Note: This is the third article in a four-part series on “Integrated Voter Engagement” in Kansas by Earl F. Glynn. The Sentinel is reprinting the series with Glynn’s permission.
This article highlights the Kansas nonprofits receiving funding to engage in IVE.
Part 1 reviewed the history of IVE and how it started in Kansas.
Part 2 looked at the healthcare foundations funding IVE in Kansas.
Part 4 reveals the impact of IVE on Kansas, and especially the “blueing” of Johnson County.
The map shows recipients of Kansas Health Foundation grants for Integrated Voter Engagement. (Thicker arrows mean larger grant amounts.)
Grant summary by healthcare foundation
Table of health care foundation Integrated Voter Engagement grants to numerous nonprofits in Kansas. Two organizations had different names at different times.
Other nonprofits receiving funding related to Integrated Voter Engagement from the healthcare foundations include:
- Community Health Center of Southeast Kansas / VotER Engagement, $4,500.
- Direct Action and Research Training Center, Inc [DART], $1.8 million.
- Kansas Interfaith Action, $50K.
- League of Women Voters Topeka/Shawnee County, $10K.
- Peace and Social Justice Education Fund, $35K.
- SoCe Neighborhood Action Foundation (The Neighboring Movement), $125K.
- Sunflower Community Action. $85K.
- URGE: Unite for Reproductive & Gender Equity (Riley County), $25K.
- Voter Rights Network of Wyandotte County, $100K.
Grants by IVE Phase
Phase 1: 2017-2020
Initial Phase 1 IVE approved grants from Kansas Health Foundation for 2017-2020. Some “capacity building” grants are not included.
Phase 2: 2021-2025
Phase2 IVE approved grants from Kansas Health Foundation for 2021-2025. Additional “capacity building” grants are not included.
Example nonprofits involved in IVE
Climate + Energy Project
Integrated Voter Engagement (IVE) is a systems-wide approach to foster civic engagement on climate action. Climate + Energy Project uses components of the IVE Wheel to build power in communities across Kansas.
The IVE Wheel captures the myriad aspects of Voter Engagement that help build long-term power across the state.
El Centro
The Voter Advocacy & Engagement program primarily works with anyone who will like to get engaged Johnson, Wyandotte, and Shawnee Counties …
Integrated Voter Engagement: which includes new voter registration and education. We can also assist with updated address, or registration information and requesting advance ballots as well as providing nonpartisan election information. The purpose of this area is to uplift the underrepresented voices in our communities through engaging and informing the neighborhood to enlighten the power that they have.
Kansas Appleseed
Integrated Voter Engagement in Southeast and Southwest Kansas
?Southeast and Southwest Kansas communities know their unique strengths and perspectives are integral to what makes Kansas the state it is. Despite this, communities in these regions experience some of the worst statistical indicators for health outcomes in the state, including some of the lowest levels of civic engagement and voter turnout. To address these issues, Kansas Appleseed launched our integrated voter engagement (IVE) campaigns in these regions of the state. Our work began in Southeast Kansas in 2017 and in Southwest Kansas in 2019.
Kansas Appleseed report on Integrated Voter Engagement
Kansas Rural Center
About the Integrated Voter Engagement Project
Since 2018, KRC has been involved in a statewide Integrated Voter Education project, aimed at improving economy, community, environment, and health in Kansas by strengthening civic engagement and public policy support that better incorporates Kansas farms and communities into the state’s healthy food supply chain.
Liberal Area Coalition for Families
During COVID in 2020 this group included voter registration and early voting information in both English and Spanish with each of the food and cleaning boxes they distributed:
“… we started a new food bank at the South Church of God,” [Kay] Burtzloff said, adding that it delivered 320 food boxes from June through September to a part of town that didn’t have a food bank for more than 10 years. “We have been including information in English and Spanish about voter registration or early voting opportunities plus census information in each of the food and cleaning boxes.”
MORE²
If the leaders [of] Gamaliel affiliate Metro Organization for Racial and Economic Equity (MORE²) have their way, Kansas City, Kansas, will become a model for voter engagement all over the country.
… a primary focus of MORE²’s Integrated Voter Engagement (IVE) efforts in the Kansas City area was changing the narrative around voting in communities of color, with particular emphasis on the importance of voting even when a constituent’s preferred candidate is unlikely to win.
KHF Capacity Building and Maintenance Grants
See Kansas Voting Data / Jake Lowen / GPS Impact on this page
See Blueprint Kansas Inc. doing business as KSVotes.org to register voters.
Sources and Limitations
Grant information was derived from online information and IRS 990s.
Two of the healthcare foundations provided online lists of grants and grantees. All three provided information about grants in online press releases.
- Kansas Health Foundation: Our Grantees. Older grants were found on this page in the Wayback Machine and sometimes through Google searches.
- REACH Healthcare Foundation: Where We Invest. Older Wayback Machine versions of page.
- Health Forward Foundation: Grant information was found from perhaps two dozen Google searches of the Health Forward site for particular names or terms in funding announcements and news releases (see example). Some information was only found in IRS 990s.
IRS 990s were not always helpful in identifying IVE grants since funding from press releases often did not match a particular yearly IRS filing, and sometimes a recipient received multiple grants including work besides IVE.
Part 4 reveals the impact of IVE on Kansas, and especially the “blueing” of Johnson County
