Ireland Funds half way to $100 million target
Howard Lake | 8 May 2011 | News
The Ireland Funds has passed the half way mark in their $100 million ‘Promising Ireland’ fundraising campaign.
The campaign, which was launched publicly last year, aims to raise the $100 million by the end of 2013. In March the Funds announced that the Chairman of the American Ireland Fund, Loretta Brennan Glucksman, made a $3 million gift to Promising Ireland.
The Promising Ireland campaign is helping charitable and non profit organisations across the island of Ireland and Irish communities abroad meet the challenge of increased demand for their services at a time of major reductions in resources. The funds are being distributed as they are raised over the course of the campaign and a grants round which closed at the end of March received 800 applications.
The Promising Ireland campaign has already assisted over 200 projects since it began its quiet phase in 2009. Irish organisations facing financial hardship have confirmed the impact of the campaign.
“When we heard the money was coming in from the Ireland funds, the parents couldn’t believe it,” said a parent from the Saplings Schools for Children with Autism in Dublin, one of the beneficiaries of the Promising Ireland campaign.
This week Irish Taoiseach Enda Kenny was guest of honour at the annual dinner of the American Ireland Fund in the Lincoln Center, which will have an attendance of 1,200 and is expected to raise in excess of $2.5 million (€1.68 million) for various Irish charities.
www.irlfunds.org
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.