Foundation has used Lilly wisely (05/24/08)

Whenever grants are involved, there's a tendency to think of them as "free money." And all too often good judgment is replaced by a kid-in-a-candy-store mentality.

Maybe because The Portland Foundation has been on the giving end of grants for more than 50 years, it was able to take a more thoughtful and sober approach when it was on the receiving end of a grant from the Lilly Endowment.

A few years back, the Lilly Endowment, which has played a tremendous role in the development of new community foundations across Indiana, created a new program aimed at improving those foundations and making them more professional.

The program focused on "sustaining resource development," and The Portland Foundation was among many which received Lilly grant dollars to be spent over a three-year period.

To its credit, the foundation board has spent the money wisely.

Twenty separate projects were identified that the board felt would benefit the foundation, local grant recipient organizations, and the community as a whole. Some of them were relatively small in scope, others took the foundation into areas where it had never been active.

Among the programs that have been established or expanded thanks to the Lilly Endowment funding:

•The Women's Giving Circle.

•The Friends of Jay County Agriculture Endowment.

•Board development workshops for more than 40 area non-profit organizations.

•New community endowments being created on a matching fund basis with Portland, Dunkirk, Pennville, Redkey, Bryant, and Salamonia grassroots support.

•A foundation directors' endowment fund supported by current and past members of the foundation's board.

•A series of high-energy speakers in the field of community development, including Vaughn Grisham, John Phipps, Mamie McCullough, and Carol Weisman.

Rather than treat the Lilly grant as "free money," the foundation has used those dollars to broaden the foundation's base, reach new constituencies, and assure that the foundation's own grants to community organizations will have even greater impact.

That reflects a degree of wisdom and maturity that other community foundations would do well to emulate. - J.R.[[In-content Ad]]