Rotary Club of Fox Chapel Area

BOD Meeting

December 9, 2015

Minutes

Present: Chip Crawford, Bonne Cardinali, Dick Thomas, Dusty Klavon, Al Hribar, Mary Lee Gannon

Excused: George Dull

Welcome and open meeting – Chip opened the meeting with prayer at noon

Overview of charity vetting process – Chip provided a history of this year’s process which included an all member web-based survey. Chip shared his views on the process overlap between calendar and fiscal years.

Mary Lee provided an in-depth review of the charity vetting process over the past few years.

1. Establish a deadline for general grant requests to be sent. We did this in the past. My year we did this in the fall so we had what we needed for the golf outing but somehow it got moved to March 15th. We might want to change that back to October 1stso you have what you need for the golf outing.

2.The process for applying is already established. The BOD may choose to affirm or tighten grant criteria.

3.Send a press release to the Herald in August or two months prior to the October 1st deadline for Grant completed Grant Applications.

4.Establish a process for vetting the top charity. (I would vet those who apply for overall support. My preference and that of other small organizations like The Women’s Board of Pittsburgh, etc. is that it be a charity that that otherwise may not have a sophisticated fundraising component. In those organizations you can really make a difference.

5.An overview of the top five charities chosen by the board can be explained to the club at a meeting.

6.A description of organizations can be sent to the membership for a vote. This vote could be accomplished by a web-based survey.

7.The boardultimately decides.

8.All of the charities get considered for grants generally around $1,000. (Chip -this fiscal year we may increase per rata grants as our funds have doubled.)

Identification of top 4 charities (These 4 submitted grant applications the week of November 30th. Grant applications for all other charities will be completed in Feb / March of 2016.)

1) Circles Sharpsburg

2) Beechwood Farms (Audubon)

3) Meals on Wheels

4) Cooper Siegel Library

There was discussion about finances (Trusteesline item) for FaithUnitedMethodistChurch. We would like clarity on the relationship between Faith United, The Family Worship Center and Circles Sharpsburg. Chip will follow-up with Pastor Tom Parkinson and report back to the BOD.

Bonne raised a question about faith communities / places of worship as grant recipients. Mary Lee advised most grass roots community support charities work through local faith based organizations. These organizations do not have the structure, staff, external support or funding which is typically seen in many main line charities.

Reflections / plans for Charity Golf Classic (fundraising)

Al provided information about the Charity Golf Classic with the fund raising goal of $30,000 (last year we were just short of $28,000)

Target funds for supporting charities

In addition to the golf fundraiser 3 members committed a total of $35,000 for distribution to Rotary benevolence.

Choose lead charity / charities

Al suggested that we think of segmenting the various potential grant recipients into groups in terms of their function and the constituents they benefit as a way of helping to develop priorities for providing grants. Based on this idea, we can define focus areas and then, for any given year, determine which, if any, area we want to prioritize for significant gifting, determine the grant amount for each charity selected in that area and then determine grants for the other focus areas. The following four focus areas were identified based on the organizations Rotary has supported in the past and those that we are considering for this year.

Focus Area 1) Organizations which aid and support the disadvantaged and people with special needs including organizations such as: Aspinwall Meals on Wheels, FamilyWorshipCenter (community meals), Circles of Sharpsburg, and the St VincentdePaul Food Bank.

Focus Area 2) Youth leadership development including programs and activities such as: outstanding student recognition and awards, sponsorship of attendance at the World Affairs Council, Interact Club support (student Rotary Clubs), and unique educational needs and opportunities.

Focus Area 3) Community resource support organizations for people and families of all ages and backgrounds: Cooper-Siegel Library, the LauriAnnWestCommunity Center, the Audubon Society, and AspinwallRiverfrontPark.

Focus Area 4) Rotary International (Global projects, initiatives) – the 4th Focus Area may include benevolence for District 7300 beyond the 10% annual International gifting.

