Billionaire Casts Wide Net, But Stays Close to Home

Paul Allen’s philanthropy is eclectic, a reflection of a man who has pursued a variety of business ventures

and enthusiastically indulges his interest in sports, music, and technology.

Last year, Mr. Allen, who, along with Bill Gates, founded Microsoft, contributed $74-million to charity. He provided $14-million to the University of Washington, $250,000 to the Affiliated Tribes of Northwest Indians to help bridge the “digital divide,” and $250,000 to Harborview Medical Center, in his hometown of Seattle, for research on how virtual-reality technology might distract burn victims from their pain.

He also contributed $14-million to land-conservation groups and $12-million for social-services efforts in the Pacific Northwest.

His passion for the arts — he has helped several Seattle-area arts groups — is perhaps best seen in the Experience Music Project, a $240-million rock-‘n’-roll museum he built in 2000. The museum was designed by the renowned architect Frank Gehry to evoke the image of a broken guitar.

Mr. Allen, who has contributed more than $500-million to charity over his lifetime, has seen his net worth slide in recent years. Forbes estimated in September that his fortune is worth $21-billion, down from the $40-billion the magazine said he was worth in 1999. And he lost $7-billion recently when his investment in Charter Communications, a St. Louis-based cable company, went sour.

Still, Mr. Allen, 50, is the third-wealthiest American, after Bill Gates and Warren Buffett, according to Forbes. He left Microsoft in 1983 to battle Hodgkin’s disease, but he held on to his Microsoft shares and has invested in a number of technology and entertainment companies over the last two decades. He also owns the Portland Trailblazers basketball team and the Seattle Seahawks football team and this year entered a yachting team in the America’s Cup race.

Grant-Making Style Varies

Mr. Allen says he has no big strategic plan or fixed principles that guide his giving. Unlike some philanthropists, he does not ascribe to a particular theory, pretend to be a visionary, or long for a specific kind of political or social change. His grant-making style varies. Sometimes he likes inventing things from scratch, like the Experience Music Project. Other times he prefers to support existing organizations.

His level of involvement depends on how much the topic engages him. Mr. Allen says he focuses full-time on philanthropy only a few times a year, when grants come up for review. But he often plays more of a hands-on role on projects close to his heart, such as a documentary series about evolution he co-produced for PBS.

Mr. Allen is well aware that he is almost always compared with Mr. Gates in business and philanthropic endeavors. In an interview with The Chronicle, Mr. Allen repeatedly brought up Mr. Gates, who, along with his wife, Melinda, has contributed at least $23-billion to charity. The two share an interest in introducing children to technology and are collaborating on an educational project that will be announced this year, Mr. Allen says.

But other than that, Mr. Allen says his philanthropy is very different from Mr. Gates’s. While Mr. Gates has focused most of his giving on a limited number of causes — such as improving education and fighting disease in developing countries — Mr. Allen supports a wider range of efforts.

And while Mr. Gates has devoted much of his philanthropy to international causes, Mr. Allen proudly points out that his philanthropy mainly goes to organizations in the Pacific Northwest, where he grew up and continues to live. Asked whether he had any role models in philanthropy, Mr. Allen mentioned members of the prominent Stroum family, who have given to the University of Washington, the Seattle Symphony, and local Jewish institutions, among others. Sam Stroum, an investor and entrepreneur who died in 2001, has passed the mantle of civic responsibility to the next generation of Seattle philanthropists, including the two Microsoft founders, Mr. Allen says.

Mr. Allen has been criticized for not devoting as much of his resources to philanthropy, proportionately, as Mr. Gates has.

Laura Rich, author of The Accidental Zillionaire: Demystifying Paul Allen, says Mr. Allen’s “philanthropy reflects the fact that he isn’t single-minded about things the way Gates is,” she says. “He has a broad and diverse range of interests.” She also notes that while he is one of the richest men on the planet, he is by no means one of the most generous philanthropists.

Jason Hunke, a spokesman for Mr. Allen, says that Ms. Rich’s book is “a joke.” He outlines the difference between the Microsoft founders, saying that Bill and Melinda Gates’s “resource base allows them to tackle global issues that require grants at the level of hundreds of millions of dollars. The thousands of grants the Allen family have done over the years range from thousands to tens of millions and are a vital source of support for the region.”

Jimi Hendrix Fan

One of Mr. Allen’s strongest interests is music. He plays the guitar and collects Jimi Hendrix memorabilia. Last year, he lobbied the U.S. Senate to declare 2003 the “Year of the Blues,” which it did. Now he is producing a PBS documentary on blues music and organizing benefit concerts across the country that raise money for music education and blues artists.

