Category Archives: Blog

Blog, Charities

Jack’s Basket

Posted on by Lisa Mattson

Amount Awarded: $32,404 ($19,268 member donations + $13,136 Schulze matching donation)

Jack’s Basket is a non-profit organization that’s mission is to celebrate babies born with Down syndrome. We strive to ensure that every new and expectant parent is provided resources and avenues of support within the community. We aim to educate medical providers on how to discuss the diagnosis in an unbiased way in hopes that the birth of a child with Down syndrome is celebrated like any other.

Learn more about this organization at: www.jacksbasket.org

Jacks’s Basket was the selected charity for September, 2017.

Blog, Charities

Mobile Loaves Twin Cities

Posted on by Lisa Mattson

Amount Awarded: $31,521 ($18,907 member donations + $12,614 Schulze matching donation)

Providing food and clothing while respecting human dignity, Saint Joan of Arc Mobile Loaves & Fishes (ML&F) volunteers serve homeless and working poor individuals and families. Armed with fresh warm sandwiches, fruit, needed toiletries and socks, the ML&F catering truck ventures out into the community nearly every night of the week to serve our brothers and sisters in need. The truck serves meals four or five days or evenings each week. MLF is part of SJA’s Sustainable Partnerships program and operates jointly with Knox Presbyterian Church in South Minneapolis. Together, we are the Twin Cities franchise of Mobile Loaves & Fishes based in Austin, Texas, mlf.org.

Learn more about this organization at: www.saintjoanofarc.org

Mobile Loaves Twin Cities was the selected charity for June, 2017.

Blog, News

Making a Difference – The Power of 100 Twin Cities

Posted on by Lisa Mattson

Published in North Oaks Living magazine – March, 2017

Edited by Tara Myers

North Oaks resident Lisa Mattson loves spreading the word about The Power of 100 – Twin Cities, an organization she founded with several women from North Oaks and the Shoreview area in 2012. Lisa explains, “The Power of 100 is a giving circle for women who are interested in collectively giving to charities in our local communities. Any charity that is a 501(c)3 is eligible to benefit from donations given by members of The Power of 100 – Twin Cities.”

So how did The Power of 100 get started?

“This group of women had volunteered together for years at our children’s schools and sports associations,” Lisa says. “As our children got older, we were looking for new ways to support our local community.” A group got together and started brainstorming about ways to collectively give back. Through a quick Google search, the ladies learned about a group in Ohio called 100+ Women Who Care that was bringing women together to help address the financial needs of charities in their area. Lisa and her group used their model to create The Power of 100 – Twin Cities in 2012. “I am delighted to be a founding member of an organization that has such a simple, powerful, and effective concept!” Lisa shares. Since then, The Power of 100 has fostered the development of three new chapters in the Twin Cities; in addition to their group in the east metro, there are now chapters in Eden Prairie, Lake Minnetonka, and Maple Grove.

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Blog, News

Local women pool their cash to power philanthropy

Posted on by Lisa Mattson

This article from PioneerPress.com

Maja Beckstrom, Pioneer Press

Four times a year, a group of women gather in Shoreview and get to feel like big-time philanthropists.

They use a fishbowl.

The women are members of The Power of 100 Twin Cities Women Who Care.

It’s a nonexclusive club. You simply show up, learn about organizations in the community, vote and write a check for $100.

On a Monday evening in early December, dozens of women sat around tables in a hotel banquet room. A few women in the corner holding glasses of white wine playfully pounded a table in a spontaneous drum roll as the names of three nonprofits were pulled from a glass bowl.

The name on the first slip was Alexandra House, a battered-women’s shelter in Blaine. The second was Theresa Listening Center, a program for homeless women in St. Paul. The third was Second Stork, a volunteer effort to give free diapers to needy new moms.

At the end of the hour, one would be selected to receive the total of all those $100 donations, plus a matching grant from Best Buy founder Richard Schulze.

“When you multiply your money, the impact is so much greater,” said member Lisa Mattson of Shoreview. “And there is this wonderful synergy in the room of women who all have an interest in doing something for someone besides themselves.”

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Blog, News

The Power of 100 Grows 40% and Donates $165,780 to Local Charities

Posted on by Lisa Mattson

In only three years since the organization’s founding, charitable donations from “The Power of 100 – Twin Cities Women Who Care” now total $165,780 to local charities. The organization, founded in September 2012, to-date has raised contributions for 12 local charities, including its most recent donation of $20,725 in August to University of MN Foundation – Project Stealth.

Project Stealth is re-engineering cancer therapy. Research being conducted by Dr. Daniel A. Saltzman at the University of Minnesota is focusing on a new and potentially breakthrough therapy in the fight against cancer. This therapy uses altered or “attenuated” salmonella bacteria to deliver anti-cancer drugs directly to tumor cells. The early phases of this research have been highly successful, but before this therapy can be used to treat cancer patients, more work and research needs to be done. “Our advancement in this important cancer research is moved forward by support of individuals that want to see their contributions go directly to our lab and our results, “said Dr. Saltzman.  Continue reading →

Blog, News

Women leaders raise powerful funds for local charities, build relationships

Posted on by Lisa Mattson

This article from Presspubs.com.

Greg Lucid, Shoreview Press

SHOREVIEW – Raising money in support of local charities has been the driving force behind an initiative launched by a group of women.

Since 2012 women in the Shoreview area have been pooling their funds to support worthy local charities. Shoreview resident Lisa Mattson is one of 10 women who founded The Power of 100, an organization designed to support a select set of Minnesota area charities.  Co-founder Pam Maccani told her friends of an idea she had found for a giving group, where every member of a group gave a certain amount of money to a single charity or cause. “It’s just a way to give back and a way to feel like you’re making a contribution to a charity serving our community,” Maccani said.

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Blog, News

Richard M. Schulze Will Provide Matching Funds Through Pilot Program

Posted on by Leanne Woodland

In the two years since the organization’s founding, charitable donations from “The Power of 100 – Twin Cities Women Who Care” have exceeded $100,000 to local charities. The organization, founded in September 2012, to-date has raised $100,230 for nine local charities, including its most recent donation in September to “Cars for Neighbors.” Cars for Neighbors, founded in 1999 under the name “Free To Be,” is a non-profit organization that assists Anoka County residents who are challenged with transportation issues.
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