Building Hope Together
From Fiscal Sponsorship to Their Own Nonprofit
The Challenge:
Building Hope Together brings volunteers and neighbors together to repair homes and restore hope for families across San Antonio. When Cielo Strategy Group first partnered with the team in January 2025, they had heart, hustle, and a growing volunteer base, but not yet the fundraising infrastructure of their own to match.
Building Hope Together came to Cielo Strategy Group needing to build its fundraising capacity, but there was a challenge: the organization was operating under a fiscal sponsorship. That arrangement had helped them get their work off the ground, but it also meant they couldn’t build the donor relationships, grant pipeline, and fundraising systems a growing nonprofit needs.
Our Approach:
Over six months, from January through June 2026, we worked side by side with Building Hope Together’s staff team to assess their fundraising culture and build what they needed next. We developed a grants pipeline and boilerplate content, built out a donor database with CRM recommendations, and created the tools a lean team needs to fundraise well: a fundraising budget, calendar, and dashboard, a gift acceptance policy, a donor gratitude and stewardship process, prospect mapping, a full philanthropy plan, and a list of top funders to cultivate. We designed their first coordinated appeals, including a year-end appeal letter template built to use for years to come, and supported their spring fundraising push with content, structure, and coaching.
In order to truly build long-term sustainability, we recommended that they pursue their own nonprofit status to create the infrastructure a standalone nonprofit would need from day one, including updated bylaws, an operational policies guide, and board governance recommendations.
From Our Partner:
“We greatly valued the approach your team took during our partnership. The training was practical, engaging, and, most importantly, produced meaningful deliverables we could implement immediately. Over the years, we have worked with several consultants. While some partnerships have been incredibly valuable, others have resulted in a somewhat fragmented approach to organizational development. The Cielo team brings a comprehensive approach. Rather than general recommendations, we received tools and resources tailored to our unique needs and stage of growth.”
– JAILLIN DIAZ LOPEZ, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, BUILDING HOPE TOGETHER
The Outcome:
Building Hope Together left the engagement with a full toolkit for sustainable fundraising: an organized donor database ready to grow, a fundraising calendar and dashboard the team can run on their own, a grants pipeline and boilerplate content ready for the next proposal, and their first-ever year-end appeal. Just as important, they left with updated bylaws, an operational policies guide, and board governance recommendations built for a nonprofit standing on its own.
That groundwork paid off. Building Hope Together officially received its 501(c)(3) status, a milestone that capped a year of building their board, developing their programs, and establishing the governance structures to sustain their mission on their own terms.
We were honored to watch Building Hope Together clear that milestone, and even more honored when they came back to us this year. Now, they have asked Cielo Strategy Group to partner with them again, this time for a full organizational assessment and strategic implementation project to align the systems we helped them build with the next stage of their growth.
There’s no better sign of trust than a partner who comes back for round two.