Jesse Melgar, CIELO Fund Chair and IECF Board Chair
The Cultivating Inland Empire Latino Opportunity, or, CIELO Fund, at IECF announced $450,000 in its 2025 round of grant awards to 40 organizations serving the region. This brings the CIELO Fund’s total investment through its grantmaking, research, narrative change initiatives, and scholarship program to $1.4 million since it launched in 2022, accounting for nearly 100 grant awards to organizations in Riverside and San Bernardino counties. This year’s grantmaking also included awards in Imperial County for the first time ever.
“As families across Riverside and San Bernardino continue to face rising costs for essentials like housing, food, childcare, eldercare, and education, the CIELO Fund’s grantmaking this year is intentionally focused on supporting organizations that are directly addressing these pressing community needs,” said Jesse Melgar, Founder and Chair of the CIELO Fund and Board Chair of IECF. “With this third round of funding, we are proud to award $450,000 to 40 remarkable organizations that are helping families lead more enriched and fulfilling lives. Since launching the Fund in 2022, we have now invested nearly $1.4 million into grantmaking, research, narrative change, and scholarships that uplift the Inland Empire’s Latino community. Our commitment remains unchanged: to build a future where equity and opportunity are not the exception, but the expectation for everyone who calls our region home.”
The CIELO Fund has commissioned several reports from leading California universities to better understand the challenges facing the region, including its Latino residents. Last year, the Fund partnered with the UC Berkeley Possibility Lab and Institute of Governmental Studies to run a poll on the community’s ability to access essentials. It showed that nearly 80% of Latino voters report difficulty finding affordable housing. Some 70% expressed difficulty finding healthy, affordable food; 65% and 63% reported difficulty finding affordable eldercare and childcare, respectively; and 61% reported difficulty finding good jobs. These findings guided the Leadership and Grantmaking Committee’s grant decisions in 2025.
2024 CIELO Fund Grantees
“We are incredibly proud of the impact the CIELO Fund has achieved in such a short time. Through thoughtful grantmaking and deep partnerships, the Fund is helping to uplift and empower Latino-led and Latino-serving organizations across our region,” said Michelle Decker, President & CEO at the Inland Empire Community Foundation. “We look forward to building on this momentum and continuing to support our communities that need us most.”
The 2025 grantmaking included media partnerships to elevate positive regional narratives through original and effective programming. The CIELO Fund is continuing to support KVCR’s IE Latino Voices segment which it helped co-design and launch in 2023. It is also supporting an innovative partnership with the LA Times’ Latino vertical, DeLos, to support special coverage of the Inland Empire.
This year, the CIELO Fund is partnering with the UCLA Latino Policy and Politics Institute to commission a data profile on the Latino community’s experiences with vital conditions which will be released later during Latino Heritage Month.
The 2025 CIELO Fund Grantees:
- About Families, Inc.
- Arcoiris Collective Learning
- Asociación de Emprendedor@s
- Bordando Nuestras Raíces
- Casa Blanca Home of Neighborly Services
- Centro Del Inmigrante
- Chinampas
- Comite Civico del Valle
- Corona Relief Organization
- Danza Azteca Citlaltonac
- El Sol Neighborhood
- Garcia Center for the Arts
- High Desert Second Chance
- Huerta Del Valle
- IE Prism Collective
- Imperial Valley Equity & Justice
- Immigration Legal Educational & Advancement Project
- Inland Coalition for Immigrant Justice
- Inland Empire Future Leaders Program
- Inland Empire Immigrant Youth Collective
- Inland Empire Latino Lawyers Association
- Inland Equity Community Land Trust
- Inland Valley Recovery Services
- Ives Torres Foundation
- My Baby My Way Foundation
- Organización en California de Líderes Campesinas
- Providers Need Care
- San Bernardino Community Services
- Society of St. Vincent de Paul of St. Catherine de Alexandria
- The Codex Creation Committee
- The Exception
- The Key Nonprofit
- The Shella Foundation
- TODEC Legal Center
- Undocumented Student Services Center, CSUSB
- Unidos for La Causa
- Veterans Success Center, CSUSB
- We Are One United
Members of the CIELO Fund Leadership & Grantmaking Committee
For the first time ever, the committee decided to support two organizations in neighboring Imperial County as part of a rapid response fund to organizations doing frontline work.
The CIELO Fund was launched in 2022 as a Signature Fund celebrating the Foundation’s 80th Anniversary. The CIELO Fund’s mission is to uplift and invest in organizations, initiatives and ideas that are led by – and serve – Latinos in the Inland Empire.
The CIELO Fund Leadership and Grantmaking Committee is made of up of the following regional Latino leaders:
- Tomás Morales, President, CSU San Bernardino*
Elizabeth Romero, Assistant Vice Chancellor of Government and Community Relations, UC Riverside* - Diana Z. Rodriguez, Chancellor, San Bernardino Community College District*
- Sergio Bohon, Wells Fargo Advisors*
- Silvia Paz, Executive Director, Alianza Coachella Valley*
- Neftali Galarza, Director, Community Engagement & Partnerships, Office of the Riverside County Superintendent of Schools*
- Marco Robles, Latino Leader*
- Helen Iris Torres, Executive Director, Hispanas Organized for Political Equality (HOPE)*,
- Luz Gallegos, Executive Director, TODEC Legal Center, Inc.*,
- Angel Rodriguez, Associate Vice Chancellor of Government Relations & Strategic Communications, San Bernardino Community College District*
- Marisa Valdez Yeager, Associate Vice President for Government and Community Relations, CSU San Bernardino*
- Liliana Andriani, IECF Board Member and Chief Executive Officer, Angel Jewelers*, and
- Jesse Melgar, Senior Advisor at the UC Berkeley Possibility Lab*
*Titles listed for identification purposes only.
For more information or to donate to the CIELO Fund, visit www.iegives.org/cielofund
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