The St. Paul Police Foundation has named Kate Kelly as its new executive director.
Kelly once worked in advertising for the Star Tribune and later was head of the St. Paul Winter Carnival's parent organization — the St. Paul Festival and Heritage Foundation.
She'd recently been director of external affairs for Catholic Charities.
The Police Foundation was founded in 2005 to help raise money for the police department as strains on the the city budget left many feeling the police were underfunded.
As an example of the foundation's funding, it gave $63,000 to the police department last year for these programs:
- $51,000 for updated SWAT team vests
- $1,307 for Cops and Kids, a motorcade with Santa to hospitals
- $4,000 for Shop with Cops, buying presents with low-income youth
- $3,500 for the Police Athletic League work with youth
- $3,146 for Explorers.