History
In May 1964, four men – J.J. Daniel, Robert R. Feagin, Laurence Lee, Jr. and Thomas R. McGehee – formally created The Greater Jacksonville Area Community Foundation, the 77th community foundation in the United States and the first in the State of Florida.
"Ours will be a small beginner but we can hope that on down the road we will take our place as one of the major foundations in America," wrote McGehee to the first Board of Governors that May.
"We will be a depository for the people of Jacksonville – both the large and small – the wealthy and the moderate, to be able to give for the betterment of their fellow man, not just today, but in a continuing way, through the principles of a foundation, for years to come."
Forty years later, McGehee's vision is being realized. The Community Foundation today ranks among the 20 largest foundations in Florida and is the state's third largest community foundation, ranked by assets. It serves as steward of more than $125 million invested by the people of Jacksonville. In its first four decades, it made grants in excess of $115 million to benefit individuals and organizations.
Early Leaders
For almost the first two decades of the Foundation's life, McGehee was its heart and soul. He repeatedly chaired the Board of Governors, he hired the first staff (Byon Morris, recruited from Baptist Hospital in 1979), and he instigated the "Five-Year Revitalization/Development Program" to grow the Foundation's assets between 1979-1984. So integral to the Foundation's work was he that a consultant once noted that the public had "the misconception that the Greater Jacksonville Community Foundation is the personal philanthropy of Thomas McGehee." McGehee's vision, however, was bigger than his own philanthropy, and in 1983, he took two significant steps that would influence the Foundation's future.
From the beginning, the Foundation had been governed by Trustees, who represented various financial institutions that managed trusts for individual donors, and by the Distribution Committee, whose members represented various community institutions. Together, the Trustees and Distribution Committee formed the Foundation's Board of Governors. There was no direct connection to the donor community, or the community of nonprofits that would be the Foundation's beneficiaries.
In 1983, under McGehee's leadership, the Foundation formed its first Advisory Board, a 67-member body that, according to chairman Guy W. Botts, would be an "...important link between the Community Foundation, private and corporate sources of funds, and the institutions that are the beneficiaries of private philanthropy."
Also in 1983, McGehee paid a visit to a close personal friend, Bob Shircliff. Shircliff recalls what transpired:
"Tom McGehee was among my best friends and, when he came to see me in my office in the Gulf Life Tower, he was very worried about the future of the Community Foundation. He knew the Foundation needed to move to the next level, improve and expand its image, but it wasn't happening. He asked me to join the board of directors and take over as chair of the Foundation.
'Tom,' I said, 'I don't know anything about running a community foundation.' And Tom said, 'Bob, it's obvious that we don't, either.' "
Shircliff took over as chairman and went to school on community foundations. Meanwhile, the Advisory Board members joined in the task of attracting donors to the Foundation. On Nov. 1, 1984, the Foundation celebrated its 20th anniversary and the conclusion of the Five-Year Revitalization/Development Program with assets of $2.6 million, up from $250,000, and $2.9 million in grants were awarded from 1979-1984.
Shircliff, however, was not content to rest on these accomplishments. He launched a marketing campaign and a search for a new executive director. It was the leadership search that brought him up short: he interviewed 14 local candidates – "upstanding, intelligent, prominent individuals... But once they grasped the scope of the task at hand, they lost interest."
Finally, in desperation, Shircliff sought professional help in identifying candidates for the position and was sent the names of three candidates: "An extremely qualified gentleman from California who was way too expensive, and a good candidate from Atlanta who was just expensive. We didn't hire the Atlanta candidate on the spot because we wanted to meet the third candidate before making a decision. The third candidate was a young man from Winston-Salem, North Carolina, who also was expensive, named Andy Bell. I invited Andy to fly to Jacksonville. He asked,
" 'How will I recognize you at the airport?'
"I told him, 'I'll be the only person in the entire airport wearing a bow tie.'
"Andy said, 'No you won't. I'll be wearing one, too.' "
Shircliff hired Bell without the Board's approval. "We didn't have enough money budgeted to pay him but Tom [McGehee] and I agreed to subsidize his salary until he could get the Foundation on its feet." At that time, 1988, the Community Foundation had assets of $4.5 million.
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Building Assets
When Andy Bell left the Winston-Salem Foundation, it had assets of $25 million, which Shircliff and McGehee considered substantial. Shircliff hoped to grow the Jacksonville Foundation's assets to $10 million, and he looked to Bell to get the job done. Bell's strategy was to tackle governance and public identity issues simultaneously.
The Foundation restructured its board, moving from a board dominated by bank trustees to a community board of 10 members, six of whom were appointed by the governor, the mayor and other leaders. This not only consolidated control of the Foundation within the organization, but the "appointed" positions lent prestige and credibility to the board. New board members were recruited, led by Jack Uible, Courtenay Wilson and Shep Bryan.
At the same time, Bell began making the rounds in the community.
"Andy was young, bright and had a vision," Shircliff recalls. "He would always start his presentations with the history of community foundations – the story of community leaders in Cleveland, who were concerned about the future of their community should the Rockefellers leave, banding together and starting a foundation that would serve the common good and, ultimately, giving away more money than the Rockefellers ever did. It was a great story, and it was part of a very important strategy: He shifted the conversation with potential donors away from 'what the Foundation can do for you,' to 'what the Foundation can do for Jacksonville, with your help.' "
By 1995, when Shep Bryan completed his two-year term as chairman, the Foundation's assets stood at $25 million. From 1996-2001 – the years of booming stock markets before the market slump and the near simultaneous shock of the September 11 attack on America – assets of the Foundation soared 125 percent to almost $70 million. Gifts to the Foundation during this period totaled almost $63 million, buoyed by a $10 million bequest from Harold K. "Bud" Smith in 1997. Though gifts to the Foundation dipped in 2002, they continued strong growth in 2003 and 2004, with a major gift of $25 million from the Lucy Gooding Charitable Foundation Trust.
