Pooling Resources to Drive Change
Staff Photo by Andrea Adelson Impact Giving founding board member Betsy Gosselin wants to see the affect of her charitable contributions. Five Laguna Beach women are making a $1,000 a year commitment to instigating change in their community and beyond by tapping into a growing trend in philanthropy.
Enlisting their friends and attracting like-minded givers along the way, the founding board of Impact Giving aims for a 1,000-woman strong collective that cumulatively can donate $1 million a year to nonprofit organizations.
Twenty-eight women signed on at the first meeting last month. Another is scheduled for April 22. By relying on the Internet to collect donations, review grant applications and keep overhead costs low, they intend to bestow their first grants this fall.
With economic storm clouds gathering last fall, Karen Wilson felt downhearted about the need to cut back her own charitable giving. The solution came from friend Anne Duncan, who returned from a visit to her hometown of Austin where she rubbed shoulders with sorority sisters turned partners in Impact Austin. Like members of giving circles nationwide, they each donate to a pooled fund and grant their money back into the community.
Photo by Linda Grossman The founding board of Impact Giving, a collective philanthropy group, from left, Carol Ummel Lindquist, Karen Wilson, Betsy Gosselin, Susan Marxx and Ann Duncan. "That was the birth," said Wilson, who assembled a fourwoman team of friends to establish the locally based giving circle. A 2006 survey by the Forum of Regional Associations of Grantmakers determined that giving circles nationwide doubled to 400 in two years.
"It pushes ownership and responsibility and was a darn great idea. I love to create opportunity," said Wilson, a former consultant to nonprofits and Impact Giving's chair and founding partner.
Impact Giving intends to annually award grants in one or more of seven categories including the environment, hunger and shelter, women and children, health and wellness, arts and culture, human rights and a category called Beyond the Box. A potential grantee must demonstrate a direct benefit to individuals or a cause.
"We all give small, little amounts that didn't make a difference," said Elizabeth Gosselin, vice chair and a founding board member. "But pooled resources touch lives in unique ways. The other side of that is seeing the impact on organizations."
Taking on the responsibility of evaluating potential grant recipients propels members into the organization's battle zones, exposing them to on-the-ground social and cultural issues of the day. "We're educating ourselves about these organizations that are making change in the world," Gosselin said. "We are lifelong learners together."
Collective giving groups differ from community foundations, which also pool contributions, advise donors on worthy potential recipients but typically establish managed endowment funds. The Laguna Beach Community Foundation, led by Laura Tarbox and Peter C. Kote, was recently established.
Collectives, though, are closer to venture investing, said Colleen Willoughby, founder of the Seattle-based Washington Women's Foundation, who has helped establish 22 other giving collectives and aided the Laguna Beach group.
"By women being involved in the discovery, identifying needs being overlooked, it's much more of a personal engagement in the life of a community," she said. "We may not all be wealthy women, but we hold great wealth in common. It's the leverage of collective wealth making things happen."
As an example, one partner who also served as a board member of a Seattle adoption agency, described the difficulty of placing middle school children. With a $100,000 grant, the agency could hire a staff person to target this population. More than 75 kids were placed.
"That's the kind of need that might not get on the radar," Willoughby said.
For some women, collective giving circles provide a vehicle to speed a philanthropic surge without an outlet, said Rebecca Powers, who founded Impact Austin in 2003. "They didn't know how to be involved."
She's seen an unexpected result for members, now steeped in community needs and personally experiencing the satisfying result of collective investment. Partners are in high demand, viewed as valued community leaders. "Our resources are greater than our money," she said.
With $5,000 in seed money underwriting their administrative start up costs, Impact Giving vows to dispense 100 percent of its contributions, a pledge that appealed to local resident Kristin Thomas, who recently joined the board of a Tanzania education foundation, but will also join Impact Giving.
Thomas found another reason compelling. "You walk into a room with powerful, intelligent women with a heart."
For more info visit www. impactgivingnow.org or call Karen Wilson at 949/290-7162.
