LinuxWorld Award to Dot.Che

Tucson, AZ-- January, 2003: The Donor and Community Exchange (dot.che) software that Ephibian built for the Arizona Community Foundation (ACF) was honored as one of six finalists in the Best Open Source Project category at the LinuxWorld Conference and Expo Awards for Excellence at New York’s Javits Center.

The Ephibian-built software, which powers the community foundation’s website, www.azfoundation.org, electronically connects donors who want to make charitable gifts with grantseeking nonprofit organizations. Dot.che greatly simplifies the grantmaking process. Special features include up-to-the-minute data for donors who want research to match community needs with their specific charitable interests, as well as valuable tools for professional advisors working with donor clients. The site’s online grant process saves time and resources for the community foundation, while eliminating the mounds of paperwork generally associated with requests for grant proposals and streamlining the actual granting procedure.

The Arizona Community Foundation is a statewide nonprofit organization with four regional office serving 11 affiliate community foundations. Established in 1978, ACF has an endowment of more than $300 million, and in 2002 it awarded $19.3 million in grants to other nonprofit organizations. While most its funds support activities in Arizona , grants can be made nationally as well.

Pioneered in Arizona, a second dot.che was recently completed for the Triangle Community Foundation serving Wake, Durham, Orange and Chatham counties in North Carolina.