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Growing Philanthropy
Growing assets is not necessarily synonymous with growing philanthropy. Increasing assets certainly increases the financial capacity for grantmaking. But becoming a wise grantmaker is an evolutionary, not an arithmetic, process.
During the Foundation's first two decades, grants generally were determined by the bank trust officers (and their clients) and approved by the Foundation's Distribution Committee. As governance evolved to a community-based board, a new level of knowledge and understanding was required of these community board members and the Foundation's growing professional staff. In 1989, two critical partnerships developed that were instrumental in helping the Foundation reach new levels.
During that year, the Foundation was selected as one of only three community foundations nationwide to receive a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. The NEA grant provided $50,000 a year for four years to support small and mid-sized arts organizations and individual artists, provided the Foundation raised $100,000 a year in matching funds. The Foundation called the initiative Art Ventures.
"I wasn't too concerned about raising the matching funds," said Shircliff, but his confidence was short-lived. "That was the hardest money I've ever had to raise." The reason? Art Ventures was an open grant-making program – that is, the donors to the Art Ventures endowment could not determine the grant recipients. Donors at that time were not accustomed to giving away money and letting others decide how it would be granted out. But they learned and, since then, Art Ventures has supported scores of artists and small arts organizations through 139 grants valued at $603,469.
The same year, the Jessie Ball duPont Fund presented a similar challenge to the Foundation. The fund offered a grant of $400,000 if the Foundation would raise matching funds and create an endowment to fund targeted grantmaking in response to emerging or existing community problems. The endowment was named the Venture Philanthropy Initiative and the first community challenge the Initiative chose to tackle was interracial cooperation and understanding.
In 1992, Jacksonville's Circuit Judge John Santora made injudicious racist remarks and community tensions erupted into confrontations. In response, The Florida Times-Union ran an extensive article citing evidence of positive race relations in the community. Of the 15 activities cited, 12 had been funded through the Venture Philanthropy Initiative.
These early initiatives created a foundation for subsequent programs:
- Building Our Community – an initiative launched in 1995 to support neighborhoods, children and families;
- The Philanthropic Initiative – launched in 1999 to develop the next generation of philanthropic leaders;
- The Jessie Ball duPont Community Building Fund – a five-year initiative launched in 1999 in partnership with the Jessie Ball duPont Fund to build the capacity of child-serving organizations in Duval County;
- The Women's Giving Alliance – an initiative launched in 2001 to encourage and develop philanthropy among women that benefits women and girls.
And they taught The Community Foundation the many benefits of partnering with others to accomplish community goals. One such partnership – with the Jessie Ball duPont Fund, the Jaguars Foundation and others in 1998 – was instrumental in bringing to Jacksonville the Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC/Jacksonville), a national nonprofit that establishes local offices to assist and support community improvements in at-risk and deteriorating neighborhoods. The $100,000 invested by the Foundation in that effort represented the largest discretionary grant made by the Foundation at that time.
Through a similar partnership, The Community Foundation helped establish in 2002 the Nonprofit Center of Northeast Florida, an independent nonprofit support center serving the Greater Jacksonville region.
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The Future
In 2003, the Foundation staff and trustees paused and took a deep breath. They were no longer grantmaking novices. The Foundation was maturing financially and structurally. In 1994, the Foundation had converted its legal structure from trust to corporate form, allowing much greater freedom with investment performance, and assets were growing at a steady pace. A new affiliate foundation – the Suwannee Valley Community Foundation – had been created and other affiliate opportunities were on the horizon. Jacksonville continued to grow and, with that growth came continuing challenges. It was time to reflect and plan for the future.
Throughout 2003 and 2004, the Foundation studied and listened. Staff and trustees learned about effective strategies in community-based philanthropy. They listened to community groups and leaders discuss the particular challenges facing Jacksonville. They wrestled with decisions on how to best leverage their resources and have a positive impact on the community.
As 2004 came to a close, an array of opportunities were unfolding. Andy Bell, who had led the Foundation since 1988 – overseeing many of the Foundation's most significant developments – decided to retire. The trustees selected Nina M. Waters, the Foundation's executive vice president with a strong background in philanthropy and nonprofit management, to succeed him. Changes in back-office procedures positioned the Foundation for improved investment management and more sophisticated donor services. And the staff and trustees identified public education as the focus of the Foundation's major grantmaking initiative for the next decade.
In 2005 the Trustees and staff developed a comprehensive education initiative called Quality Education for All. The initiative has three components: Community Learning, Advocacy and Public Policy, and Direct Investment (grantmaking—targeted at assisting students make the transition from elementary to middle school).
In 2006, the Pew Partnership for Civic Change selected Jacksonville as one of two cities to implement Learning to Finish, a program focused on dropout prevention. Because of its work in quality education, The Community Foundation was chosen as Jacksonville's sponsoring organization. In addition, The Community Foundation received recognition from The Council on Foundations for its compliance with national standards.
When Tom McGehee wrote to those earliest trustees, he wrote about the power of giving "not just today, but in a continuing way." Through his vision, the hard work of many, and the dreams of many yet to come, The Community Foundation is giving to Jacksonville – "not just today, but in a continuing way."
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