GRAYS HARBOR COMMUNITY FOUNDATION
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GRAYS HARBOR COMMUNITY FOUNDATION
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A FOUNDATION OF, BY, AND FOR
GRAYS HARBOR COUNTY
Prior to 1994, no community foundation existed in Grays Harbor County. If a donor wanted to leave his estate for the general benefit of local communities, he would have had to establish a separate private foundation or contribute to an organization with a narrower focus. No other public charity in Grays Harbor County serves all areas of need and is also designed specifically to manage permanent endowments. The Grays Harbor Community Foundation fulfills a need, then, for the average person who wishes to leave a gift of lasting benefit to our local community. IMPROVING PHILANTHROPY The Grays Harbor Community Foundation enables any person interested in improving any part of Grays Harbor County to establish a named fund, permanent or temporary, for almost any charitable purpose which benefits local residents.
Year after year, the income from a donor's fund might be used to make grants to local charities who request assistance, to fund scholarships for local students, or to make regular contributions to one or more specific local charities. It's up to each donor to determine his or her fund's purpose.
We handle the administrative details of all such funds, making it easy and affordable for more people to get involved in long-term philanthropy.
To learn about some of the local people who have already used the Grays Harbor Community Foundation to give back to their communities, read some of our stories. HOW DOES IT WORK? A community foundation receives contributions from a wide range of local individuals, families, and businesses. Some contribute to The Fund for Grays Harbor, which is the core fund supporting our community grants program. Others establish separate named funds for specific purposes: to support local education or health, to fund a scholarship for local students, or to endow a local nonprofit institution.
A community foundation saves individual donors time and money by handling the administrative details of many funds jointly: through the community foundation's finance committee it makes investment decisions for all funds; through its staff it handles all tax filings, bookkeeping, and grants processing; through its central design it helps to attract the best grant proposals from the area served, expanding the awareness of individual donors of community needs.
Each community foundation works with the nonprofit organizations in its area of service to find ways in which the foundation can support or improve their work. All local charities are welcome and encouraged to apply for grant support.
Depending on the donor's wishes, the process of making grants may differ. Some donors choose to become involved in the grant process by offering recommendations to our board (donor advised funds). Others allow our board of directors to select grant recipients (unrestricted funds). Or a donor may choose to specify a general area in which grants from his or her fund should be made (area of interest funds).
Regardless, the community foundation's board of directors oversees the whole process, and in order to ensure that all grantees are charitable organizations, the board also has final say on how assets are distributed. This results in a balance of control between what donors hope to accomplish and the oversight of the "community," as represented by our board.
Because of this and other built-in "safeguards" of the community foundation model, the IRS permits each fund established in a community foundation to qualify as a "component fund" of it.
In effect, that means that each fund qualifies as a publicly-supported, non-profit 501(c)(3) organization unto itself. It becomes, as it were, a "foundation within a foundation."
In turn, the advantage of public-charity status gives donors maximum tax benefits for all their donations.
We simplify the process of giving. By offering donors an easier way to achieve their charitable and financial goals, we help them avoid the complicated and sometimes expensive process of establishing a separate private foundation. We help them focus on what's really important -- supporting solutions to local problems.
Our expenses are funded by a simple annual administrative fee (1% of total net assets in most cases). There are no other fees to establish or maintain a fund.
The Grays Harbor Community Foundation is a philanthropic resource for all people who want to improve Grays Harbor County. Our mission, in essence, is to help the people who help our community.
Our hope is that by telling our stories and sharing our message, we will inspire more people to begin sharing their own dreams for making Grays Harbor a better place to live, work, play and serve.
Follow a link to learn more:
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Grays Harbor Community Foundation is a tax-exempt public charity dedicated to serving the broad needs of Grays Harbor County in Washington State. We are a member of the Council on Foundations; we have committed ourselves to the National Standards for U.S. community foundations; we are audited annually; and we consider ourselves accountable to the public upon whom we depend for support.We thank Darrell Westmoreland, Kevin Hong, Ellen Pickell, and the Polson Museum for providing the photographs used in this website. We'd like to showcase the work of more local photographers and artists on this website and in our publications. Please contact us if you'd like to help. Mail: 707 J Street | P.O. Box 615 | Hoquiam, WA 98550Email: info@gh-cf.orgPhone: 360.532.1600Fax: 360.532.8111Last modified: 01/11/06 |
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