Donor Advised Fund
If you're thinking about forming a private foundation or making a significant contribution, a Donor Advised Fund at The Community Foundation For Delta County offers many advantages. By nature, a private foundation is complex to establish, expensive to operate, subject to strict compliance regulations, and restrictive in distribution, payouts and investments.
A Donor Advised Fund, on the other hand, acts like a private foundation but is simpler; less expensive and far less restrictive. Advised funds enable you to professionalize your charitable giving without the annoyances entailed in running a private foundation.
With a Donor Advised Fund, you can refer requests to us, give anonymously, or suggest we make payments to any charity that falls within our grant-making guidelines. Then, we take care of all the clerical details. Under the Internal Revenue Service rules, our board must approve all grants. Our grant allocation procedures protect you by making sure the charity is above board and actively servicing the public.
Once you pass away, your fund will become unrestricted to help meet unknown future needs, unless you specify that you prefer it to become part of a Field of Interest Fund.
A minimum of $5,000 (either a one-time gift or accumulated gifts totaling $5,000) is recommended to establish a Donor Advised Fund with The Community Foundation For Delta County. Because a Donor Advised Fund is not subject to minimum yearly disbursements, you could fund it with undeveloped real estate or other currently non-income producing assets. You also benefit from significant tax benefits.
Field of Interest Fund
If you have a special interest you'd like to support, you can establish a Field of Interest Fund with a recommended gift of at least $5,000. Your Field of Interest Fund, which will award grants to projects or programs within your specified area will carry your name or the name of a loved one in perpetuity. When we approve a grant to an organization in that specific field of interest, we make the gift in your name. For example, we tell the organization, "This grant was made possible by the John Doe Fund."
Donors choose fields of interest that are intentionally broad so that The Foundation can still make appropriate grants to programs in that area years from now. For example, Field of Interest Funds can benefit general interest areas like "the arts" or "programs to support children." Gifts of this kind give discretion to the Board of Trustees to select the agencies that most effectively achieve your charitable interest.
The advantage of a broad Field of Interest Fund is that it keeps up with the times. The community will always be concerned about its young people. But today's problems weren't around 30 years ago, and neither were the charities that address them. Many of tomorrow's issues can't be anticipated today. Rather than locking your fund into a few specific charities that may be good today (but gone tomorrow), we place your Field of Interest Fund grants into the best hands at the right time, in perpetuity.
Like a Named Fund, you will receive immediate tax benefits, and you can choose to add to your fund at any time. Through a Field of Interest Fund, you can create a lasting legacy of caring for an area of interest that is particularly close to your heart.
Scholarship Fund
A Scholarship Fund enables you to help students pay for the growing costs of education. Not only can you name your fund, but you can also designate exactly how you want us to use the available income earned by your fund. For example, you may want to help students who are pursuing careers in a particular field or are going to a certain college.
A minimum of $5,000 is recommended as a scholarship fund investment level to generate enough income for yearly scholarship distributions. We take care of all the details in awarding scholarships from publicizing availability to paying the scholarship grants. A School Scholarship Committee, made up of responsible and knowledgeable teachers and administrators, helps screen and select candidates for a broad range of scholarship awards. You may become part of that process, if you choose.
Unrestricted and Named Funds
You can use your gifts to meet ever-changing community needs– including future needs, which often cannot be anticipated at the time your gift is made. We evaluate all aspects of community well-being– arts and culture, economic development, education, environment, health and human services, neighborhood revitalization, and more. Your unrestricted gift is then used to make a difference where it is needed most.
With a donation of $5,000, you can make a lasting contribution and help serve the needs of a changing community. A Named Fund becomes a part of The Foundation's Unrestricted Fund which targets the seven broad grant areas– arts and culture, education, youth, health, human services, community development, and the environment. Each year we publish the names of our donors in our annual report, ensuring that your name– or the name of a loved one– will always be remembered and linked with philanthropy, unless of course you choose not to have your name published.
Once you establish a Named Fund, you may always add to it to increase the benefit level. Aside from immediate benefits, establishing a Named Fund can be the first important step to creating your own legacy of caring. You may also start such a fund with less than $5,000; however, no grants will be made from the fund until it reaches the $5,000 level. Many people start with a $1,000 and add to it annually until it is a $5,000 Fund.
