Dan Snyder grew up in Washington, D.C., and he was a football fan, so it goes without saying that he was a fan of Washington Football when it was still known as the “Redskins.” He had an early start attending these games with his father, but he continued to nurture his love for the team in his young adult years.
In 1999, Daniel Snyder made his dream come true when he purchased the team. Ever since then, it has grown in the area and is a leader in the community and the National Football League. Daniel Snyder is the reason that the team remained at the top for all of these years.
Philanthropy
Daniel Snyder is a leading philanthropist and community leader in Washington, D.C. After he bought the team, the first thing he wanted to do was create a foundation, and that is what he did. He created the Washington Charitable Foundation in the year 2000 for the purpose of making youth development a joint effort. The foundation brought the community’s partners and corporate partners together so that they could invest in making a positive impact on the area’s youth.
The foundation’s focus is on health and wellness, community outreach and education, and since it began, it had the opportunity to present several people, organizations and groups with as much as $29 million. Millions of people have been positively affected by it.
The Washington Charitable Foundation has a program that it calls its “Loads of Love” program, and it had the chance to expand last year. This program provides the area’s schools with washers and dryers at no cost to the families living in the area. The washers and dryers were installed to help the homeless or kids currently living in unstable conditions. The purpose was to remove a barrier that these kids have to joining the programs and sports that are available to them. Not having clean clothes was often a problem that kept children from participating in what the foundation had to offer. More than 80 non-profit organizations and schools now have a Loads of Love laundry center on their premises.
Also last year, the foundation gave more than 115 special events and workshops that benefitted the Read Program. The Read Program increased literacy in children in the fourth and fifth grades. It also addressed the needs of seventh graders with its in-school health and wellness program. More than 12,000 children are participating in this program.
Natural Disasters
Dan Snyder’s focus is not just on the plight of people in need in the United States. When Hurricane Matthew devastated the Caribbean in 2016, he moved into action and prepared to send people the supplies they needed to recover from the storm. Two of his players participated in a game against Baltimore, but the next day, Dan asked these two players of Haitian descent if they would like to help him take medical supplies to the hospital in Port Au Prince, Haiti, and they eagerly agreed to accompany him.
After the tsunami in Thailand and Indonesia in 2004, Dan contributed to relieving the suffering in the area at that time, and he did the same thing after Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The Bahama’s Minister of Tourism acknowledged the work that Dan and his players did, and he set them up as an example of what he would like to see in the future.
Social Justice and Health
After George Floyd was murdered in May of this year, Dan donated $250,000 to Black Lives Matter for the purpose of raising awareness about social justice issues.
Dan also stepped in to help with the COVID-19 pandemic. To assist those suffering during this health crisis, Dan donated $100,000 to a local food bank so that underprivileged families wouldn’t go hungry. He also joined forces with the Maryland National Guard with the purpose of setting up a location where they would be able to test residents for the COVID-19 virus.
Dan also convinced Washington Football to follow his lead. The team donated $35,000 for the repair of the Ashburn Colored School that was vandalized in 2016. This historic building was constructed in 1892, and it was where black children were educated until 1957. Because Dan made such a large contribution, the fundraisers were able to bring in more than their original target amount of $100,000.
Devotion to the Military
Dan’s organization also initiated a club that appreciates the military. The organization is known as “Salute,” and it spends the year creating military appreciation initiatives. This is the first organization that focuses on showing appreciation to those in the military, and it hosts several events just for military members. In 2016, Dan and the Gary Sinise Foundation got together to build a smart home for Captain Luis Avila, a Washington Football fan and veteran of the U.S. Army.
See the latest news on Dan Snyder: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/07/sports/dan-snyder-washington-nfl-defamation-lawsuit.html