A Win for Watertown!
Giving Back 365 Members Vote for Big Impact

Food for students, seniors, and most importantly those that need it most. Diverse experiences for Watertown area youth. Rides to work for those seeking a better situation. Life-saving devices where they are needed most. Members of the Watertown Area Community Foundation’s Giving Back 365 program make all these opportunities AND MORE possible for our community by awarding grants to 15 local non-profit organizations totaling over $34,000.

Unique to Giving Back 365; members donate $365 annually, a dollar a day, for the opportunity to support local non-profit organizations and participate in the annual grant-making process. Donors vote to determine which of the applying non-profit organizations receive grants. Supporters selected the following organizations:
 

• 4 the Kids SD, $2,500 to provide healthy snacks for Watertown school students.
• Boys and Girls Club of Watertown, $2,500 for an additional warming oven.
• Brothers & Sisters Behind Bars, $2,500 to support an educational assistance program.
• Codington County Historical Society, $2,500 for a storage container for Carnegie Christmas Market booths.
• Community Transit of Watertown/Sisseton, $2,128.34 for transportation needs of Brothers and Sisters Behind Bars participants.
• East-Central CASA, $2,470 to purchase computers for volunteer advocates.
• Friends of the Goss Opera House, $2,035 to host Beads on One String.
• Inter-Lakes Community Action Partnership, $2,500 for 60’s Plus Dining.
• Joy Ranch of South Dakota, $2,000 for horse stall updates.
• Lake Area Zoological Society, $2,147.50 for the Wildlife Warriors Program.
• Sandwich Ministry Program, $2,500 to support food costs.
• Watertown Area PACH, $2,500 to support food costs.
• Watertown Area Snow Queen, $1,000 to host Girl Power.
• Watertown Fire Rescue – PAD Program, $2,500 for Public Access Defibrillators.
• Watertown Hockey Association, $2,500 for Mites and Squirts jerseys and “Stick It to Cancer” Varsity jerseys.

 
Donations to the Giving Back 365 program exceeded $53,000 during 2023. Of that, half was placed into the Giving Back 365 endowment fund at the Foundation to continue to grow over time. The other half plus the earnings from the endowment fund of over $7,600 were available to members for immediate granting.

“Giving Back 365 members range in age from grade school up to 100 years young,” shared Mengwasser. “They have first-hand knowledge of the most pressing needs of our community and are proof that philanthropy in any amount and at any age builds a thriving Watertown for us all.”