Grants
Our Grants
It is our honor to help our fellow San Diegans through our grant program. Below are some of our grant recipients throughout the years. To protect their privacy, first and last names may not be displayed.
To request a grant, click the “Request a Grant” button.
Foster and Displaced Children in Court
Foster and Displaced Children in Court
The Rob Benzon Foundation once again provided more than 500 new stuffed animals to comfort the scores of scared children in our county’s juvenile dependency court rooms. The children are there for hearings which include taking kids away from their parents, and placing kids in foster homes after abuse or neglect. Each child gets to pick out a stuffed animal for comfort during the hearing and then is surprised with the news that they keep their new friend and take it home.
Grant made July 2014
H.P.
H.P.
H.P. is a 22 y/o, newly diagnosed, gender fluid individual who had ran into very tough times. He had little family support and gender fluidity presented challenges for housing and employment. His landlord illegally evicted him from his apartment without any notice and immediately changed the locks. H.P. had been able to scrape up the last of his money to pay for a hotel room for three days but would have been back on the streets and homeless without quick assistance coordinated by his caseworker and paid for by RBF to get him temporary housing. H.P. is a very motivated and resourceful person and the Foundation was glad to be able to help H.P. with a short-term emergency need to keep him from homelessness and give him the bridge he needed back to safe self-sufficiency.
Grant made May 2014
Margaret I.
Margaret I.
Margaret I.is a 75 year old woman who has the diagnosis of chronic respiratory failure. She is on constant oxygen and is chair bound. She is slight of build. The chair she has is very uncomfortable and she is starting to have painful skin breakdown on her heels and her elbows. The chair makes her back hurt and she has difficulty getting in and out of the chair. Rob Benzon Foundation was able to get her a medically recommended chair that enabled Margaret to get in and out with creating sores and pain and helped provide much needed comfort to this lovely woman.
Grant made April 2014
PFLAG Scolarship Fund
PFLAG Scolarship Fund
Donation made for the PFLAG Rob Benzon Scholarship Fund which is awarded to a bisexual, transgender, lesbian or gay student planning to attend a post-secondary educational institution. The purpose of the PFLAG scholarships is to recognize outstanding LGBT seniors in high school, undergraduate and graduate students, to encourage them to continue post-secondary education, and to promote a positive image of LGBT youth. The recipients this year were Gabriel Figuroa & Juan Carlos Ortega.
Grant made March 2014
Felicitas G.
Felicitas G.
Rob Benzon Foundation was able to give 72 year Felicitas and her family comfort and relief in her final months of life. Felicitas has a terminal diagnosis of respatory failure, a history of stroke, heart problems, and renal failure. She was a pre-school teacher for most of her life and her husband was a maintenance man. Felicitas could not afford the breathing machine that would give her comfort and help her sleep through the night. RBF stepped in and quickly covered the cost of the machine to get Felicitas immediate help. Felicitas died peacefully a few months later. Her lovely family was struggling with how to cover her medical bills. With the help of her amazing social worker who negotiated the bill down, Rob Benzon Foundation was able to help the family so they were left with memories of Felicitas and not medical bills.
Grant made January 2014
UCSD Mother, Child and Adolescent HIV Program
UCSD Mother, Child and Adolescent HIV Program
Provided support to help with a holiday celebration bringing a meal and small gifts to children and mothers struggling with HIV. The donation helped UCSD bring much needed support and holiday cheer to the families living with chronic illness and stigma.
Grant made December 2013
Special Delivery
Special Delivery
Rob Benzon Foundation answered the call to improve the nutritional status and quality of life of members of the LGBT community living with life-threatening illnesses in San Diego through the provision of medically-appropriate meals. RBF provided a targeted grant to help Special Delivery support its Home-delivered Meal Program; specifically, special-diet meals. Our grant provided three home-delivered special-diet meals per day for approximately 30 clients with AIDS, heart disease, cancer, kidney disease and other life-threatening illnesses for about three weeks.
Grant made November 2013
Mama’s Kitchen
Mama’s Kitchen
Mama’s Kitchen pantry service provides a once a month shopping opportunity for San Diego County residents affected by HIV/AIDS who are able to prepare meals and whose income is less than $1,400 per month. Qualified clients visit Mama’s Pantry and select their own non-perishable items such as cereals, pastas and canned goods from a wide selection. A limited number of perishable items, including meat, dairy, fresh fruit, and bread, are also available. This October, Mama’s kitchen experienced a huge demand on their pantry program and was in need of emergency assistance to help meet the need for service. RBF provided substantial assistance so that Mama’s Kitchen Pantry remained opened and stocked for all the clients who rely on this critical resource.
Grant made October 2013
K-9 Friendly Visitors
K-9 Friendly Visitors
The Foundation gave a grant for to help provide a vehicle to K-9 Friendly Visitors so they could get the service dogs to local special needs children in need. K-9 is a wonderful local non-for-profit that is the only organization of its kind that uses specially trained dogs to increase self esteem and academic excellence in the deaf, hard of hearing and special needs students directly in the San Diego school system.
Grant made September 2013
Foster and Displaced Children in Court
Foster and Displaced Children in Court
The Rob Benzon Foundation once again provided more than 500 new stuffed animals to comfort the scores of scared children in our county’s juvenile dependency court rooms. The children are there for hearings which include taking kids away from their parents, and placing kids in foster homes after abuse or neglect. Each child gets to pick out a stuffed animal for comfort during the hearing and then is surprised with the news that they keep their new and friend and take it home.
Grant made September 2013