A Frustrating Game to Raise Critical Funds
To the Editor: In response to Humphrey Taylor’s dead-on criticism of the reluctance of many foundations to consider funding a non-profit’s core expenses (“‘Core Funding’ Is Key to Charities’ Success,” Letters to the Editor, February 25), I say: Amen, brother. Many of us on the front lines of…
Don’t Bash Value of Corporate Giving
To the Editor: Two letters to the editor in your April 8 issue -- “Philip Morris’s Giving Is Publicity, Not Charity” and “More Marathon Funds Should Go to Research” -- left me wondering why corporations even bother to give to charities and why charities even bother to raise funds. Regardless of…
Academic Centers Need to Find a New Balance
To the Editor: For the past 25 years I have been an adjunct professor at universities in Missouri, Colorado, and New York State that train non-profit leaders, so I read with great interest Pablo Eisenberg’s March 25 opinion piece on academic centers’ inability to develop true charity leaders…
Critique of Report Missed Some Key Points
To the Editor: Having only recently succeeded Robert Bothwell as the president of the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy, I was not involved in the genesis of N.C.R.P.'s newest report, "$1-Billion for Ideas: Conservative Think Tanks in the 1990s,” but I could not have been more pleased…
Carnegie’s Views on Giving: No Longer Gospel
“The problem of our age is the proper administration of wealth, that the ties of brotherhood may still bind together the rich and poor in harmonious relationship.” Thus begins “Wealth” (later named “The Gospel of Wealth”), Andrew Carnegie’s 1889 manifesto that launched a century of organized…
By Mark Dowie
Contributor
Film and Video Projects Must Appeal to the Heart as Well as the Head
To the Editor: I almost agree with Suzanne Stenson Harmon’s opinion piece “Grants to Media Projects: More Than Meets the Eye” (My View, March 25). Her statements about the power of the media in successfully communicating a charity’s message are right on. In fact, it almost sounds as if she is…
Endowing a Species: a New Frontier for Donors
As the world’s biological riches continue to decline at an alarming rate, an unusual opportunity presents itself for donors who may be accustomed to endowing buildings, schools, and programs for the good of the community: endowing a species. Traditionally, species often have been named for the…
By David Rothenberg
Contributor
Filmmakers Say the Search for Money May Be Harder Than Ever
Jon H. Else, who won the Filmmakers’ Trophy at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, ALSO SEE:Filmmaking Finds a Bigger NicheA Screen Test for CharitiesNew Fund at Andy Warhol Foundation to Benefit Struggling ArtistsNumerous Organizations Help Filmmakers Deal With Financial Matters spent nine years…
By Debra E. Blum
Contributor
The Rev. Henry Lyons Earned His Punishment
To the Editor: Regarding your article on the conviction of the Rev. Henry Lyons (“Fla. Jury Finds Church Leader Guilty of Misusing Donations,” March 11): Black, white, pink, or blue, what the good reverend has been convicted of is no less reprehensible than robbing the church poor box. There are…
Crossing the Atlantic for British Quid: a Major Challenge for Fund-Raising Pros
A senior fund-raising position is currently vacant at a leading British university. The university no doubt wishes to attract the best applicants available, yet it instructed a British recruitment agency not to look in the United States. American candidates were not welcome. Henry Drucker, managing…
By Paul J. Summerfield
Contributor