Mary Lee made a motion to make the focus area of disadvantaged and people with special needs the lead beneficiary for the proceeds of the golf outing (Circles of Sharpsburg, Family Worship Center community meals, Aspinwall Meals on Wheels, and the Sharpsburg (St Vincent DePaul) Food Bank) and that the split of the golf outing proceeds between these four non-profits would be decided at a future board meeting. The motion was approved unanimously.

Date of next BOD meeting - Wednesday, January 27th10:45 Field Club – room TBD

Meeting adjourned at 1:05 p.m. (see following addendum)

Since the BOD meeting Al provided the following information and perspective which Chip will include in a member communiqué.

The Rotary BOD met Wednesday, December 9, 2015 to consider grants to charitable organizations.A review of non-profit organizations active in the Fox Chapel Area School District, which we are considering supporting this fiscal year, fall into three broad categories or focus areas:

Those which aid and support the disadvantaged and people with special needs including organizations (but no limited to) such as: Aspinwall Meals on Wheels, Family Worship Center (community meals), Circles of Sharpsburg, and the St Vincent dePaul Food Bank.

Youth leadership development including programs and activities such as: outstanding student recognition and awards, sponsorship of attendance at the World Affairs Council, Interact Club support (student Rotary Clubs), and unique educational needs and opportunities.

Community resource support for people and families of all ages and backgrounds: Cooper-Siegel Library, the LauriAnnWestCommunity Center, the Audubon Society, and AspinwallRiverfrontPark.

The BOD discussed a new model for prioritizing grants. The shift will be from identification of one organization for significant gifting to what is referred to as a focus area (category, grouping, etc.). We spotlight a focus area then determine in any given year the grant amount for each charity selected in that focus area. We then determine grants for the other 3 focus area.

Our major fund raising event is the Charity Golf Classic. Rather than spotlight one organization for lead charity the BOD recommends the category of the disadvantaged and people with special needs as beneficiary for the proceeds of the golf outing (Circles of Sharpsburg, Family Worship Center community meals, Aspinwall Meals on Wheels, Circles of Circles of Sharpsburg and St Vincent DePaul Food Bank) with a strategy to divide a major percentage of the golf outing proceeds between these four non-profits. The percentage split between the four focus areas is shown below with actual dollars to be determined after the Charity Golf Outing fundraising results are known.

Last year the Rotary Board voted to devote 10% of the net golf outing proceeds to International Projects and this was intended to be an on-going practice.

[A question that does arise is whether that decision by last year's board to devote 10% of funds raised automatically applies to the then unexpected arrival of the $35,000 in foundation donations to the club. While I don't know the exact wording of last year's Board decision, I would think that the intention was that we would donate 10% of any unrestricted funds raised or donated to International Projects. This is something we should probably try to get some clarification for from George, Barry and/or Mary Lee.]

One other factor in ultimately determining how the total funds we have available are given to non-profits are any possible restrictions that the donors may decide to place on thefoundation donations. If there are any, it may possibly have some affect on the distribution of dollars between the focus areas. If there are no restrictions on the foundation donated funds and we allocated 10% of all funds to international projects, then an initial target of splitting the $65,000 in funds would look like this:

The following is hypothetical for the purpose of example as the BOD will be making decisions about the specifics of grants (organizations and fund amounts) in the Spring.

Focus Area 1(45.0%) $29,250 (disadvantaged and people with basic life survival needs)

Focus Area 2(22.5%) $14,625 (youth development)

Focus Area 3(22.5%) $14,625 (community support and enrichment)

Focus Area 4(10%) $ 6,500 (international)

How the funds would actually be split, particularly for Focus Areas 2 and 3 would depend on an evaluation of the non-profit grant requests, and whether there is a special need or unique opportunity the club would like to support.An example is an idea suggested by a member to support the development of the riverfront trail and get permanent posted recognition by a sign identifying a section of the trail as the Rotary Trail (or some such designation). If we were to do something like that we might allocate more monies to focus area 3 and less to area 2 for that year. Thus the final allocation of funding between the focus areas and within the areas would be a Board decision (with input from committee chairs and club members.)

We may wish to consider holding a small amount of funds, raised by the golf outing and other funding sources, to provide a short term reserve going into the next fiscal year for any unexpected needs that arose among non-profits.