WALLACE, La. — Greenfield Louisiana announced plans to found West Bank Prospers, a new foundation that will invest millions of dollars in new grants to West St. John High School, a new community health clinic, scholarships to River Parishes Community College and more.
West Bank Prospers will target its initial $3.85 million in directed grants toward education, job training, community health, local farmers and cultural preservation.
Greenfield Louisiana, a subsidiary of Colorado-based Greenfield Holdings, is the agriculture business working to build a new $400 million grain export facility in St. John the Baptist Parish. The project has drawn resistance over the last two years from activists who say it would be located too close to the town, and it could create new environmental hazards and disturb unmarked slave burial sites.
In addition to the $3.85 million initial investment in the foundation, Greenfield is also committing to donate the first $500,000 of its profits at the export facility every year in perpetuity to the foundation to direct to additional community priorities.
West Bank Prospers will announce the first of its board members in the coming weeks, as well as launch a process for members of the community to join the board and shape its grant-making. Once incorporated, the nonprofit will be able to raise funds from other sources.
“In every conversation we have with our neighbors, we’ve heard people’s hopes for a revitalized West Bank,” said Tanisha Marshall, project manager at Greenfield. “Good jobs are part of that, but so are stronger schools for kids, improved local health care for seniors, workforce training for our young people and helping farmers make ends meet. West Bank Prospers will be an engine for good, driven by this community and for this community.”
