousands of dollars of value over 10 projects with Catchafire.
Snapshot of Portfolio
We ended the year with $207.5 million in total assets, a substantial increase from year-end 2020 as a result of $22 million in investment earnings. Outflows included grantmaking of $10.2 million and other expenses for operations and non-grant support activities of $2.1 million (an approximately 6.1% payout rate). In 2021, the trend of outsized investment returns despite the continued disruption to lives and livelihoods continued, calling into stark relief the disconnection between Sewall’s values and an extractive and unjust economic system.
One North on the former Great Northern Paper site. Photo courtesy of Our Katahdin and One North.
As a result, we at Sewall are more committed than ever to aligning our investments with our mission, values, and commitment to equity. In 2021 we committed to and funded two additional investments – A $100,000 investment in a startup food business called Tootie’s Tempeh and a $250,000 investment in Welcome Home Downeast, an initiative of Mano en Mano and Sunrise County Economic Council that is expanding the availability of homes and homeownership opportunities.
We continue to explore new opportunities to deploy our nearly $20 million commitment to impact investments in projects or businesses in Maine that are aligned with Sewall mission and values. If you’re working on or aware of initiatives seeking investment, please contact Thomas Mitchell, Sewall’s Finance and Community Investment Partner.
Sewall Board of Directors
The Sewall board is the governance body for the Foundation, and as such, it guides and supports the work of the Sewall Foundation, championing our mission and values, providing strategic leadership, and serving in an equity-informed fiduciary role. Since our inception, the Sewall Foundation has evolved and grown to have a professional staff, and along the way the board role has shifted from that of a working board to a governance board. We are grateful for the continuing vision, stewardship, and guidance of the board along this journey and are excited for the next phase of our journey together.
2021 was a year of transformation for our board: they worked all year to develop updated bylaws and a new governance framework that aims to decentralize power and decision-making within the board. We also launched our first-ever open call for applications process, casting a wide net to identify new values-aligned directors to serve on our board. We are thrilled to have welcomed six new board members to our board of directors because of that process. The open call process was informed by our values and commitment to equity, community centeredness and transparency. These six new board members bring a wealth of experience, diverse perspectives, and deep commitment to the mission and values of the Sewall Foundation.
As we celebrated bringing new directors to our board, 2021 also marked the end of an era, with three long-time serving board members stepping off the board as their terms came to an end. The Sewall Foundation would not be what it is without the dedication, commitment, and vision of Bill Curran (1982 to 2021), Roy Partridge (2009 to 2021), and Carol Wishcamper (2008 to 2021). We are deeply grateful for their service.
Joining continuing board members Rotha Chan (board chair), Betsy Biemann, Dale McCormick, Gail Dana-Sacco, and Kent Wommack, are directors:
Jono Anzalone
John Banks
Autumn Fitch
Leslie Hill
Amara Ifeji
Vendean Vafiades
You can read more about all our board members here.
Sewall Staff: Evolving Organizational Structures to Reflect our Values
In our equity learning journey, we are challenging how power operates in our organization and designing structures to better reflect our values and center equity. In the summer of 2020, we organized the functions of the Foundation into different “pods.” Each pod has a purpose and a body of work, and a staff lead who coordinates that work. Meeting monthly throughout 2021, pod members worked collectively on projects such as developing tools to support continual learning (Learning and Evaluation Pod) and planning semi-annual staff retreats (Equity Pod).
We saw some clear benefits of the pod structure in 2021: increased thought partnership and collaboration among different configurations of staff; expanded leadership opportunities for staff in leading pods; and explicit integration of our grant-making with other strategies, such as capacity building, communications, and values-aligned investing. We also have seen some drawbacks. For example, we needed more cross-pollination among our program areas and pod functions than our initial pods could support. And for staff whose jobs were closely aligned with the work of a pod, it was confusing to distinguish areas of responsibility. Our year-end staff retreat focused in part on reviewing and suggesting revisions to the pod structure and, in 2022, we will implement those suggestions so that pods can better support our work as it takes shape.
We look forward to exchanging updates with other nonprofits and foundations that are exploring how shifting their structures can more effectively support both what they do and how they work. Here are some resources that we have found helpful in our learning:
Holocracy
Sociocracy
Round Sky Solutions
Reinventing Organizations
Being the Change
About the Sewall Foundation
At the Elmina B. Sewall Foundation, we believe that the health and well-being of people, animals and the environment are inextricably linked, and we seek to create a Maine where all thrive. With an equity-first approach to everything we do, we build mutual, trust-based partnerships spanning socioeconomic, cultural, and geographic boundaries. We connect organizations to each other and the resources they need, amplify their voices, and make sure they have a say in decision making. Together with our partners we’re expanding access to power, righting historical wrongs and strengthening communities for a just, healthy and sustainable future.