Spring is a time for renewal. As this newsletter attests, this spring has been especially active for the Community Foundation.
In March we purchased the former University Club building in downtown Syracuse as our new home – the CNY Philanthropy Center. We will not only create a permanent and visible home for ourselves, but also space that enables us to amplify our work as a convener and center for community dialogue. The renovation of the former ballroom on the second floor of the building – now bank offices – will allow us to hold donor events, nonprofit gatherings and offer space for other community purposes. Over the next eighteen months, we’ll keep you updated on our progress with this project at our new building website: cnyphilanthropycenter.org.
The current economic crisis reaffirms the importance of the role of philanthropy – permanent charitable capital deployed for the purpose of creating sustainable positive change. As the largest endowed philanthropic resource for our region, the Community Foundation has a special responsibility in this regard. Despite economic uncertainty, we are committed to maintaining the same grants budget for this year as we have had in previous years. This represents more than $2 million in support through our Community Grants process and various initiatives. While the investment return on our portfolio was down by 27% in 2008, the combination of a prudent endowment spending formula and the recent addition of several new bequests allows us to provide the same level of grant support through our unrestricted Community Fund. This is only one part of our community support. We anticipate that additional grants made through our Donor Advised and Designated funds will also remain roughly the same. We owe a great debt of gratitude to the hundreds of donors who, by entrusting their gifts to us over the last 82 years, have enabled us to provide a continuous level of community support.
As I approach the close of my first year leading the Community Foundation, I want to express my thanks to our board of directors for their time and dedication – in particular to the members who will rotate off our board in June: Gary Germain, Baird Hansen, Mike Connor, Jeff Rubenstein, Mary Ann Shaw, and our board chair, Anne Messenger. Thank you again for your service to the Community Foundation and the community at large.