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Del Corazon de Jessica, Inc. Proposal for the Ak-Chin Indian Community 2024 Prop 202 – 12% Contribution Grant Application A. Purpose of Grant: 1) Rural communities throughout Arizona face many challenges. One of del Corazon de Jessica’s goals is to help children (and indirectly their parents) gain access to various items that are needed such as clothing, books, school supplies, etc. Our current program enables us to provide a lot of the need. Our proposal is to increase the amount of support that we can provide based on various holidays/seasons. We know that holiday and seasonal celebrations can be greatly enhanced with good meals as well as other items. Children living in rural communities reside far from cities or urban centers which in turn make it more diƯicult for them to access everyday resources like school supplies and clothing. While there are many programs oƯering free school supplies and clothing for low-income children and families, these programs primarily serve urban school children in major metropolitan areas. Del Corazon de Jessica’s mission is to aid families in rural communities that lack resources. The proposed project, special project program increases access to school supplies and clothing for children residing in rural communities across the state to ensure they have access to new clothing and supplies throughout the year and around major holidays. 2) The target population for this project is the Yavapai County region of Arizona. The population of rural communities in Arizona is 776,272 according to the 2020 Census. We realize that we are currently too small to properly support the size of all the rural communities. We do have a goals to serve as many of the rural population as possible in the future. 3) The goal of the special items project is to raise funds to have the ability to purchase new and non-reusable items that are normally not donated or can’t be donated. increase access to school supplies and clothing for low-income children and families in targeted rural areas of the state. Through this request, our aim is to provide much needed resources in rural communities so that we can meet the demand for supplies in these areas. Some of these items include diapers, baby wipes, strollers, back packs, school supplies, hygiene packs, books, Christmas and other holiday items, etc. Our plan to meet these goals include purchasing items as soon as funding is received, with events scheduled around the special dates, back-to-school time, holidays,, etc. 4) This project will be completed within a year. The various project events are spread out over the year and correspond to holidays and seasons. We are confident that we can complete this project as planned. B. Resources: 1) We do not have a current funding source for the project. We are actively and humbly requesting support. 2) We do not have any organization or partners that directly financially contribute to this project however, we do have local businesses that we work with that allow us to use their facilities and help with reaching our target demographic. 3) This is a new project for our organization. The goal is to enhance our current capabilities so we can create an even greater positive impact. 4) i. We have submitted a request to the Gila River Indian Community in March 2024 as well as a request to Tohono O’odham Nation in May 2024. ii. We have been blessed by the great Tohono O’odham Nation last year with funding for our core business operations. The support has enabled us to ensure our core business operations is sustainable. This funding support has greatly enhanced our organization. We are forever grateful for your generosity. C. Reports: Del Corazon de Jessica will submit monthly (or preferred frequency) reports to the Ak- Chin Indian Community. The reports will list expenditures that have been completed during the reporting period along with a brief description of the events that were held and their attendance numbers. We currently keep informal data on event coordination but can easily track it. D. Budget: Description Amount 1. Winter Jackets $ 6,600 2. Halloween Event $ 3,163 3. Thanksgiving/Fall Event $ 8,160 4. Christmas Event $ 6,669 5. Back to School Event $ 5,616 6. Easter/Spring Event $ 2,808 7. Summer Event $ 2,290 8. Mother's Day Event $ 1,253 9. Father's Day Event $ 1,166 10. Kid's Arts & Craft Supplies $ 1,728 11. Project Marketing $ 3,240 12. Hosting Kid's Corners $ 4,050 Total Budget $ 46,743 Each of the items listed above corresponds to a holiday or seasonal event. All our events are tailored to children with the purpose of strengthening their community bonds and increasing their quality of life. For example, our Winter events will provide jackets, gloves, etc. to help get kids ready for the cold weather. We’ve noticed in our regular events that we quickly run out of Winter clothing and can’t seem to keep enough in stock. We are requesting additional funding for these types of events to ensure to provide to as many kids as possible. Our planned timelines will have funds expended within 12 months of receiving it. Depending on when funding support is received, we will kick oƯ the event next on the calendar. But we do plan on exhausting the funds within a year. This is why it would be amazing if we could receive multi-year support. E. Additional Information: Background: Del Corazon de Jessica was established in Fall 2022 to help kids (and their parents) who live in rural communities. Our primary mission is Child Advocacy. We saw a need after spending time in several locations throughout Arizona while doing family road trips. As an example, in Yarnell the nearest thrift store or school supply store that sells kid items is located 45 minutes away in either Prescott or Wickenburg. We don’t think it makes sense to open a thrift store in Yarnell but feel strongly that the community can be best served by holding Kids StuƯ Exchange events where they have an opportunity to get items at no cost. Our goal is to amplify the “community” spirit within rural communities. We understand that there isn’t a need for handouts but helping each other in times of need is very important. We want to bring much needed programs that are lacking in rural communities. Most items that we have are from donations from friends, family, and people within the communities we’ve served. We accept these donations, ensure they’re properly treated, and add them to the inventory that we share out. Events: We have held several events in the past several months. We have named one type of our events “Kids StuƯ Exchange”. The purpose of the exchange is to allow kids (and their parents) to shop for clothes, toys, books, etc. with no money requirements. During the Holiday Season, it was heartwarming to watch kids “shop” for their sibling’s holiday gifts. We typically have about seven folding tables filled with diƯerent items. We held two “Kids StuƯ Exchanges” in Yarnell and one in Wilhoit. Yarnell was a great first location for us because the Community Center let us utilize a newly created space and the community is small. This allowed us to work out some of the logistics since we were new. We then went to Wilhoit to hold an event at the request of the Community. They heard about our event and a lot of families were not able to join us at our first Yarnell event. The Wilhoit event proved to be a hit. One of the local churches allowed us to use their space and we had good attendance. The Southern Yavapai Fire Department asked to participate and passed out brand new winter coats to all in need. They even donated winter coats to us to add to our items. We participated in the Williams Christmas Parade as well as the Wilhoit Christmas Parade. These were magical events and really got us all in the spirit. We proudly advertised our services and events. We took our homemade train to both events and it was a hit. We also set up two booths at the Yarnell Fall Festival. One booth gave participants (mostly kids but also some adults) an ice cream treats if they were able to correctly answer trivia questions. The other booth was for a train ride on a homemade train made of 55-gallon barrels mounted on a dolly/hand truck. The train ended up being one of the most popular even though there were jump houses and various small carnival rides/games. To help increase our capabilities to help others, we are budgeting for “Special Needs” items. We learned through past events that there are times when kids have unexpected needs that pop up. For example, back to school and new born items are things we would need to buy. We came out of pocket to buy a bunch of onesies and disposable diapers because we didn’t have any of those items donated to us.