Our Work In The Region

Giving and living in greater Rochester's eight counties offers promise for future generations

Your Community Foundation benefits a broad geographic region, just as our legal name implies:  Rochester Area Community Foundation.

Understandably, our ties to Monroe County, where we were founded in 1972, are very strong. But our  impact on the rest of the region — Genesee, Livingston, Ontario, Orleans, Wayne counties and, just recently, Yates and Seneca counties — reflects a widespread drive to make communities better for the people who live and work there.

Our communities have benefitted from the generosity of hundreds of local philanthropists who share our concern for the future. In Wayne County, for example, the estate of businesswoman Jeanette "Nettie" Bullis was instrumental in the establishment of the Wayne County Community Endowment, as well as the Bullis Fund. Roxanne Marshall, a retired Brighton librarian who was raised in Batavia, established the multi-million-dollar Muriel H. Marshall Fund for the Aging, which has awarded nearly $4 million in grants to help seniors live independently in Genesee County.

This year, summer and year-round residents of Yates County have created the Yates Community Endowment, to pave the way for a brighter future in the Finger Lakes communities within that county's borders.

These community philanthropists and many more have enabled the Community Foundation to distribute more than $285 million in grants since 1972.