Dear Friends of The Char and Chuck Fowler Family Foundation,

Being part of Northeast Ohio’s philanthropic community is a joy and a privilege. Through our responsive grantmaking over the last 12 years, The Char and Chuck Fowler Family Foundation has enjoyed engaging with dedicated individuals and organizations to pursue our shared goals. We are very appreciative of these people and organizations who work hard every day to improve our community, and we feel lucky to know them and support their work.

Since our inception as a foundation, we have strived to help create a more equitable Northeast Ohio. In 2012, we established our mission (or focus areas) to support the Arts, Education, and Adolescent and Young Adult Cancer. In 2021, we expanded our scope to include Criminal Justice and later announced a focus on Environmental Action and Reproductive Rights. Every grant disbursed by the Foundation made a unique difference, and we are proud that our foundation has invested more than $70 million in over 300 area nonprofits to help further their missions.

It was never our intent to continue our grantmaking work in perpetuity. We always understood that the Foundation’s assets would be spent over a short period of time to maximize our impact. This is why we enthusiastically distributed about 15% of our assets each year rather than the standard 5% mandated by law. Those who know our family understand we espouse the idea of disbursing wealth in a timely fashion into the hands of the changemakers where it belongs.

While we always anticipated an eventual end to our grantmaking, we could never have predicted the heartache we feel in preparing to let go of this part of our lives in the community, making this announcement so difficult.

Additional information will be available on our website. For now, and through the end of 2025, it’s “business as usual” in our responsive grantmaking and day-to-day work. We are committed to being a dedicated partner and serving as a resource for area organizations aligned with our strategic focus areas through our final 18 months of grantmaking.

Thank you for being a trusted partner of The Char and Chuck Fowler Family Foundation and for your steadfast dedication to helping make our community more accessible, vibrant, and equitable.

Sincerely,