David & Lura Lovell Foundation Celebrates 20 Years Of Partnering With Nonprofits For Positive Change

TUCSON, Ariz. - Oct. 22, 2014 - PRLog -- The David and Lura Lovell Foundation is celebrating 20 years of partnering with nonprofit organizations to promote positive changes in the communities they serve. Since 1994 the family foundation based in Tucson has awarded more than $11 million in grants to support these four pillars of its mission:

Ø  Mental health
Ø  Integrative medicine
Ø  Cultural and spiritual enrichment
Ø  Philanthropic education
“This year – our 20^th anniversary – we are celebrating the impressive accomplishments of our nonprofit partners,” said Ann Lovell, president of the foundation. “We have had the privilege of working with really bright people who are doing amazing things. These people did the real work. We are so fortunate to be able to support them.”

Those partners include the Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine, founded by Dr. Andrew Weil, which has received a total of $1.6 million from the foundation. The most recent award was a multi-year commitment to establish the Institute on Place and Wellbeing, headed by Dr. Esther Sternberg.

Another program that received more than $1 million over time is The Bravewell Collaborative. In 2002 Ann and Lura became founding directors of this national partnership of philanthropists who worked together for more than a dozen years to advance integrative medicine.

The National Alliance on Mental Illness of Greater Toledo, which Lura helped establish, received nearly $1 million over the years.

Ann has served on the foundation’s board of trustees since its founding, was executive director from 2004 to 2012 and is now president, following Lura’s death in September, 2013.

“Going forward, the Lovell Foundation will have more resources and be able to support nonprofits not just for projects and programs but also in ways that can help them evolve and expand their capacity to better serve their communities, “ Ann said. “We can do so much more. I really want to help move the needle on important social issues.”

David and Lura Lovell decided to create the foundation when they were preparing to sell the chemical company that David founded and grew for 25 years. At the time the Lovell family had homes in Toledo, where the business was based, and in Tucson. Before the foundation was fully established, David was diagnosed with advanced lung cancer and died less than two months later at the age of 66. His wife and daughter Ann moved the foundation forward, supporting causes that the Lovell family cared about on a deep personal level.

David and Lura had four children, including a son born with organic brain damage in 1957. It would be years before his condition was finally diagnosed as a combination of Asperger’s Syndrome, schizophrenia and epilepsy. Both Lovells worked for decades on behalf of their son and others with mental illness.

Lura served on the Lucas County Mental Health Board in Ohio, distributing federal, state and county funds to 17 mental health agencies. During her tenure, she secured a multi-million-dollar grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. She also helped establish the Toledo Alliance for the Mentally Ill, an organization which later received nearly $1 million from the Lovell Foundation.

The foundation also supported the film “Out of the Shadow,” in which filmmaker Susan Smiley documents her paranoid schizophrenic mother’s journey through the mental health system. The film aired more than 1200 times on public broadcasting stations since 2006 and has been translated into nine languages.

The Victory Center in Toledo, originally The Wellness Center, received $473,400 to provide an array of services for cancer patients at no charge, including support groups, educational programs, healing touch, massage, Reiki, reflexology and other integrative therapies.

The Lovell Foundation also supports nonprofit arts, cultural and religious organizations. The family believes that providing spiritual and cultural experiences can open doors to a brighter future.

The foundation also helped the Women’s Foundation of Southern Arizona establish Unidas, a philanthropy program for high-school-aged young women in Tucson. They study social issues, evaluate proposals and award grants. This innovative model led to similar programs for other nonprofits.

Ann said, “Philanthropic education today prepares the next generation with the skills and insights needed to address the community challenges that will arise tomorrow. It also provides opportunities for those new to philanthropy to learn from each other, and from thought leaders in the field, how to become more effective grantmakers.”

Ann is an influential philanthropist involved in issues around the globe. She’s  founder of the Valley Foundation and founding director and vice president of Women Moving Millions. She serves on the Women’s Leadership Board at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, the Circle of Ten of the Institute for Inclusive Security and the Foundation for Women’s Leadership Council in California and Liberia.

In all, the Lovell Foundation has partnered with 60 nonprofits in local communities where family members live, including 20 in Tucson and 17 in Toledo, plus a few projects that are national in scope.

To celebrate the accomplishments of these nonprofit partners, the foundation has launched a new website – www.lovellfoundation.org – highlighting the scope of their community impact.

SIDEBAR:  2014 Lovell Foundation Grants

In 2014 the Lovell Foundation awarded grants totaling nearly $400,000. Several additional large collaborations are pending for longtime partners.

The largest grant was $140,000 to Interfaith Community Services in Tucson, bringing the total foundation support for that organization to $390,000. Programs funded include the ICS Health and Wholeness Program that helps faith community leaders integrate health-related activities into their congregations. The foundation also supported the 2012 and 2014 Faith and Mental Illness Conferences.

Other grants include:
Ø  Toledo Symphony Orchestra, $35,000
Ø  The Victory Center in Toledo, $35,000
Ø  National Alliance on Mental Illness of Greater Toledo, $30,000
Ø  St. Elizabeth’s Health Center in Tucson, $25,000
Ø  HOPE, Inc. in Tucson, $24,875
Ø  National Alliance on Mental Illness of Southern Arizona, $15,000
Ø  Toledo Museum of Art, $15,000
Ø  University of Arizona Department of Psychiatry, $12,000
Ø  UApresents, $12,000
Ø  Neighborhood Properties, Inc. in Toledo, $10,000
Ø  Arizona Theatre Company In Tucson, $7,500
Ø  Invisible Theatre in Tucson $7,500
Ø  Tucson Museum of Art, $7,500
Ø  Tucson Symphony Orchestra, $7,500
Ø  Mexico Dental Mission, $5,000
Ø  ProMedica Academic Health Center Corporation in Toledo, $5,000
Ø  The Un-Scripted Theater Company, $5,000
For a complete listing of Lovell Foundation partners and funding, visit www.lovellfoundation.org.