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By David Vollrath, Executive Director Union County Foundation Recently I was asked to make a presentation to a business leadership team that was considering starting a scholarship fund in honor of an esteemed colleague who had recently passed away. The Foundation is always pleased when an organization expresses an interest in charitable activity so naturally I prepared some applicable materials and appreciatively made the presentation. After listening a bit to what the company wanted to accomplish it seemed to me that their foremost objective was to charitably honor the memory of this outstanding co-worker and that a scholarship was simply the most familiar means to that end. I suggested that a scholarship would indeed be very nice but that perhaps they would appreciate having the flexibility, through a donor advised fund, to extend broader acts of charity from the fund. Maybe a scholarship would be appropriate one year while underwriting a research project might make sense the next year. Why not give your Fund that extra flexibility? A pure scholarship fund could only be used for scholarships. This idea seemed to make a lot of sense to the leadership team, so that is the path they are pursuing. As the conversation progressed the leadership team inquired about the costs involved to initiate and administer the fund. In response to the question I answered that there is no fee for the foundation to produce the legal document known as the fund agreement. I further explained that really the only fee involved is an administrative fee of 1% of the fund balance billed out quarterly in .25% increments. Following this explanation I noticed that one of the key members of the leadership team was chuckling. He couldn’t believe that such a fund could be created at such a low cost to them. I was happy to explain further that the mission of the Foundation is to promote and facilitate charitable giving and therefore we intentionally make our services available without onerous service fees and startup costs. Needless to say they were pleased with the value that they would be receiving. Too often individuals and organizations with charitable inclinations fail to put those intentions into action fearing too much “red tape” and expense. Please know that organizations such as the Union County Foundation stand poised and ready to make the process of initiating a charitable fund painlessly easy and virtually expense free. The Union County Foundation is equipped to help you achieve your charitable goals by providing: planned giving and estate planning resource information, charitable gift annuities/life income plans, and a broad array of charitable choices including establishment of scholarship funds and donor advised funds. The Foundation encourages you to work closely with your professional advisor(s) as you develop your estate plan and consider your present and future charitable goals. Please call us at 937-642-9618, email info@unioncountyfoundation.org, reference our website at www.unioncountyfoundation.org, or stop by our Marysville office at 126 N. Main St. We are committed to helping you… “preserve your footprint in time.” |
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