About Waccamaw Community Foundation
Build & maintain sustainable philanthropy.
Focus Areas
Community developmentEducation / ScholarshipsHuman servicesDisaster reliefArts & cultureEnvironment / ConservationHealth
Who They Fund
local neighborhoods and community-led organizationspeople with unmet basic needs (low-income/resident populations)environmental nonprofit projects and stewardsphilanthropic organizations / nonprofit sector (administrative recipients)
Funding Style
About Waccamaw Community Foundation
Waccamaw Community Foundation’s recent giving shows a blend of philanthropy infrastructure, community support, and scholarship funding, with a very large 2024 grant to South Carolina Christian Foundation for philanthropy and administrative support. That same pattern appears in other sizable awards that help local nonprofits carry out services in Horry County and nearby parts of coastal South Carolina. The foundation also backs human needs organizations such as Samaritan’s Purse in Boone, North Carolina, and Veterans Welcome Home and Resource Center in Little River, South Carolina, while continuing to support place-based institutions in Myrtle Beach, Conway, and Pawleys Island. Its grantmaking reflects a local community foundation model: scholarships, disaster relief, basic needs, education, arts, environment, religion, and neighborhood development all appear in the portfolio. Beyond direct service grants, the foundation uses flexible funding and administrative support to strengthen nonprofit capacity and sustain community initiatives. The mix of large awards and smaller scholarships suggests a funder that supports both long-term civic infrastructure and immediate local needs.
What Waccamaw Community Foundation Funds
A clear theme in the portfolio is support for basic human needs. Waccamaw Community Foundation gave $157,500 to Meals on Wheels of Horry County for human needs, and it also made a $94,088 grant to United Way of Horry County Inc for the same broad area. In neighborhood and community development, the foundation awarded $75,000 to the City of Conway for local development work and $50,000 to the Waccamaw Regional Transportation Authority for community infrastructure. Education is another consistent area: the University of South Carolina Columbia received $51,704, while the foundation also maintains scholarship programs for students in Horry, Georgetown, and Williamsburg counties. Arts and environmental work appear as well, including grants to the Franklin G Burroughs-Simeon B Chapin Art Museum and Brookgreen Gardens.
How Waccamaw Community Foundation Gives
Typical grants cluster tightly around the low five figures, with a p25 of $9,062, a median of $10,880, and a p75 of $25,000. At the same time, the foundation makes occasional much larger awards, including several six-figure grants in the recent record. The portfolio includes both recurring recipients and one-off awards: organizations such as First Presbyterian Church of Myrtle Beach and All Saints Church - Waccamaw appear more than once, as do Georgia Tech Foundations Inc and City of Conway. Waccamaw Community Foundation is a community foundation, and its structure includes both discretionary grantmaking and named scholarship funds. One active program, the Waccamaw Community Trust Fund (Competitive), accepts unsolicited applications; other programs use nominations or specific eligibility rules.
Financial Snapshot
Annual Giving
$3.3M
Total Assets
$38.4M
Total Revenue
$5.6M
Total Expenses
$3.5M
Typical Grant Size
Most grants fall between $9K and $25K, with a median of $11K.
25th Percentile
$9K
Median
$11K
75th Percentile
$25K
Geographic Reach
Local12 states funded
Funding intensity
LowHigh
Headquarters
Leadership
MICHAEL L MANCUSO
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