The Philanthropy California team vetted the list of response funds below to help you direct resources to the most vulnerable communities. We update this page on a daily basis and hope that it will help you stay informed and take rapid actions to support families, businesses, community-based organizations, and others during this crisis.
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National Funds
CDC Foundation: Emergency Response Fund
CDC is taking aggressive public health measures to help protect the health of Americans against coronavirus, COVID-2019, and we need your help to mobilize quickly. Funds raised by the CDC Foundation through our Emergency Response Fund will be used to meet emerging needs identified by CDC to help respond to the public health threat posed by this virus. These include additional support for state and local health departments, support for global response, logistics, communications, data management, personal protective equipment, critical response supplies and more.
Center for Disaster Philanthropy: COVID-19 Response Fund
The Center for Disaster Philanthropy has launched the CDP COVID-19 Response Fund to support preparedness, containment, response and recovery activities for those affected and for the responders.
Restaurant Workers’ Community Foundation: COVID-19 Crisis Relief Fund
Restaurant Workers Community Foundation established a Restaurant Workers COVID19 Crisis Relief Fund to: 1) Immediately direct money to organizations leading on-the-ground efforts in the restaurant community, 2) To bolster our impact investing budget to provide zero-interest loans to businesses to maintain payroll during closure or re-open once this crisis has passed; 3) To establish a relief fund for individual workers facing economic hardships or health crises as a direct result of COVID-19.
National Domestic Workers Alliance: Coronavirus Care Fund
The Coronavirus Care Fund will provide emergency assistance for home care workers, nannies and house cleaners, and enable them to stay home and healthy.
The Actors Fund: Emergency Financial Assistance
The Actors Fund is a national human services organization serving everyone working in performing arts and entertainment. The Actors Fund emergency financial assistance program helps eligible applicants in need. It is not income replacement, but limited funds for basic living necessities. The Actors Fund is also administering COVID19 Assistance programs for performing arts and entertainment unions including SAG-AFTRA, IATSE, Actors Equity Association, American Guild of Musical Artists and Musicians Local 802. For information about contributing, contact Keith McNutt, Director of the Western Region.
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Statewide Funds
United Way of California: COVID-19 Relief Fund
California United Ways have established a statewide relief fund to help those impacted by COVID-19. This goal of this fund is to relieve hardship for vulnerable working families, due to quarantine or disruption of income, to support the coordination of community relief efforts, and to ensure equity in the distribution of philanthropic resources across all of California. This statewide fund will complement regional United Way funds.
Latino Community Foundation: Love Not Fear Fund
The Latino Community Foundation established the Love Not Fear Fund to support Latino-led organizations that provide wrap-around services to the most vulnerable, especially undocumented seniors living in the Inland Empire and Central Valley and families that have already lost wages.
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Northern California Funds
Silicon Valley Community Foundation: COVID-19 Coronavirus Regional Response Fund
The Silicon Valley Community Foundation’s COVID-19 Coronavirus Regional Response Fund will support lead organizations representing each of the nine Bay Area counties and their immediate efforts in addressing COVID-19 related challenges in their respective counties. Contributors can choose to support any of the nine Bay Area counties (Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Napa, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Solano, and Sonoma) in their efforts to address issues associated with COVID-19 coronavirus, or national response efforts managed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Foundation.
Napa Valley Community Foundation: COVID-19 Fund
In response to a declared emergency in Napa County, the Napa Valley Community Foundation has launched a COVID-19 Fund that will support efforts to help slow the spread of the virus within Napa County. It will deploy additional financial resources to best meet evolving needs. The Foundation will pay special attention to populations in Napa County that may be particularly susceptible to becoming seriously ill, like the elderly, the medically frail and those living in close quarters. It is paying special attention to community health, the potential for working families to face economic hardship and food insecurity in the months ahead.
Tipping Point Emergency Response: COVID-19
Today in the Bay Area, 1 in 5 people have less than $400 in savings. COVID-19 is only intensifying this financial strain due to loss in wages. For hourly workers, losing a shift can mean the difference in stable housing and eviction. Our grantees are already seeing the impact on the people they serve and are feeling the effects themselves. Tipping Point is committing $1 million in addition to this year’s core funding to support our network of grantees working on the frontlines. 100 percent of donations to Tipping Point go directly to its non-profits on the ground supporting vulnerable communities.
Community Foundation Santa Cruz County: COVID-19 Coronavirus Response Fund
The Community Foundation Santa Cruz County's COVID-19 Fund aims to protect the health of the public and giving to the most vulnerable in Santa Cruz County.
City of San Francisco: COVID-19 Response
Donating to help San Franciscans most impacted by the coronavirus.
COVID-19 Relief Fund for Monterey County
Monterey County is a caring and generous community. The Community Foundation for Monterey County and the Monterey Peninsula Foundation have created the COVID-19 Relief Fund to help those affected by the impact of the Coronavirus in Monterey County. The COVID-19 Relief Fund will address the immediate and longer-term needs of our region’s most vulnerable residents.
COVID-19: A Just East Bay Response Fund
Hosted by the East Bay Community Foundation, COVID-19: A Just East Bay Response Fund will rapidly deploy resources to organizations addressing the economic impact of the broader COVID-19 outbreak, including the immediate needs of communities and organizations affected by coronavirus-related closures. The Fund helps expand local capacity to address all aspects of the outbreak as efficiently as possible.
United Way of the Bay Area COVID-19 Community Relief Fund
The United Way Bay Area COVID19 Community Relief Fund contributions will support local Bay Area organizations and their short term and long-term response services in four key impact areas: 2-1-1- information and referral, technology infrastructure, direct assistance funds, and worker support.
