Community Foundations in 10 Minutes

1
Community Foundations in 10 Minutes

• Juraj Mesik
• Senior Community Foundations Specialist
• World Bank

2
Characteristics of CFs

• grantmaking foundations (but many also do their
  own programs)
• broad range of donors and seek grants also from
  outside of their communities (diverse portfolio
  of donors high stability)
• geographically defined community
• broadly defined mission (like to improve quality
  of life in community, to strengthen social
  capital of community )
• governed by local and representative board
• build endowment, element of eternity

3
Other Functions of CFs

• neutral players for convening various
  stakeholders in the community to face the issues
  and challenges of common interest,
• provide leadership by identifying critical
  issues, searching for strategies to tackle them
  and mobilizing resources
• empower people by providing them with simple,
  fair, transparent and fast, yet competitive,
  access to funds for implementing their ideas and
  projects

4
Other Functions of CFs

• network people within the community and outside
• bring and spread innovations (best practices)
• serve as model of transparency and
  accountability, where such practices do not exist
  in public institutions
• by being transparent and implementing strict
  conflict of interest policies, CFs rebuild the
  trust towards institutions in their communities

5
Other Functions of CFs

• strengthen existing and encourage establishment
  of new CSOs within community
• provide intermediary for strategic giving for
  businesses
• provide opportunity for efficient giving by
  middle class or poor people, SMEs...

6
How do we (the Bank) build Community
Foundations???

• We do not !
• Local people do !!!

7
What Can the Bank Do?

• To inspire and catalyze their growth as a part of
  our scaling up efforts by
• Increasing awareness about CFs in the Banks
  client countries
• Supporting a favorable legal environment through
  dialogue with client governments
• Exposing stakeholders from the communities in
  client countries to existing CFs
• Providing know-how and training in initial phase
  of CFs development

8
What Can We Do?

• Work with foundation partners to provide the seed
  money to start grantmaking and establish track
  record (but to avoid risk of killing them by
  excessive amount of easy funds!)
• Offering technical assistance
• Giving them status and prestige among Banks
  partners, opening doors
• Explore endowment building
• Making a long term commitment (for institutional
  development)

9
Fastest Growing Field of Foundations

• Look at Global Geography and Short History of
  Community Foundations

10
History of CFs

• Prehistory city-based foundations exist in
  cities in Europe and elsewhere at least since
  middle ages.
• the first modern CF established in 1914 in
  Cleveland, USA
• the spark jumped over to Canada in 1921, Winnipeg
  CF
• 1979 Northern Ireland Voluntary Trust, the first
  CF in Europe, established with the support of the
  government
• 1985 Puerto Rico Community Foundation the
  first CF in Spanish speaking world
• 1990s explosion of CFs in Europe, Mexico,
  South Africa, Russia and other regions

11
Global Geography

• Americas
• USA 600, accumulated endowments over 30 billion
  USD)
• Canada (100, accumulated endowments over 1
  billion USD)
• Mexico (22)
• Brazil
• Virgin Islands
• British West Indies
• Ecuador (has one national CF-like foundation)

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Global Geography

• Europe
• United Kingdom 64
• Germany 45
• Italy, Poland, Slovakia, Russia (each around a
  dozen of CFs)
• Ireland 1
• Latvia and Ukraine 1
• Belgium and France have one national CF-like
  foundation each

13
Global Geography

• Asia India, Japan have each one CF
• Australia and New Zealand several
• Africa South Africa (several CFs), Zimbabwe,
  Kenya, Mozambique (each one CF-like f.)
• ... and efforts are under way to establish first
  CFs in Philippines, Thailand, China, Romania,
  Croatia, Estonia, Lithuania...

14
Summa Summarum

• Community foundations are
• the fastest growing field of philanthropy
• around the world.
• Their existence and functioning is no longer
  limited to the richest nations.

15
But

• CFs, just like people, are complicated animals.
  They need
• massive transfer of know-how in order to start
• long time commitment and patience to mature.