Arizona
30th Season for Sharing raises nearly $1.6M; Funds granted to over 160 nonprofits
The 30th annual Season for Sharing campaign is officially a wrap, and every penny of the nearly $1.6 million donated by readers of The Arizona Republic has been granted to more than 160 nonprofits that serve Arizonans in need.
“For three decades, Season for Sharing has demonstrated how vital it is for Arizonans to help Arizonans,” said Greg Burton, executive editor of The Republic, azcentral.com and La Voz. “Because of the generosity of Arizona Republic readers and the dedication of scores of hard-working nonprofits, thousands of people will be nourished and sheltered and be able to obtain other critical support like health care and education.”
The Republic covers all administrative and promotional costs of Season for Sharing, meaning 100% of donations go to organizations helping people in Arizona communities.
The biggest grants from the 2023-24 Season for Sharing campaign went to groups that provide food and shelter.
Central Arizona Shelter Services received a $30,000 grant to support families experiencing homelessness. Child Crisis Arizona, St. Mary’s Food Bank, and the Arizona Food Bank Network each received $25,000. In addition, The Salvation Army, UMOM and Chicanos Por La Causa each received $20,000.
List of nonprofits: Here are the Season for Sharing grantees for 2023-24
“Generous contributions through Season for Sharing allow CASS to improve client empowerment programs, provide essential shelter services, toiletries and hygiene items, and ultimately offer a hand up to so many in our community who need us,” said Whitney Thistle, Central Arizona Shelter Services’ chief development officer.
The Arizona Pet Project was among this year’s first-time Season for Sharing grant recipients. The nonprofit received $7,500 to help people keep their pets despite challenging circumstances, like the need to cover a costly vet bill when a household budget is already stretched to the max.
“When people are facing difficult times, they’re making choices between themselves and their animals,” said CEO Leanna Taylor. “It really is about whole family care, and people consider their pets part of the family.”
Native American Fatherhood & Families Association, based in Mesa, is also a new Season for Sharing grantee. The nonprofit received $7,500 to support free parent education classes and workshops and family law and child support clinics.
Since 1993, Season for Sharing has raised more than $74 million to support nonprofits. Many groups that received Season for Sharing grants in the campaign’s first year were operating long before — and continue to serve Arizona communities.
The Arizona Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired, for instance, has been offering training and building community since 1947. The Phoenix nonprofit received $7,500 from the 2023-24 Season for Sharing campaign to help maintain programs that enrich the lives of older adults.
“The reason why this population is underserved is because it’s hard to provide services and costly,” said Michelle Hargreaves, the nonprofit’s chief development officer. “The Season for Sharing grant helps us elevate our level of services for these older adults so that they can continue to participate and engage and have a full life.”
Nonprofits help break down education barriers
Almost half of the 2023-24 Season for Sharing campaign donations were granted to groups that support young people. Many do so by providing educational opportunities.
Audubon Southwest, which received $7,500, is one of several Season for Sharing grantees that make field trips and other hands-on learning activities more accessible for students.
“These funds support our outdoor learning education programs, which connect students and families with science and nature right here in Phoenix,” said Katie Weeks, Audubon Southwest’s director of community education. “We offer free field trips and classroom visits to Title I schools that allow students to get outside and explore with birds, wildlife, rivers and more.”
Several Season for Sharing nonprofits, including the Arizona Friends of Foster Children Foundation, The Black Theatre Troupe, and Arizona Recreation Center for the Handicapped, have committed to using their grants to create spaces where young people can explore the arts and other extracurricular activities. All three of these groups received $7,500.
Other Season for Sharing grantees work to ensure kids have what they need to thrive in school. Back to School Clothing Drive, based in Phoenix, received $10,000 to help students from low-income households and students living in shelters or foster care.
“Each summer, we give thousands of children new clothes, shoes, backpacks, school supplies, dental screenings and fluoride rinses, and books. We also put on a STEM camp for some of the older students where they can assemble a laptop they get to keep,” said Krissy Miskovsky, the nonprofit’s director of strategic initiatives. “We wouldn’t be able to meet the rising needs without the funding that we — and the nonprofits we partner with — get from Season for Sharing.”
Ensuring the well-being of Arizona’s older adults
About a quarter of this year’s Season for Sharing nonprofits work to improve the quality of life of older Arizonans.
Aunt Rita’s Foundation, based in Phoenix, is a first-time grantee. It received $7,500 for its regular gathering of people 50 and older living with HIV. The social and support group helps reduce isolation and promote community, according to the nonprofit.
Ballet Arizona and Scottsdale Arts will use their $7,500 Season for Sharing grants for tailored arts programming. Ballet Arizona offers dance classes through its Creative Aging program, which helps older adults express themselves creatively and improve strength and flexibility. The dance company also provides the Dance for Parkinson’s Disease program, which teaches people with the disease and their caregivers ways to manage physical and emotional symptoms. Scottsdale Arts offers Memory Lounge events — arts-oriented learning opportunities for adults with dementia and their careers.
Most Season for Sharing nonprofits that work with older adults will use their grant funding to provide meals, housing and other supportive social services. Benevilla, based in Surprise, will use its $10,000 to help ensure older adults and people with disabilities in the West Valley have support that allows them to live independently.
“The Benevilla Home Services program is much more than just picking up groceries or driving someone to the doctor,” said Sara Villanueva, Benevilla’s vice president of donor relations. “The positives of the relationships built between the members and their volunteers are truly invaluable.”
Reach the reporter at alexis.waiss@gannett.com.
