Empowering Communities Through Grassroots Initiatives

Evidence shows that an individual’s ZIP code has a greater impact on health than their genetic code. It also shows that the path to better health outcomes is not found in the doctor’s office, but rather, where people live, work, and play. In 2015, NYHealth launched Building Healthy Communities, a place-based initiative focused on investing in innovative, scalable approaches to help New Yorkers lead healthier lives in six neighborhoods across New York State. For these place-based initiatives to be successful, we knew that we had to work in tandem with community leaders.

ioby (an acronym for “in our backyards”—the positive opposite of NIMBY, “not in my backyard”) quickly emerged as a promising partner for this work, offering a grassroots complement to top-down policy efforts. ioby provides individuals who want to lead service projects in their neighborhoods with an online crowdfunding platform, paired with one-on-one fundraising coaching.

This brief examines the activities and outcomes of a series of grants NYHealth made to ioby in support of resident-led projects to improve health in neighborhoods across New York State in 2016, 2017, 2019, and 2020.

Over the course of four grants, NYHealth invested a total of $546,000, most of which was used to leverage $476,106 in citizen philanthropy through a 1:1 matching campaign—that’s $1 in funding provided for every $1 raised through crowdfunding. These grants also helped to provide resident leaders with resources to tackle some of their most pressing community health concerns; continue the matching funds campaign to advance hyperlocal ideas for building healthy communities; and respond to the impact of COVID-19. NYHealth’s partnership with ioby was an important step into the emerging field of grassroots grantmaking, where best practices are not yet a standard.

Read the brief.