By Marge Nichols, ESC Consultant
and former Director of Research,
United Way
As all nonprofit leaders know first-hand, times are
tough. Funders and donors have less money to give, and they are constantly
making tough decisions about how to spend their money. There is one important
ingredient to any proposal that will help you convince them they should be
spending their money on your organization—data.
With a little research, you can arm your proposals
and presentations with information that can’t be ignored: recent facts and
figures about the problem and the population your program will address. The
right data will get donors’ attention and help sell your message.
This article provides some easy tips for how to
find and use data to make your proposal stand out among the rest in these
challenging times.
Sources for Fresh
Data
The Census Bureau American Communities Survey collects comprehensive
population data that isn’t available anywhere else. Good news: yearly data is
available for larger cities, and a moving 3-year average for smaller
communities, is available for L.A.
County. Bad news: The census survey
data is released about two years late (i.e. 2006 survey was released in
September 2008 and 2007 will be released in September 2009).
Healthy
City is
a relatively new resource providing an online community service and policy
research tool for all of Los Angeles
County.
Healthy
City provides unprecedented access to
the largest database of community resources and localized demographic and health
data on a cutting-edge GIS mapping platform.
Healthy
City displays data for many
geographic areas in the county, including ZIP Code, city, service planning area
(SPA) and SPA sub-areas, L.A. County Health Districts and many
more.
California
Employment Development Department provides continually
updated labor force data, which is particularly useful in today’s economic
climate. Good news: monthly unemployment (and of course employment) data for
most cities in the county. Bad news: These unemployment estimates don’t include
under-employed or discouraged workers.
On the California Department of Education
website, the Dataquest tool provides a wide variety of public school data,
including enrollment, graduation rate, testing results and many other items.
Data are available by school, school district and the county as a whole.
The most recent source of subcounty data
on poverty is a United Way
study from 2008: United
Way of Greater Los Angeles, “Geographic Divides in
Los Angeles
County: Demography, Income and
Housing,” Research Brief, 2008. Also available is the 2007 Zip Code
Databook.
Additional data sources:
- California Department of Social Services,
California Work Opportunity and Responsibility to Kids (CalWORKS), Los Angeles
County Reports, July 2005 – 2007. Click here.
- University of
California at Los Angeles, Center
for Health Policy Research,
California Health Interview Study,
2005. Click
here.
- United Way of Greater
Los Angeles, Zip Code Databook,
2007. Click
here.
- California Child
Care Resource & Referral Network, The California
Child Care Portfolio: Los Angeles
County by the Numbers,
2007. Click
here.
- Los Angeles County Children’s Council.
Good Health. Click
here.
- Children Now.
California Report
Card 2009: A new 56-page report presenting a clear
case for prioritizing smart investments in children's health and
education. Click
here.
- Children Now.
California Report Card 2008: The
State of the State’s Children and 2007 California County Data Book. Click here.
- California Department of Public Health
provides yearly birth and death data by zip code. Click here.
In these difficult economic times, the
right data from research or evaluation studies about issues addressed by your
program can make all the difference in the success of your next proposal or
presentation. This information is not only very helpful to you as you craft your
message, but will also help focus your target audience on your objectives. Be
sure to always provide specific references for studies cited.
