Supporting the Charity of Her Choice

As the first curator of her local museum and long-time Chair of its Board of Directors, Marian Bain, was well-acquainted with the challenges facing non-profit organizations. She knew that just paying the phone bill every month could be an uphill battle.

So when the St. Stephen, New Brunswick resident started planning a charitable gift for the Charlotte County Museum, she had a very specific purpose in mind. “It’s a lot easier to find funding for exhibits or special projects, but nobody wants to fund the mundane, but necessary, operational costs of running a museum”, says Marian.

That’s why Marian chose to establish her own charitable fund with the Fundy Community Foundation in St. Andrews, New Brunswick. The Wall-Bain Charlotte County Museum Fund allowed Marian to direct her fund to her favourite charity and to specify the purpose of the fund. Now, every year the earnings from Marian’s legacy will provide sustained funding for the museum to cover its operational expenses.

The Wall-Bain Charlotte County Museum Fund is an example of a designated fund – one of the many choices a community foundation delivers to its donors to fulfil their philanthropic goals. A donor may opt for a donor advised fund to achieve flexibility in how grants are directed, since funds of this kind allow the donor to make annual recommendations to the community foundation’s Board of Directors about which charitable organizations should receive income from the donor’s fund.

Or the donor may set up a field of interest fund which enables grants to be made to organizations within the donor’s specific area of interest. The Board of Directors selects charities to receive grants from funds of this kind, based on applications reviewed by the board’s grants committee.

Many donors prefer to set up a community or unrestricted fund. This kind of fund still offers the donor a naming opportunity, but puts the focus on priority community needs. Grant applications are invited from various community organizations, and grants are made after review by a grants committee and approval by the foundation’s Board of Directors.

Increasingly, donors are looking for ways to ensure their funds will have a lasting influence on their favourite causes. Because community foundations are experts in community issues and can ensure a gift is directed as the donor intended for years to come, a donor may be attracted to the continuing, permanent benefit a community foundation offers over an outright current gift to a charitable organization.

That’s exactly the kind of enduring benefit Marian Bain has in mind for the Charlotte County Museum.