DANVILLE -- In just eight years, the Danville Area Community Foundation has grown from an idea to a booming community service that has grown 70 percent in the past year and will have more than $3 million in assets by the end of 2007.

Not too bad when you consider the foundation is still developing.

"We're in our growth years," said Randy May, foundation treasurer and chairman of the development committee.

Part of the larger First Community Foundation of Pennsylvania, Danville's local organization was formed in 1999 with the goal of filling unmet needs in an area encompassing the Danville Area School District.

The foundation began because former Geisinger President and CEO Henry Hood believed one was needed in the area. He talked with retired veterinarian George Leighow, Marty Walzer and May, who are retired business owners, and "asked us to accept the challenge," May said. Also serving on the original board were Jean Knouse and the late Gerald Levandoski.

The group needed outside assistance to get the idea off the ground. After researching foundations, they chose First Community, the oldest in Pennsylvania and based in Williamsport, founded in 1916.

"They had a track record and at the time $40-some million in assets. They were already successful, had a place for co-mingling of our dollars to invest and we decided, why reinvent the wheel," May said. "First Community is like a holding company. We're our own foundation."

What does it do?

The DACF has grown every year, and officials expect it to keep growing.

Foundation Chairman and Geisinger physician O. Fred Miller III, said in their annual report, "We are on the way to making the Danville area an even more desirable place to live" with the foundation building an endowed charitable reserve which brings new dollars into the community by providing grants and scholarships each year.

As the foundation grows through gifts from people in the community, it invests that money and uses the income from grants and scholarships instead of fundraising every year.

In 2007, 236 individuals and organizations contributed $519,412 to the foundation, a growth of nearly 70 percent.

"What you want to see are signs of a growing foundation, and you see that in Danville," said Julie Adams, Marketing & Communications manager for the First Community Foundation. "It's just really taking off and catching on. The people in Danville are really enthused about what their foundation can be and what it's potential really is."

Adams said one of the biggest reasons for the large growth in Danville is the hard work of the 15-member Board of Directors, headed by Dr. Miller. "They have made the commitment and you are starting to see the benefits," she said, noting the Danville foundation should surpass the $5 million asset mark by 2010.

Students are among the largest beneficiaries of the endowment. In 2007, 26 scholarships were awarded to graduating seniors totaling more than $35,000. Among that total were nine students who received more than $1,700 each from the Bloch-Selinger Education Fund, established in the 1960s.