June 26, 2011 | Read Time: 1 minute
In 2009, when Kim McNamer joined Deschutes Children’s Foundation—which operates four campuses that provide rent-free offices to human-services groups—she inherited the job of collecting more than $60,000 in pledges made as part of a $4.1-million capital campaign to help the group construct a new building as well as an addition to an existing building.
The task has not always been easy. “They’re saying they don’t have disposable income right now; touch base with me in three months,” she says. “There’s just a constant pushing back. Then there are some that are just not responding.”
With debt service on a $600,000 tax-exempt bond to pay off, Ms. McNamer says she is hoping the charity can make ends meet without starting to charge rent or increase fees to the 27 nonprofits that use its space, many of which are also struggling.
Still, the capital campaign allowed the charity to construct a “beautiful new building” where nonprofits now serve more than 10,000 clients, she says.
Ms. McNamer, who works with a $500,000 budget, says her board now expects her to spend 80 percent of her time on fund raising, but she is hoping to get some help by converting a half-time development position into a full-time post.
She says central Oregon, like other small or rural communities, lacks the fund-raising expertise that she found when she worked in Portland for 12 years.
“Executive directors are not only having to run the organization, but to fund raise as well and being asked to do a lot more with less,” she says.
