Vidant Beaufort Hospital has begun accepting letters of intent for this year’s Community Benefit Grants Program, given by the Vidant Health Foundation.

The program started in 1999, and it “promotes outreach projects that focus on wellness, disease prevention and management,” according to the Vidant Health website.

Last July, a total of more than $110,000 was awarded to 2015-2016 Community Benefit grant recipients. The Health Foundation as a whole distributed more than $1.8 million for 132 grants last year throughout eastern North Carolina.

Among the Beaufort County recipients last year were Higher Heights Human Services Inc., Beaufort County Health Department, Beaufort County Boys & Girls Club and Ruth’s House, the domestic violence shelter.

Loretta Ebison, executive director of Higher Heights Human Services Inc., an organization dedicated to helping pregnant teens in Beaufort County stay in school, get proper prenatal care and provide education to prevent a second pregnancy, said the nonprofit was awarded about $8,000 in July, and it turned out to be a vital piece of the organization’s funding.

Ebison said the organization used the grant money to hire its first full-time employee, Janae Johnson, to head the Higher Heights Healthy Outcomes program.  Johnson also plays a large role in organizing fundraisers, such as Adopt-A-Teen, and works directly with the teen mothers to help lower birth mortality rates and lower dropout rates.

“Without that funding, we wouldn’t have been able to hire that full-time employee,” Ebison said.

She said the organization is planning to send in a letter of intent for the 2016-2017 cycle, as well.

The Boys & Girls Club of Beaufort County was another 2015-2016 grant recipient and was awarded $14,000 in July.

Mal Collins, area director of the county’s Boys & Girls Club, said in a previous interview that she was grateful for the money, and the organization planned to use it for its Washington and Belhaven locations.

“They continue to support us year after year,” she said of Vidant and its Health Foundation.

According to a press release, Vidant Beaufort is accepting letters from organizations focusing on three health-related issues: access to care (including mental health), chronic disease/cancer management and prevention and nutrition/physical activity.

This cycle of grant awards will be for July 1, 2016-June 30, 2017 and is open to organizations in Beaufort and Hyde counties, the press release stated.

Upon receipt of the letters of intent, a Grants Review Committee will then review each one to see if it fits the hospital’s objectives, the Vidant website stated.

Organizations may then be asked to submit a full application for the grant money, and recipients are determined after the applications are reviewed by an Appropriations Committee and voted on by the Foundation’s Board of Trustees, according to the website.

Letters of intent for the 2016-2017 Community Benefit Grant Program cycle must be submitted by Feb. 8. Interested nonprofits or government entities should submit the letters online at www.vidanthealth.com/communitybenefit and link it to Vidant Beaufort’s grant program.

For more information, contact Pam Shadle at 252-975-4134 or pam.shadle@vidanthealth.com.