Photograph by Kathy De La Torre
Nancy Bussani, president and chief executive officer of the Mountain Winery, also serves as executive director of the Mountain Winery Kids Foundation, a newly formed nonprofit.
The Mountain Winery Starts A Foundation For Children
Poverty-level youngsters will be the beneficiaries
After-school is focus
By Kara Chalmers
There is a lot of wealth in the Silicon Valley, but many children here never see it. The nonprofit Mountain Winery Kids Foundation, launched in December after many months of planning, aims to help Santa Clara Valley schoolchildren who are at or below the poverty level realize their potential and break the poverty cycle.
Rather than create new programs, the foundation will support existing ones that work well.
The board of directors for the foundation includes two Mountain Winery owners and Colleen Wilcox, the superintendent of Santa Clara County Office of Education. The 10-member board held its first meeting Dec. 14 to narrow the focus of what kinds of children's programs it will fund in the coming year.
"We are focused on the time period from after school gets out to before parents get home, for kids who are at risk, in school districts where that is a problem," said Dave House, chairman of the Foundation.
House, a Saratogan who worked at Intel for 22 years and served as the chief executive officer of Bay Networks, said one of the goals of the foundation is to expose children to ideas that could lead them to successful careers.
"We're taking this a step at a time," he said, noting that he doesn't think the foundation will look to expand beyond this year's focus. "There are a number of programs that really focus on this time of the day and this set of kids. We're not eliminating anything, but this is going to keep us pretty busy for a while."
One component of the programs the foundation seeks to fund will be adult role models. House noted that, although some Valley residents enjoy jobs and wealth, part of the population does not have access to certain jobs, and thus there are children who don't have role models.
"They aren't exposed to engineers and lawyers. They don't see the opportunity for those careers and don't have the chance to let their abilities blossom," House said.
At the meeting Dec. 14, Wilcox said that after-school programs produced even better results for children when they included an adult role-model component. She said statistics show that children generally succeed when they have an adult role model in their lives.
"She [Wilcox] plays a key role in providing information to us about what's going on in schools and with young children," said Nancy Bussani, the foundation's executive director, who noted that the foundation sought out Wilcox because she has this expertise.
Board members have not yet decided on any specific programs, but Bussani said that they will research existing programs and will request proposals from those organizations in January. The foundation plans to provide grants of a minimum of $50,000 to one or more organizations from those researched. House said the board will be proactive, focused and "seek out what's happening here in the Valley."
Bussani, who is also the president and chief executive officer of the Mountain Winery, spent 10 years at San Jose State University as the director of contracts and grants and also was Santa Clara County's grant writer for housing and homeless activities for three years. Before coming to the winery, Bussani was president of Manex, a nonprofit consulting company for small businesses. She has three children: a 7-year-old and 5-year-old twins.
According to Bussani and House, the winery owners were the inspiration for the project. "There is a strong awareness that what the owners are enjoying in their own lives is not necessarily what all kids in Santa Clara Valley have," Bussani said of winery owners Bill Hirschman, Elizabeth Dodson, Jack Smith and Anaflor Smith. Bussani said they feel a responsibility to try to help those children see what opportunities are out there.
The foundation's first fundraising event was a formal New Year's Eve event at the winery. The four owners have already donated $20,000. They have also provided Bussani's time to spend on the foundation's business, as well as all startup funds. The board hopes to continue to raise money through events and individual donations, so that it can provide more grants with each future year.
For more information, call 408.741.2820.
Saratoga, California Since 1955
