Sam Passmore (SP): You're right, we have been funding in this general area for some time, at least since the last program plan was approved in 1998. We've been pleased with the impact we have had over the last several years and with the performance of our grantees. So, I guess the big news about the new plan for the freshwater program area is that there are no big changes. We're making some modest revisions at the margins, but mostly, we're staying the course.
When we made the commitment to freshwater ecosystems several years ago, we started with the simple fact that we're based in Michigan and we care a lot about environmental issues in our home state. Every drop of water in Michigan drains into the Great Lakes -- we’re sitting in the middle of 20 percent of the world’s fresh water. For us, it just makes intuitive sense that some portion of our domestic environmental grantmaking be directed at the Great Lakes. But it’s more than a Michigan issue. Beyond Michigan -- regionally, nationally and globally -- the availability and management of fresh water is of great concern. Our work developing models for managing freshwater ecosystems will not only benefit the Lakes, but also be of use to other places in the world.
Another critical issue, both domestically and globally, is loss of biodiversity -- and given the interest in the Great Lakes it's natural for us to come at that from a fresh water perspective as well. When Mott was rethinking its domestic environmental grantmaking six years ago, we asked ourselves a series of questions: What areas in North America are rich in freshwater biodiversity? Where are there organizations in place dedicated to protecting these resources? Where can our dollars do the most good? When you ask that series of questions, the southeastern part of the country emerges as a tremendous opportunity.
Mott: What do you hope to accomplish with this new plan?
SP: In terms of strengthening the capacity of the environmental community -- which is one of our major objectives -- we hope the organizations focused on freshwater conservation are demonstrably stronger in terms of their staff, diversity of revenue and those kinds of internal capacities. We also hope to see them coordinate more effectively and add value to one another's work.
Another major objective focuses on policy reform in a handful of specific areas, one being state-level implementation of the Clean Water Act. We don’t want to see erosion of basic water quality standards in states where we make grants. We also hope to see advancement in specific areas like the control of storm water pollution and wetland preservation. On the water quantity side of the ledger, we hope to see many states in both regions begin to adopt new water management policies that meet society's water needs while also maintaining and restoring the natural flow of rivers and streams.
We've seen a lot of success in the work we've supported on the relicensing of hydropower facilities. The time has come to wind that down because most of the big relicensings in the Great Lakes and Southeast are done. As we do phase out this grantmaking, we want to see groups in place that will be able to monitor implementation of each completed license.
Finally, under our previous plan, we put a lot of effort into helping groups prioritize which freshwater ecosystems are most important to protect through site-based conservation work. Now we would like to shift more to helping groups do something to protect some of these places -- first by developing strategic action plans. We also want to invest directly in the protection of selected sites -- we don’t have a lot of money for this -- but we’ll do the best we can.
Mott: How long does it take to create a grantmaking plan at Mott, and what informs your thinking?
SP: The process for this plan began in the fall of 2004. When we developed our previous plan in 1998, we made a commitment to review things every six-to-eight years. We began this latest review by commissioning a handful of evaluations, which were finished by spring 2005. We spent most of 2005 absorbing the information and asking for input from grantees and peer funders.
After reviewing all the information, we concluded that the basic direction of our freshwater grantmaking was sound. We made a few minor adjustments and in September 2006, we presented the Trustees with a preview. We wanted to get their opinion -- take their temperature so to speak -- on where we were heading. Their reaction was positive, so we started writing. The result was approved this March.
Mott: How will you measure your progress over the next grantmaking arc?
SP: Our Trustees asked that we develop baselines for each of our program areas against which we measure our progress going into the future. Internally, we call our goals “anticipated outcomes,” and we try to create markers that are both aggressive and feasible.
In most cases, we ask our grantees to establish the baselines and we get their help in measuring progress. For instance, aggregated information collected by two grantees, River Network and the Land Trust Alliance, provides us with some helpful information on the environmental community as a whole. It's also fairly easy to ask our grantees to report back on their own progress in terms of organizational development and see how they are progressing.
Mott: If a strategy stalls, is it possible to make corrections or change the direction of your grantmaking?
SP: We have a fair amount of flexibility within our grantmaking plan. While we go into great depth with our Board of Trustees regarding our basic grantmaking directions, we also have annual reviews with Foundation management and Trustees, where we take a closer look at how the grantmaking is playing out. Based on our observations, grantee feedback and in some cases, expert opinion, if a strategy isn’t effective, we have the opportunity to make adjustments along the way.
Mott: What do you look for in potential grantees?
SP: It’s important to understand that our freshwater grantmaking budget has not grown in recent years. Given that constraint, and the Foundation’s tendency to work on complicated issues that take a fairly long time to resolve, there’s very little opportunity to bring in new grantees. We tend to invest in organizations over the long term.
That said, what we do look for in new grantees are proposals that are direct “bull’s eyes” in terms of our grantmaking objectives. We look for proposals that complement the work we’re already funding. We spend time getting acquainted with potential new grantees. We try to get to know the staff that will be involved in the proposed project and we try to gauge how well the organization relates to our other grantees. It’s important to us that within a cluster of grantmaking, our grantees are pulling together toward the same goal.