K21 Recommends 'Catastrophic Illness Fund'

Its coffers are flush from the proceeds of the sale of the Kosciusko Community Hospital and the investment income it has generated to date.

Now, the Kosciusko 21st Century Foundation's grant committee has begun in earnest to develop the criteria by which the foundation will share the wealth with the community.

The committee's brainstorming session Thursday concluded with one concrete monetary recommendation for assisting with nonmedical expenses relating to catastrophic illnesses.

The recommendation to the full board calls for a $100,000 allocation for one year from the date of the board's approval. Qualifying expenses would include housing, utilities, child care or travel. Neither expenses covered by medical insurance nor other non-covered KCH bills would qualify for assistance.

Two other recommendations approved by the committee include:

• Foundation grants would be limited to meeting unmet health needs for the first year. Wellness and fitness requests would take a lower priority.

The consensus of the committee was the foundation should concentrate exclusively on health issues and programs.

"We need to to keep a pretty narrow focus, at least in the beginning," said Ken Davidson. "Once you broaden out the scope of what you're going to support, it's very hard to bring it back in."

• Provision of indigent dental care for children. Ideally, the service would be provided by an independent agency, with the bills being paid by the foundation.

"We need to find an organization that is providing a service and support them," said Pat Oppenheim, foundation president. "And where there isn't a service being provided, we could provide the venture capital to help it get started. But we really don't need or want to be running the program."

The committee also agreed upon some initial parameters it will use when considering grant requests:

• Requests must be for the support of health or medical purposes. Requests for support of recreational or sports activities will not be entertained.

• The support being sought isn't offered by another organization, such as the Red Cross, American Cancer Care Foundation, etc.

• Venture capital grants will be considered for nonprofit organizations to start providing needed health services not currently available.