Designated Fund

What is a Designated Fund?

Establishing a Designated Fund allows you to support the good work of a speciﬁc nonproﬁt organization. Because it is given through your community foundation, your gift provides the organization you select not only funding, but planned giving and investment management services and the power of endowment.

How it works

• You identify an organization that you wish to beneﬁt.

• You make a gift to your community foundation — you can give cash, appreciated stocks, real estate, or other assets.

• We set up a special fund in your name or in the name of the nonproﬁt organization you choose.

• You receive tax beneﬁts in the year your gift is made.

• Our board issues grants to the designated nonproﬁt organization and we handle all the administrative details, including managing speciﬁc qualiﬁcations

that you may establish for grant disbursements.

• You receive updates on the impact the fund is making.

• Your gift can be placed into an endowment that is invested over time. Earnings from your fund are used to make grants addressing community needs.

Your gift — and all future earnings from your gift — is a permanent source of community capital, helping to do good work forever.


	A Source of Strength and Stability Designated Fund Example Three times a week, Wendell Pittman delivers meals to homebound senior citizens as a volunteer for Meals for Seniors. The organization depended largely on small donations and lacked a consistent funding source. “Our organization needed more reliable funding, but we had trouble accepting large or complex gifts,” says Mary Lynch, Meals for Seniors’ executive director. After talking with his ﬁnancial advisor, Wendell decided to begin a Designated Fund with his local community foundation. He donated a piece of rental property that was becoming a bother in his retirement. The foundation then sold the property establishing the Meals for Seniors Fund. Thanks to this fund, other donors wishing to assist with Meals for Seniors can contribute assets of a variety of types and sizes to augment the fund.