The Community Foundation of St. Clair County has launched an Equity & Inclusion Committee that will support underserved populations through grantmaking and community engagement. The community foundation announced that the committee’s first focus area will be supporting small businesses owned by people of color and women.

Through this effort, the committee utilized dollars from the foundation’s Thumbcoast COVID Response Fund to hire two small business consultants to advise and prepare businesses to apply for local, state and federal COVID-19 supports.

“The community foundation is going to