“The Foundation has provided the funds needed to start and support so many of the Village’s most beloved events and programs,” says Sadhna Morato-Lindvall, Foundation board president. “We’re excited to spend the next year showcasing the many ways in which these grants have enriched the community over the last six decades.” The variety of grants greenlit in the past year, either from individual applicants or through the organization’s annual Shark Tank Challenge, runs the gamut. In 2023, the group approved 17 grants totaling over $100,000, including $422 to the Shorewood Conservation Committee to promote its “No Mow May” initiative, $7,500 to cover travel costs for the SHOREWOOD FOUNDATION
Supporting Shorewood for Six Decades
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BY JENNIFER ANDERSON
he Shorewood Foundation is embarking on a celebration of its diamond jubilee anniversary: 60 years. One of the oldest community nonprofits in the state, the Foundation got its start in 1964 when Alvin Meyer, nicknamed “Mr. Shorewood” for his many civic activities, rallied a group of 14 of his peers to create an organization designed to financially assist groups that were working in some way to benefit the community. In the ensuing years, the Foundation, now made up of 12 volunteer board directors, has funded hundreds of grants and has been lauded by other communities wanting to replicate its successful operating model. No doubt Mr. Shorewood would be proud of many projects the Foundation has funded over the last six decades. They range from the small but important, like funding Shorewood High School student scholarships and subsidizing the lighting around the Plensa sculpture at Atwater Park, to the truly community-altering, like spearheading a major renovation of the Shorewood Public Library in the early 2000s and providing seed money and ongoing support for the Shorewood Farmers Market every year since its 2015 inception.
The Foundation has provided the funds needed to start and support so many of the Village’s most beloved events and programs.
— Sadhna Morato-Lindvall, Shorewood Foundation board president
Shorewood Little League team to attend the regional championships and $30,000 for the costs associated with being the annual sponsor of the Village’s 4th of July fireworks display. “I’ve been so proud to be a part of an organization that is solely focused on this very simple concept of putting funds into the hands of capable groups and individuals who have great ideas about how to help Shorewood thrive and then letting them run with those ideas,” says MoratoLindvall, whose tenure as president wraps up this spring. “For all that the Foundation has accomplished in the past, I’m even more excited to see what we can make happen in the future.” n
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