Our History

Our history

Our Founder and first Chairman was the late 10th Duke of Richmond and Gordon. He felt that Sussex needed a community foundation to support the smaller charities and community groups often overlooked when local people and companies thought about giving to charity. 

“It is, in my view, a scandal that there are areas in Sussex which are in the bottom 20% of national measures of social deprivation. At the same time, when local people or companies think of giving to charity they tend to think of large national bodies, because little is known about the small community groups on their doorsteps,” he said.

“Sussex Community Foundation has been set up to bridge this gap and to make it easy for local people and companies to give to local communities. The Foundation can make a significant difference to local quality of life. This is about local communities working together for the welfare of all for many years to come.”

A number of individuals, companies and trusts agreed to become founder donors and support the initial costs of setting up the Foundation in 2006. They were:

• The American Express Foundation
• BAA Communities Trust
• Barclays
• The Batty Charitable Trust
• The Ernest Kleinwort Charitable Trust
• The Henry Smith Charity
• West Sussex County Council
• 11 individual donors.

Sussex Community Foundation is now a thriving organisation with 15 members of staff. Since 2006 we have made grants worth £30m in support of 3,000 local groups and organisations.