Club debuts Nationals Philanthropies during pandemic shutdown

The Nationals on Thursday announced the debut of Nationals Philanthropies, a new broad-based philanthropic organization which replaces the Washington Nationals Dream Foundation.

The community initiatives Nationals Philanthropies are currently working on include the NATS4GOOD Community Response Fund, the Youth Baseball Academy and Get Shift Done DMV.

Tal Alter, the chief executive officer of Nationals Philanthropies and the Youth Baseball Academy, introduced the new organization during a Zoom call Thursday morning.

"We are building the organization on the relationship between the baseball team, its fans and the broader community that each represents," Alter said. "As part of what we do is the simple purpose that we hope it will have a resounding impact to foster a culture of philanthropy in the DMV.

"We are using the hashtag #NATS4GOOD. Nationals philanthropies will raise funds in order to direct coordinated investments for services benefiting the community at large."

Nationals Philanthropies was to begin this season anyway, but because of recent events, the #NATS4GOOD Community Response Fund was established in response to the coronavirus pandemic.

The specific intention for these grants from the fund are to assist in providing food, health and human services to those in need. This overall size of the fund is currently $310,000. The KPMG Foundation donated more than $50,000 to the fund.

The fund has made grants to the Mid-Atlantic Food Resilience and Access Coalition, Martha's Table, DC Central Kitchen and the Inova Health Foundation.

The Nats Youth Baseball Academy is closed, but is offering grab-and-go dinners for children and residents of the Fort DuPont community every weeknight from 2-6 p.m. Those meals are prepared at Nationals Park by the World Central Kitchen. They are also offering heavily discounted prepackaged produce every Wednesday from 3-6 p.m. at a local farmer's market in Ward 7.

Further, a league-wide initiative called the Home Plate Project, which provides four million meals, is administered by each of the 30 Major League Baseball clubs and coordinated through over 50 MLB players to help fight childhood hunger.

Nationals catcher Yan Gomes, Big League Impact and Teammates for Kids have given a $24,000 grant to support the food access program at the Youth Baseball Academy. The grant funds approximately 11,500 meals over a seven-week period for the nightly meals and fruit produce distributed via the academy.

Alter said another great initiative that was has done well in the Dallas area and brought to the DMV is a program called Get Shift Done.

Get Shift Done will coordinate, schedule and pay adversely affected hourly workers in the hospitality industry to work shifts for local food access providers.

"The program was created to fit the gap between the reduction of volunteers in a time where there is an increased need among food banks and other nonprofits," Alter said. "The program would then match up that work force need with those from the food service industry seeking supplemental income."

Interested restaurants, nonprofit partners and individuals can visit Get Shift Done DMV to sign up.

Alter also recognized founding investors that covered the cost of the program and the costs of shift work, providing budget relief: The J. Willard and Alice S. Marriott Foundation, Capital One, the A. James & Alice B. Clark Foundation, and the Magnum Family Foundation.