Arizona
Arizona’s Rugged Wilderness Area Has Gorgeous Mountain Trails And Scenic Camping Spots – Islands
While those who haven’t spent a lot of time exploring Arizona may associate the Grand Canyon State with towering saguaro cacti and endless stretches of barren, moon-like landscapes, that description, though accurate, does not tell the complete story. Because located within the Tonto and Coconino National Forests is 252,500 acres of rugged wilderness that, in addition to cacti and desert, also includes pine forests, snow-dusted mountain peaks, and the Verde River, Arizona’s only designated Wild River Area.
Called the Mazatzal Wilderness Area, and spanning from the brush-covered Sonoran Desert to the tip of the 7,903-foot Mazatzal Peak and beyond, the area became a designated wilderness in 1940. It has since become known for its diverse, rugged scenery that includes steep ridges, narrow canyons, riparian habitats, and 240 miles of hiking trails, many of which are too craggy and steep for mountain bikes and horses. The trails are gorgeous, however, offering sweeping forest and mountain views as well as several scenic camping spots along creeks and ridgelines of wildflowers. Mazatzal, which gets its name from an Aztec word that means “land inhabited by deer,” is home to mule deer and whitetails as well as bald eagles, river otters, bears, and kit foxes, among other wildlife.
Mazatzal is unique in that it combines a rich network of diverse ecosystems into one expansive wilderness area, allowing you to swim in a cactus-lined river or cool off in an icy mountain waterfall. Just two hours from Phoenix, Mazatzal offers access to remote wilderness you can experience without having to venture too far from the comforts of urban life.
Mazatzal Wilderness Area is a backpacker’s paradise
The more than 40 hiking trails at Mazatzal offer breathtaking Tonto National Forest scenery full of unforgettable wildlife and panoramic views. “…This ‘secret’ area has some of the most beautiful, interesting, fascinating geography, geology, flora and fauna to be found anywhere in the high Sonora Desert,” writes a reviewer on TripAdvisor. “You’re almost guaranteed to see not a single other person for your entire hike, but you’ll see birds, snakes, lizards, range cattle, desert bighorn sheep and who-knows-what other animals while getting a sense of what it must have been like a hundred years and more ago, the natural environment almost absent [of] the effects of human beings.” One of the most popular hikes includes the moderate, 6.2-mile Barnhardt Trail Waterfall, where the sound of birds singing will be your soundtrack as you hike through lush vegetation punctuated by red rocks and jagged cliffs to lookout points with sweeping views of the hazy rolling hills and olive-green forests below. A seasonal waterfall is your reward at the end. “Barnhardt trail is an absolute must, one of the top 5 classic hikes in Arizona,” says a reviewer on a forum for Backpacking Light.
Although gorgeous, many of the trails are challenging, with cat claw plants that snag on your clothing, treacherously steep inclines, and rocky, overgrown terrain where you can twist an ankle if you’re not careful. Portions of the Arizona National Scenic Trail pass through the wilderness area, too, with the Arizona National Scenic Trail ranking number six in the list of the 11 U.S. National Scenic Hiking Trails ranked by difficulty.
Mazatzal offers primitive and dispersed camping throughout the wilderness area that can serve adventure-seeking backpackers and multi-day hikers with a remote wilderness camping experience. None of the campsites have toilets or any other facilities and all campers are encouraged to follow Leave No Trace principles and pack out all waste. Although glamping this is not, the campsites offer scenic views of ponderosa pine canyons and fire-red mountain ridges. For those looking looking to RV or car camp, Mazatzal is about a 40-minute drive from Payson, a high-elevation Arizona lakeside town where you can camp at one of the full-service campgrounds as well as shop, dine, and gamble at the Mazatzal Casino.
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A former candidate for Gilbert mayor has opened the first Arizona location of a Founding Fathers-themed ice cream shop in Chandler.
Brooker’s Founding Flavors Ice Cream is a Utah-based ice cream shop centered around the early history of the United States. Female employees scoop cones in bonnets and dresses; male employees wear tricorn hats and coats. The ice cream flavors have names like Martha Washington’s Colonial Cotton Candy and Alexander Hamilton’s Not Throwing Away My Scoop.
On a trip to Utah in 2019, Arizonan Shane Krauser went to a Brooker’s and was blown away.
“I walked out of that, called my wife Janelle and I said, ‘We will own one of these,’” Krauser said.
The couple had no previous restaurant experience, but decided to open up the chain’s first location outside of Utah, choosing a storefront near the intersection of Chandler Boulevard and Dobson Road. The store opened on June 6.
Krauser loves how the shop creates conversation among customers about American history.
“I love history. I love the Founding Fathers. I love the ideals of America,” Krauser said. “It’s an amazing concept.”
Opening Founding Flavors isn’t political, it’s a ‘labor of love’
Krauser is a retired lawyer turned motivational speaker who addresses topics including “freedom, the proper role of government and the parameters of the U.S. and state constitutions,” according to his website.
In 2024, Krauser ran for Gilbert mayor, but withdrew his candidacy amid scrutiny over involvement with a past investment fraud scheme and his son’s appearance in a video with the Gilbert Goons, The Arizona Republic reported.
Although the shop plans to host events celebrating the 250th anniversary of the U.S., such as one for Constitution Day in September, Krauser said he does not see the ice cream store as related to his political career.
“The mayoral run was something to be involved in politically. This is more of a labor of love,” Krauser said. “This is not political in nature at all. It’s an ice cream shop with an American theme.”
Details: 2560 W. Chandler Blvd. #3, Chandler. brookersicecream.com, 480-881-6100.
Reach the reporter at reia.li@gannett.com. Follow @reia_reports on Instagram.
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