Club Meeting Recap--January 26, 2015

Posted 
on Jan 27, 2015
 

Pete McCown Updates the Club on the 

Elkhart County Community Foundation

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Club Vice President Terri Rickel rang the bell calling to order the January 26th meeting of the Elkhart Rotary Club. Todd Stone offered the invocation and led in the pledge.

Announcements:

  • Jim Brotherson is having some health issues and prayers are appreciated.  Cards are welcomed also.
  • The foundation dinner scheduled for February16th has been cancelled and will be rescheduled for a later date.
  • Nic Montgomery of The Salvation Army was presented a check for all the proceeds from the Christmas fundraising.
  • Jeff Peat gave the foundation minute, highlighting the match program. He explained that points given when a member donates can be transferred to another Rotarian to maximize the matching program.

The sergeant for the day was Clarence Thomas who exacted fines from numerous members.  All money collected by the Sergeant's Committee is pooled into a fund that is disbursed to area charities at the end of each year.

The speaker for the day was Pete McCowen from the Elkhart County Community Foundation. He spoke about how things are going at the Foundation, particularly recent accomplishments.

Facts from Pete's Discussion:

1. For Fiscal year beginning July 1, 2013 and ending June 30, 2014. Current assets = 227M, making them the 75th largest community foundation in the country. There were 6.5M new contributions, 7M in new grants and 27M in investment returns.

2. Beginning with the new year the foundation is working with a different grant model utilizing 5 grant committees. The new committees are scholarship, youth development, vibrant community, quality of life, and key initiatives. They have a grant application process 2 times a year and each takes about 6 months. This cycle they had about 2.25M available for grants and about 4M in grant applications.

3. Lily Endowment: A 1.5M challenge grant.

Pete also said they are spending some time working on an unrestricted scholarship fund. They are also exploring other foundations work.

For more information, visit: www.elkhartccf.org

Terri Rickel asked the trivia question for the week and the meeting was then adjourned.