Mr. Allen, who is single, says his family plays an important role in his philanthropy. His sister, Jody Allen Patton, who is also the chief executive officer of Vulcan, his investment company, helps make decisions about which groups Mr. Allen supports. “Our parents encouraged us to think about giving back to the community,” he says.

Mr. Allen says he gained an appreciation for the outdoors from his late father, Kenneth, and that he honors his father’s memory by supporting organizations that buy land and keep it from being developed.

In the last four years, he has helped land trusts acquire 502 million acres in the Pacific Northwest. Last year he gave $2.5-million to the American Land Conservancy, in San Francisco, and $1.1-million to the Western Rivers Conservancy, in Portland.

Mr. Allen’s father and mother influenced his philanthropy in other ways.

Kenneth Allen worked as a librarian at the University of Washington, in Seattle, and his son has given the institution a total of $35-million over the years. His gifts include $10-million, in 1990, to build a new library that is named after his father, and $5-million, in 1994, to the university’s museum, which is now called the Faye G. Allen Center for Visual Arts, after his mother.

Mr. Allen says that the university played an important role in his and Bill Gates’s early exposure to technology. When he was in high school, at Lakeside School — which he has also supported with a gift of $10-million in 1996 — Mr. Allen participated as a de facto student in the university’s computer-science department, he says, sometimes staying until midnight programming.

Last year he gave $14-million to help build a new computer-science building. Judy Mahoney, an assistant dean of the college of engineering, said that Mr. Allen’s gift not only helped the university come close to reaching its capital-campaign goal of $72-million, but it also helped motivate volunteers and other donors, she says.

Mr. Allen did not actually attend the University of Washington. He went to Washington State, in Pullman, but dropped out before finishing. He donated $3-million to his alma mater in 1996.

Hands-On Approach

Mr. Allen remains a hands-on technologist. At Vulcan he still spends much of his time working on specific programming and engineering projects.

Like many others who made their money in the industry, science and electronics play a role in his philanthropy. The Experience Music Project, for example, was built to be a cutting-edge multimedia museum.

In a similar vein, Mr. Allen has supported efforts to increase public understanding of science. In 2001, his documentary company produced a seven-part series on evolution for WGBH, the Boston PBS affiliate.

The series won critical acclaim, and Mr. Allen is currently helping to produce another documentary series tentatively called The World at Risk, on the topic of global public health. He likes supporting documentaries, he says, because they have a “long shelf life.”

Paula Apsell, executive producer of the science show Nova, co-produced both science series. She said that without Mr. Allen, the evolution series would never have been broadcast because the controversial topic scared off other sponsors. She recalls that when she was seeking money for the series, she went to Seattle to meet with Mr. Allen, Ms. Patton, and seven world-renowned evolution specialists. All of them sat around the table, she says, while Mr. Allen grilled the scientists about what should be included in a miniseries. At the end of the day Mr. Allen turned to everyone and said, “OK, let’s do it.”

“The funding situation in public television is tight,” Ms. Apsell says. Mr. Allen, whom she calls “far-sighted,” has supported documentaries that either do not have a constituency in the corporate world, or risk creating controversy. He also does not try to dominate the filming process, she says, even though he contributes most of the resources. “He has a lot of respect for the sweat equity we put into it.”

Unusual Structure

Mr. Allen structures his philanthropy in an unusual way. He has six separate foundations, all of which bear his name, and he has one staff member working full-time at each of the funds. Ms. Patton and Susan Coliton oversee the staff, who are housed at Vulcan. The funds are like the grant-making programs that most donors house in one philanthropy. One foundation focuses on forest protection, one on medical research, and one developing content for online-education programs. Two support the arts, and another helps needy families in the Pacific Northwest.

All grants come straight from Mr. Allen’s pocket and pass through the foundations. That approach, he says, gives him more flexibility than if he endowed the foundation. Mr. Hunke, says that Mr. Allen has considered switching to a single foundation, but decided that the separate foundations are the best way to ensure a rigorous approach to each grant-making specialty.

While Mr. Allen says it is important for someone with his wealth to be a significant philanthropist, he would not say whether he will give away all of his money before he dies or when he might step up his giving.

“I think when you have the resources I have, you have to think about it, but I don’t want to say,” he told The Chronicle.

He is, however, excited about the gifts he is planning in coming months, pointing out that “it’s blues year.”

He says to also expect a few new projects, which will include, “aeronautical things, sciencey things.” But given how widely Mr. Allen has cast his net in the past, other causes are also likely to capture his attention in 2003.