As the season of giving comes to a close, we can be sure of this: The charity that will raise more money than any other will be Fidelity Charitable, an $30bn enterprise that manages the charitable giving of more than 200,000 mostly well-to-do clients. Last year (2018), Fidelity Charitable collected $9bn in deposits. That was more …
Emmett Carson’s reign atop the Silicon Valley Community Foundation, the US’s biggest community foundation, came to an end today. The foundation’s board, which hired a law firm to investigate allegations of workplace bullying and misconduct, said that the “SVCF clearly failed to provide a safe and inclusive workplace environment for its employees.” “The unacceptable workplace behavior that …
Too many nonprofit boards are weak. The board of the Silicon Valley Community Foundation was reputed to be one of them. That changed, dramatically, today when the board put Emmett Carson, the foundation’s CEO, on paid leave while it conducts what certainly appears to be a serious investigation into the workplace culture of the foundation, …
Days after a workplace scandal with #metoo overtones led to the departure of Mari Ellen Loijens, the chief fundraiser at the fast-growing Silicon Valley Community Foundation, questions are swirling about Emmett Carson, the founding CEO of the SVCF. Carson has been trying hard to distance himself from the noxious behavior of Loijens, which was exposed …
Rules, they say, are made to be broken. This is not necessary when it comes to the rules designed to promote transparency in foundations. They’re so ineffectual that there’s no need to break them. Wealthy donors can and do hide charitable giving for which they claim tax deductions, the investments they hold in tax-advantaged accounts …
“Most donors don’t think their way into giving to charity.” So writes Al Cantor, a smart guy and a veteran of the nonprofit world. “I give from my heart – and my observation is that most other donors do the same thing,” he goes on to say. “There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that.” Sorry, Al, …
This is not the time to be holding onto money that will eventually go to charity. Needs are urgent: Globally, about one in 10 people remain extremely poor. In the US, the environment, immigrants, civil rights, reproductive freedoms and democracy itself face threats from the Trump administration. Meantime, it’s not hard to identify standout nonprofits. Yet …
Nonprofit Chronicles 