Goodyear council adopts updated community funding policy for nonprofit grants
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Summary
The Goodyear City Council unanimously adopted a refreshed community funding policy (Resolution 2025-2460) to guide grant awards to nonprofit organizations; the application opens April 12 and will be reviewed by a subcommittee in June with a council recommendation planned for July 7.
The Goodyear City Council on April 7 adopted a revised community funding policy for grant awards to nonprofit organizations, passing Resolution 2025-2460 on a 7-0 vote.
The policy update, presented by Christina Panatescu, community partnerships program manager, is a refresh and reorganization of existing guidance rather than a substantive change to eligibility or priorities. Panatescu told the council the document consolidates prior materials and separates items now handled through the regular budget process so the policy specifically governs community funding for nonprofits.
The update traces the program's roots to a council goal from fiscal year 1995 and to several later actions. Panatescu said a policy was first adopted in 2021 and that subsequent work sessions and the 2019 community assessment informed the current draft. "We took all 3 of those parts, the documents and whatnot, and put them together into what you have as the, 2025 community funding policy for grant awards to nonprofit organizations," she said.
Under the adopted schedule, the city will release the application for fiscal year 2025–26 on April 12 through the e-service application portal; the application will remain open for one month. A subcommittee will review applications using the new criteria during the week of June 2, and the subcommittee's recommendation will come back to the full council for adoption on July 7.
Councilmember Cano, who said she served on the subcommittee with Vice Mayor Campbell and Councilwoman Gillis, praised the work: "we were very pleased with the work that you had done in preparing the policy," she said. Vice Mayor Campbell added, "it was much more clear this time when we went to that meeting," and said the clearer structure will help the public understand how taxpayer funds are stewarded.
The revised policy focuses the city's community funding process on nonprofit grant awards; Panatescu said items previously included in the 2021 policy that are now part of regular budget or parks and recreation processes were removed from this document to keep it narrowly focused.
Next steps are the application release on April 12, the subcommittee review in early June, and a full-council action on July 7 when the council will consider the subcommittee's funding recommendations.
Votes and formal action: the council approved Resolution 2025-2460 unanimously (7-0).