A $115,000 grant will connect Northern Kentucky social service agencies through a shared digital platform for the first time, with Florence-based FIESTA NKY among the organizations already testing the system.
Horizon Community Foundation announced Aug. 13, that its 2026 Community Impact Fund award will go to the Northern Kentucky Social Services Transformation Project, a collaboration led by the Safety Net Alliance of Northern Kentucky. The Northern Kentucky Area Development District is serving as fiscal agent.
The money will expand CareSuite, a client management platform being piloted in partnership with United Way of Greater Cincinnati. The tool lets caseworkers at different agencies share intake information and track whether a client actually received help after being referred somewhere else, a feature called "closed-loop" referrals. Right now, most NKY nonprofits use separate systems that cannot talk to each other.
Five organizations are already piloting CareSuite: Brighton Center, Faith Community Health Network, FIESTA NKY, Gateway Community and Technical College and Erlanger-Elsmere Independent School District. The project aims to grow to 20 organizations and reach roughly 49,000 Northern Kentucky residents each year.
Florence connection
FIESTA NKY, located at 7530 US 42 in Florence, was founded in January 2024 by Theresa Cruz to serve the region's growing Hispanic community. The nonprofit runs the area's only culturally relevant food pantry and offers ESL classes, workforce development and community events. Cruz told Florence City Council at an Aug. 19, 2025, special meeting that 75 percent of FIESTA's volunteers are families previously served by the organization.
The grant dollars will fund partner training, data integration, development of a Community Resource Impact Dashboard for tracking regional needs and service gaps, and project management.
"By making one significant grant this year, we wanted to support a project with the potential to create lasting, region-wide change," Nancy Grayson, president and CEO of Horizon Community Foundation, said in the announcement. "This collaboration brings organizations together around shared tools, better data and a more coordinated approach to serving Northern Kentucky residents."
The single large award marks a shift for Horizon. When the foundation opened the 2026 grant cycle in November 2025, Grayson said the fund would move toward fewer, larger collaborative grants rather than several smaller awards. Since 2017, the Community Impact Fund has invested $632,500 in nonprofits across Boone, Campbell and Kenton counties.
Jared Mueller, Safety Net Alliance program implementation and operations manager at the NKY Area Development District, said the project aims to remove barriers for families in crisis by equipping agencies with tools to coordinate and share client services.
What's next
No timeline has been announced for when the 20-organization expansion will be complete or when the dashboard will launch. Horizon Community Foundation's annual Nonprofit Awards Luncheon, a separate event, is scheduled for Sept. 29 from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. at St. Elizabeth Training & Education Center in Erlanger.
