2010 was a milestone year for The Colorado Trust, with June marking the 25th year of our foundation. We celebrated by providing grants to strengthen the work of 10 nonprofit organizations working to improve health care for children across Colorado.

We also shared stories from many of our partners about their work over the past quarter-century to improve the health and well-being of Coloradans. These hopeful stories capture successes in bringing evidence-based solutions – such as the Nurse-Family Partnership – to communities to help moms like Shanay, a Pueblo teen who ran away from a challenging home environment filled with substance abuse. With the help of nurse Brenda Oliver, Shanay learned how to be a better mom to her young son, and is working toward a college degree to improve their futures.

Significant improvements also were realized through innovative efforts – as told in the story of nine communities in the Roaring Fork Valley – working together to address problems too complex for individual small towns. The communities in this region that are physically far from each other and economically and socially diverse, have now worked together for more than 20 years to more effectively address affordable housing, transportation, discrimination, access to health care and business development.

The dedicated efforts of our 2,000 partners across all 64 Colorado counties over the past 25 years have helped to provide many people with improved opportunities to enjoy good health and, in turn, a good life.

These efforts continue as we partnered this past year with some 200 grantees to: help families enroll in public health insurance; coordinate the delivery of health care services across multiple providers and health care settings; develop policy recommendations to alleviate health care provider shortages; and help Coloradans to become more aware of, better understand and support efforts to expand health coverage and to improve the health care system. These and other grant strategies are highlighted in this annual report.

Finally, we offer a special note of thanks this year to our many partners, as well as our staff and trustees in seamlessly continuing this work through our leadership transition. And we hold former Colorado Trust President and CEO Irene M. Ibarra in our thoughts and celebrate all that she achieved in helping to advance the health and well-being of Coloradans.

As we move into our second quarter century, our leadership remains firmly committed to ensuring that The Colorado Trust supports evidence-based solutions, innovative ideas and strong collaborations to achieve access to health for all Coloradans.

Sincerely,