HELPING GROWTH - Waseca Area Neighborhood Service Center director Cindy Kolander, center, shows off the "Community Builder" plaque presented to the Center for its role in bringing people together. Presenting the acknowledgement are Southern Minnesota Initiative Foundation (SMIF) representatives Marcia Haley, Benja Kraus, SMIF board member Ann Staloch, and Katie Godfrey Demmer. Pioneer photo by Deb Bently
SMIF acknowledges ‘Community Builders’
Thu, 10/08/2026 - 10:15am
Representatives from the Southern Minnesota Initiative Foundation (SMIF) spent the morning of Oct. 1 acknowledging eight area businesses and organizations for their roles as “community builders,” that is, for providing services and opportunities that help individuals, especially children, grow, or that bring people together.
Closely associated with one-time politician Tim Penney, who served as the organization’s president and chief executive officer from 2007 until 2025, the Owatonna-based organization is known for its donor-supported philanthropic grants and low-interest loans which focus on supporting entrepreneurship, early childhood development, and community vitality.
Long-time Waseca resident Benya Kraus now leads the organization, which has invested more than $186 million across the 20 counties of south central and southeastern Minnesota since coming into existence in 1986.
Kraus, accompanied by the organization’s senior lending officer Marcia Haley; communications director Katie Godfrey Demmer; communications and community vitality specialist Sarah Scheffert, and SMIF board member Ann Staloch, presented 10-inch oval placards to be displayed at locations where SMIF has provided either grants or loans.
Though not all could be delivered Oct. 1, placard recipients include Farmamerica, Half Pint Brewery, Lush Cakes, Matson Design Specialties, Morgan’s Meat Market, Pleasant Grove Pizza Farm, Silver Fox Plumbing, the Waseca Area Neighborhood Service Center, Waseca County Public Health, Waseca Community Education Early Childhood and Family Education (ECFE) program, and the Waseca Library.
At the Waseca Library, Kraus called attention to the facility’s role as a hub where people of different generations can come together to read and learn, use technology, and perform communication-related tasks.
At Lush Cakes, she thanked proprietor Jessica Freitag for her “business mindfulness and tenacity” in opening a place where community members can gather, and which supports people’s celebrations.
In speaking with ECFE leader Carrie Morris, Kraus highlighted community education’s role in supporting children’s early literacy and promoting lifelong learning.
At the Waseca County Public Health office, Kraus expressed thanks to the department for acknowledging that early literacy is an important element in public health. “It helps provide the strong, healthy foundation children and families can build on,” said Kraus.
Like the proprietors at numerous other stops, Mike McQuery of Half-Pint Brewery replied to Kraus’ statements about the value of his, and other small businesses, as the “heartbeat of the community,” and his role as an entrepreneur who built on the area’s connection to agriculture, by saying, “We wouldn’t be here if it hadn’t been for SMIF.”
