Foundations, or, Thank God Duke University got some money!

I was Uptown yesterday doing some research for my grant proposal for United Family Services. I was trying to find a list of foundations sympathetic to the cause, which is legal defense for domestic violence victims. I pulled out a very handy, 3,000 page 2006 listing of foundations.

For the record, a foundation can be set up by a business or an individual. I have nothing against foundations in general. If Bill Gates wants to have his own foundation, fine. If Wachovia wants to have its own foundation, fine. If Mecklenburg County wants to have its own foundation, fine. There are many reasons why these are helpful.

The idea being foundations is actually a good one. Not every organization can get national or even state grants. Having a foundation in Mecklenburg County is helpful because it concentrates the aid in Charlotte and because it concentrates funding. People may not want to spend their money on an organization that's not going to help their community. I think this is logical, and not selfish.

On the other hand, some foundations are less than helpful. I believe charity and giving should be based on need. Which is why I don't take charity. I have never borrowed money from anyone not named Citibank or the Federal Government. But I'm also in a good position. I'm white, I'm male, I'm well educated. The system isn't exactly screwing me over. I think charity should be focused on people that need it the most.

So it was a little upsetting to me to see things like this:

Foundation A: In 2004, gave 500,000 dollars to Duke University.
Foundation B: In 2004, gave 200,000 dollars to UNC Charlotte.
Foundation C: In 2004, gave 100,000 dollars to United Way of the Central Carolinas.

etc. (All of this is public information).

If there are organizations that don't need charity, I'm pretty sure universities and United Way are at the top of the list. For the record, you can just give money directly to a charity, United Way is just a way to siphon of millions of dollars in administrative fees. They are amazingly unhelpful, although they do have nice pamphlets.

Why would anyone give 200,000 dollars to UNC Charlotte? Note that this is not for scholarships, although some foundations do fund scholarships. This is just a 200,000 dollar donation to a public university. There's not a need for private, charitable giving to the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Why? Um, because its funded by the state of North Carolina! And this is not me picking against one school I don't like. I'm an alum of Charlotte.

This is a huge sum of money, but its practically inconsequential to a major university. I can understand if you went to a small school or a historically underfunded school, but why give 200,000 to UNCC when it has state/federal funding and twenty thousand plus students? Duke has thirteen thousand students, do they need private funding?

Not to mention the actual operating budgets of these universities. Duke had a fiscal year 2006 budget of 3.3 BILLION dollars! Um, someone might need that 500,000 dollar grant a little more. And this is not for scholarships. But even if it was for scholarships, its not like scholarships are the area of greatest need. The government gives out billions of dollars in student financial aid every year.

The point is, there are other areas that are more in need. Five hundred thousand dollars doesn't mean much to Duke University. But five hundred thousand dollars is more than the operating budget of a lot of non-profits. Five hundred thousand dollars will not build anything at Duke. But it can feed thousands of people, or providing thousands of students with mentoring, or run five seperate, fully funded legal assistance projects.

Don't give money to your school. Your school doesn't need it. After paying thousands of dollars in tuition, trust me, you've done your part. If you want to give money for a scholarship fund, that's fine. That would actually be helpful. But there's no need to give money to a well funded program.

There is an immense amount of need, and that should be the basis of where you give. Don't waste precious resources. A hundred dollars to a homeless shelter may mean a lot, when a hundred thousand dollars to a university means next to nothing. A hundred dollars to a church may actually trickle down to someone who needs it. A thousand dollars to United Way will go straight into their pockets.

Before I finish, though, I'd like to say that there are a lot of foundations that do a lot of good. Most of the banks contribute millions of dollars to a variety of organizations (although they still contribute to universities). And insurance providers do a lot of good as well. The Blue Cross Blue Shield Foundation contributes over two million dollars annually to free clinics. Free clinics are, um, actually helpful.

Put as much thought into giving as you do into spending. This stuff really matters.