Head Groundskeeper Jeff Ross hoses down the infield ahead of a 2025 Great Lakes Loons game at Dow Diamond.
Max Milne/Midland Daily News
Dave Shiffer, center, holds up a commemorative jersey and celebrates with Great Lakes Loons President and General Manager Chris Mundhenk, left, and Lou E. Loon after becoming the four millionth fan to attend a Loons game at Dow Diamond over the franchise’s 18 seasons on Friday, July 11, 2025.
Dan Chalk/Midland Daily News
The Great Lakes Loons welcomed students from schools in the Great Lakes Bay Region to Dow Diamond on May 2, 2025 for Kids School Day.
Dominic Sevilla/Midland Daily News
Every year since 2008, the holiday season has been followed shortly by the deadline for nonprofit organizations to apply for grants from the Michigan Baseball Foundation, the 501 (c) (3) organization that owns and operates Dow Diamond, the home of the Great Lakes Loons.
Over that time, grants generated from revenue at Loons games and other events at Dow Diamond and related properties have totaled more than $1.8 million across the 14 counties of the Great Lakes Bay Region.
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Feb. 15 is the deadline to apply for the 2026 grants at https://www.michiganbaseballfoundation.org/grants
Grant applications are evaluated on three main criteria:
The organization contributes to regional economic development
The organization is based in the Mid-Michigan area and serves young people
The funded project promotes amateur sports, fitness and overall good health
“We want to make grants mainly for capital-type projects, things that are going to last a good long time,” explained Mike Hayes, Vice President and Secretary of the Michigan Baseball Foundation, who for several years has chaired the grant committee of about eight people.
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“We look for physical projects,” Hayes continued. “We are open to non-sports-related projects as long as we think they’re for the betterment of the community, and it helps if it’s got some kind of link to young people.”
Hayes, who helped establish the foundation and the Loons in 2006, explained that the IRS at that time encouraged the foundation to become a catalyst for economic development.
Michigan Baseball Foundation keeps most of its grants to a few thousand dollars each.
“A lot of foundations are not going to do a small $5,000 or $10,000 grant (like we do). If we have a little league that has dugouts that are falling apart or a scoreboard that is inadequate, we can make a difference,” Hayes said. “We feel we can be real impactful with small, targeted grants for youth sports and general wellbeing.”
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Last year’s MBF grants totaled $81,165 and benefited organizations in Arenac, Bay, Gratiot, Isabella, Midland, Saginaw and Tuscola counties. Grants in Midland County included the following:
$2,000 to the Art Seen Festival for scaffolding for future mural projects
$4,000 to Little Forks Conservancy for creating connections to nature through play
$6,000 to the MyMichigan Health Foundation for high school athletic training mobile technology
$5,000 to Phoenix Community Farm for a season-extending greenhouse
$25,000 to the Midland Business Alliance Foundation for an economic development initiative
The other seven counties in the Great Lakes Bay Region are Ogemaw, Iosco, Clare and Gladwin on the north side, Huron and Sanilac in the Thumb, and Genesee at the southern end.
The MBF generally grants funds based on where fans at Loons games are from. But the foundation takes other factors into account as well.
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“Right from the start, we kind of adopted a formula that in a general sense we would make grants based on ticket sales. We can track them by zip code,” Hayes said. “But that’s not a hard and fast rule. In some of the more rural counties, we don’t sell that many tickets. But if we get a good application for something that can be really impactful, we consider it.
“Our ticket sales pretty much come from the 14-county region, with Saginaw, Bay and Midland being the three heaviest counties for sales,” Hayes added.
Interestingly, sometimes the MBF will ask the Dow Diamond grounds crew to go out and lend their expertise in the community where needed.
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“We have many times sent our field maintenance and grounds staff out to help with building back fields that have deteriorated. Our staff loves doing that,” Hayes said. “If they can get the materials, we can show them how to use those materials.”