Hovde management and employees consistently participate in a variety of charitable activities. In order to maximize impact, the firm has chosen to primarily focus our efforts on five major types of outreach:

Community Development
Since the collapse of the coal industry in the U.S., the area of Appalachia has suffered from continued job losses and a very high unemployment rate, which has resulted in a significant percentage of families entering and remaining in the welfare system and left many of the school-age children with little hope for a better future. WorldVision came to Hovde to ask for their assistance in constructing a Community Center in one of the more impoverished communities in West Virginia that will be used as a meeting place for the local community as well as a place for children to meet after school for recreational activities and to receive much-needed tutoring. In addition to physically helping with the construction of the center, Hovde provided computers and funds to hire staff for the center’s after-school tutoring program.

Housing for the Surviving Children of AIDS Victims
Uganda is a country in Africa that has been devastated by the HIV/AIDS epidemic, with over 30% of the adult population dying of AIDS over the last decade. As a result of this epidemic, which continues to be the number one killer of heterosexual adults in Uganda, hundreds of thousands of young children have been orphaned and left homeless. Uganda currently has more orphans affected by HIV/AIDS than any other country in the world: 880,000 compared to 70,000 in the U.S. Hovde partnered with WorldVision to provide funding and assist in the construction of homes for some of the neediest of these orphans, providing them with much needed shelter and, hopefully, a brighter hope for the future.

Shelters for Street Children
Children without parents all over the world often end up homeless and become victims of physical and sexual abuse, poverty, and other unimaginable circumstances. Many times there are no existing facilities to provide temporary or permanent homes and these children are destined for an entire life on the street. The Hovde Foundation has provided significant grants to two children’s shelters – one in Romania and the other in El Salvador. These shelters are taking children off the streets and providing them with food, clothing, education, shelter -- and most importantly, a loving and caring environment.
Currently, the Hovde Foundation is working with WorldVision to construct a “children’s home” for street children in Mexico City. It is Hovde’s intent to build, over time, a series of homeless shelters for children all over the world.

Small Business Loans in Developing Economies
Due to extreme poverty and lack of economic development in Bolivia, many families struggle to earn a sufficient income and support their children. Hovde Foundation, in partnership with World Vision, has assisted the less fortunate and some of the struggling small business owners in Bolivia. In particular, Hovde has donated significant time, money and resources to the micro-enterprise bank World Vision-Bolivia has developed. This micro-enterprise bank, otherwise known as the FUBODE, makes loans to those entrepreneurs and small business owners who cannot receive credit from and/or do not have access to a bank. The FUBODE makes $100 to $1,000 loans to these small businesses (e.g., primarily farmers and carpenters) so they can expand or improve their operations. Typical loans will be issued to fund the purchase of another cow for milking, the construction of appropriate shelter for their animals, to purchase tools for the carpenter's shop, etc. Approximately 80% of the loans are to women and 98% of the loans are collected.

Funding Research to Find a Cure for Multiple Sclerosis (MS)
MS is a disease that attacks the central nervous system and can render people blind, disabled, and the sufferers of chronic pain. Over 450,000 people in the United States and over 2.5 million people world-wide suffer from this debilitating disease. The Hovde Foundation has funded numerous research grants and has recently contributed $1 million to the Myelin Project to fund research projects that focus not only on trying to prevent the disease, but also to remyelinate and repair function to those whom suffer from the disease.