One-Time Activist Vows to Spark ‘Sense of Urgency’ at San Francisco Fund

Pamela H. David beat out 300 other applicants to become the new executive director of the Walter and Elise Haas Fund, in San Francisco. The foundation’s board considered 100 of the applicants to be serious candidates, but even after facing down such long odds, the former street activist and city-government bureaucrat still seems surprised to find herself in charge of a $180-million philanthropy.

“It was very bold of the trustees to pick someone like me, with such an unusual background,” she says. Yet at a time when California is facing a $35-billion budget deficit, charities may soon appreciate having politically savvy leaders in the nonprofit world.

In recent years the Haas Fund has made between $10-million and $12-million in total annual grants. It is one of five foundations in the Bay Area created by descendants of the heirs of Levi Strauss, the German-Jewish immigrant who first began selling riveted denim pants during the California gold rush. Together, the foundations started by the heirs are worth $1-billion.

Walter and Elise Haas died in 1979 and 1990 respectively, but their children and grandchildren still control the foundation’s board. Ms. David replaces Bruce Sievers, who retired after leading the Haas Fund for 19 years. His legacy, she says, is one of careful and thoughtful philanthropy. Now that Ms. David has taken over, he is a fellow at the Haas Center for Public Service at Stanford University, where he is writing a book tentatively called “Between Public and Private: Philanthropy, Civil Society, and the Fate of the Commons.”

Ms. David is no clone of her predecessor. She hails from the high-volume world of local politics, having waged many street protests in San Francisco during the 1980s. Most of her banner-waving had to do with gay rights, abortion rights, and other liberal causes. High-profile work on the 1987 March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights led her to work on Jesse Jackson’s 1988 presidential campaign. She then parlayed her activism into a job with Mayor Art Agnos’s administration. She says she loved working for the city, where she eventually was put in charge of carrying out the city’s response to the 1996 legislation that overhauled the federal welfare program. Now at the helm of one of the city’s oldest foundations, Ms. David works out of a corner office in a restored brick building on the Embarcadero waterfront. She manages a staff of 14.

During her first year, she and the board will review the foundation’s grant making. She expects that the emphasis on work in the Bay Area will remain, along with its program that supports Jewish charities. But otherwise the foundation, which in the past supported an almost limitless range of charity work in the region, could change radically, though she makes few predictions.

Ms. David will only say that she wants to inject a sense of urgency into the Haas Fund — to make it more attentive to the immediate needs of the city. In her grant making, she is likely to encourage charities to find ways to become more efficient, especially given the budget and economic woes making it hard for California organizations to count on government, businesses, or wealthy donors for the kind of largesse they provided in the 1990s. “This city has 3,500 nonprofits, a bloated nonprofit infrastructure,” she says. “There’s duplication of mission and we’re not organizing that effectively. Combine that with the budget crisis and there’s going to be a problem.”

She says she has already discovered one big difference in working in philanthropy compared with government. “There’s no question about accountability in local government because you’re reminded of its multiple layers, starting with the people you serve all the way through the political ranks. Here you have to create accountability yourself. There are no external pressures in a family foundation.”

In an interview Ms. David discusses her plans at the foundation:

When you worked for the city, what sorts of grant makers were most effective?

I actually was a grant maker with the city. I was responsible for $25-million in grants, 90 percent of which went to nonprofit organizations that served low-income people. While there, we tried to engage foundations. There were not as many and the alliances were not as deep as I would have liked. We appreciated it when foundations would come to us open-minded, and say, “We want to assist. Where are the holes? Where can we play a leveraging role?”

How does your background in city government prepare you for this job?

Certainly I have a lot of knowledge of community issues. That’s the advantage of working for the city. Your knowledge crosses fields: It’s economic development. It’s youth. It’s seniors. And it’s even some aspects of arts and culture. I have an understanding of San Francisco in particular. I understand how government works, and how public-sector policy and budgets drive so many other factors. For philanthropy to be effective it’s important to understand that relationship.

How will your experience working for or with organizations that receive grants inform you now?

I appreciate how hard it is to ask for money all the time. I have seen nonprofits get sidetracked from their basic mission because the philanthropic community wants to be new and different every five years. Both the public and private sector have done a great disservice by focusing solely on programs and not infrastructure, which I define not just as back-room functions but as simple mission. Let’s say you have a community center that keeps its doors open to the public, provides a referral service, and offers a few kids’ programs or seniors’ programs. Unfortunately both the private and public sectors do not want to fund it as a community center. We want to fund its child care, or its computer classes, and let them keep 15 percent for overhead.

What are the greatest philanthropic needs in the Bay Area?

Governor Gray Davis plans to reduce his $35-billion deficit by giving more responsibility to local governments, which will put a strain on the Bay Area, where income is already falling. We’ve moved people off the welfare rolls into poverty. There’s no shortage of a work ethic out there. People are trying to keep their heads above water. But cost of living, low wages, and no benefits conspire to keep many families at a high level of economic instability.

How do you handle friends who approach you for grants?

It’s not a big change compared to working at the city. The thing is, now people think I have greater flexibility with the money. In public life, I have always tried to be a resource, to have more to offer than just a check. I want to be a convener, enabler, facilitator, and a yenta. I take that very seriously.

ABOUT PAMELA H. DAVID, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF THE WALTER AND ELISE HAAS FUND

Education: Received a bachelor’s degree from Pitzer College, in Claremont, Calif., where she majored in education and psychology, and a master’s in educational psychology from Stanford University.

Previous employment: Worked for the last 12 years in San Francisco city government, in the areas of community and economic development. In 1998, she was appointed director of the Mayor’s Office of Community Development. Before her government jobs, she spent most of her time as a political activist.

Charitable interests: Serves on the United Way Community Building Council, which helps the United Way in San Francisco allot the money it raises. She is president of the board of Frameline, a nonprofit group that puts on the San Francisco International Lesbian & Gay Film Festival.

Publications she subscribes to: The cooking magazines Bon Appetit, Gourmet, and Saveur, and current-events publications including Utne Reader, Mother Jones, and The New Yorker.

On her nightstand: The Orchid Thief by Susan Orlean.