San José Strong Fund
The COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic is already hurting San José’s residents, businesses, and community-based organizations. Particularly hard hit are those families and individuals who can least afford a medical or financial crisis, small businesses whose revenues have fallen off, and nonprofits that are seeing an increased need for services or have had to cancel arts, cultural, or fundraising events. San José Strong will help three key groups: residents, businesses, and community-based organizations.
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Southern California Funds
California Community Foundation: COVID-19 LA County Response Fund
California Community Foundation launched the COVID-19 LA County Response Fund to address the immediate and mid to long-term needs of our region’s most vulnerable residents. This fund will support community needs identified by our partners in health, housing, education and immigration, and will aid impacted individuals through its Pass It Along Fund.
Ventura County Community Foundation: Rapid Response Fund
The purpose of the Rapid Response Fund is to support those organizations providing basic human needs to individuals and families in Ventura County. Funding can be used by these organizations to provide cash assistance to those they serve, which can allow for families to stay in their homes or address their needs. These organizations can also apply for funding to support their unrestricted operating expenses ensuring that these nonprofits may continue to fulfill their missions and serve Ventura County.
United Way of Greater Los Angeles: Pandemic Relief Fund
As the nation responds to the coronavirus pandemic, United Way of Greater Los Angeles has announced the creation of the Pandemic Relief Fund to support L.A. County’s unsheltered residents who are especially vulnerable to the coronavirus, and low-income individuals, students, and families at imminent risk of homelessness and hardships due to health and economic impacts of coronavirus.
Inland Empire Community Foundation: Disaster Relief Fund
In response to the alarming spread of the COVID-19 Coronavirus, and what this could mean for its two-county region, Inland Empire Community Foundation is accepting donations to assist local nonprofit organizations working to respond to this public health crisis.
COVID-19 Response Effort for Santa Barbara County
The United Way of Santa Barbara County (UWSBC) and the Santa Barbara Foundation (SBF) are working in partnership to provide financial support to address the needs of individuals and families in Santa Barbara County as well as the nonprofits who serve them. SBF and UWSBC are preemptively mobilizing in response to the increasing numbers of confirmed cases in our region. Your donation to the Community Disaster Relief Fund (CDRF) will support our COVID-19 response effort.
Mayor's Fund for Los Angeles: L.A. Emergency COVID-19 Crisis Fund
The Mayor’s Fund for Los Angeles has created the COVID-19 Emergency Response Fund. You can donate to this fund to help support families, provide critical services, and strengthen our emergency response.
The Community Foundation San Luis Obispo County: Disaster Support Fund
In response to the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, the Foundation has opened its Disaster Support Fund and will waive all administrative fees to provide urgent assistance to organizations working in the impacted communities. Foundation grants will provide flexible resources to organizations in our region working with communities who are impacted by the Coronavirus and the economic consequences of this outbreak.
OC Community Resilience Fund
The OC Community Resilience Fund is a collaborative response by the Orange County philanthropic community seeking to strengthen and support community-based organizations that serve vulnerable communities most impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.
City of Long Beach: Coronavirus Relief Fund
The OC Community Resilience Fund is a collaborative response by the Orange County philanthropic community seeking to strengthen and support community-based organizations that serve vulnerable communities most impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Great Public Schools-Now: One Family LA
This fund is an initiative coordinated by Great Public Schools-Now in partnership with several Los Angeles community organizations. Donations will go directly to Los Angeles families to meet basic needs such as food, rent, medical care, childcare, gas, and transportation. Funds contributed through this site will be administered by Great Public Schools-Now, a Los Angeles based 501c3 non-profit foundation, and distributed through our partner network funds directly to families in need during this crisis.
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San Diego Region Funds
San Diego COVID-19 Community Response Fund
A coalition of philanthropy, government and business partners has joined together to create the San Diego COVID-19 Community Response Fund held at The San Diego Foundation to rapidly deploy flexible resources to community-based organizations at the frontlines of the coronavirus outbreak in San Diego County.
Vulnerable Local Populations COVID-19 Fund
Across San Diego County, there is an ever-increasing number of people who are without a paycheck or with a significantly reduced paycheck, leaving these families food insecure and often unable to pay their rent. In addition, the needs of home-bound seniors and the homeless are growing and becoming more critical.
Public Health Response COVID-19 Fund
The scientific and health care communities need support to address the public health threat posed by the virus. This includes research, logistics, communications, and data management as well as efforts to acquire necessary equipment, and build appropriate, temporary facilities. Additional public health needs will undoubtedly emerge as our community weathers the COVID-19 challenge.
The UC-San Diego COVID-19 Response Discretionary Fund
The UC San Diego COVID-19 Response Discretionary Fund has been established to support our students, patients, caregivers, and community at this unprecedented moment for our university and the world. The fund will allow us to address the greatest needs in this evolving situation including critical supplies, expanded testing and diagnostics, supporting displaced and impacted members of the UC San Diego community, and research efforts to better understand and respond to COVID-19.
The San Diego Homeless Seniors COVID-19 Response Fund
Funders Together to End Homelessness San Diego, a collaborative of San Diego Grantmakers, has established a fund to pay for hotel rooms for homeless seniors and others who are at higher risk of contracting COVID-19. There are over 2000 homeless people in San Diego who are age 65+ living on the streets and in crowded shelters. The County of San Diego, and other government entities, are securing hotel rooms for people who have already contracted COVID-19. This fund expands upon those efforts by targeting people who are high-risk but have not yet gotten sick.
International Community Foundation COVID-19 Response
COVID-19 has directly impacted funding for some of Mexico’s most vital Community Funds. As uncertainty heightens, we need to ensure the future of Mexico by addressing the communities’ most critical needs. Your support will allow us to continue to make weekly rapid response grants from a number of funds.