The $491 million Central Indiana Community Foundation has switched investment advisers after the market crash of 2008, a year
in which it saw greater losses than many of its peers.
The civic festival Spirit and Place, which runs Nov. 5-16, has been a fixture of the fall season since 1996, but organizers
are still trying to explain to Indianapolis residents what it’s all about.
Lilly Endowment lost 26 percent of its value in 2008, falling from $7.7 billion to $5.7 billion. What’s different about the
Indianapolis-based endowment is that its most recent loss caps a downward slide that’s lasted eight years.
The Reeve foundation is supporting the Brawlers this year with a $16,645 grant to Rehabilitation Hospitals of Indiana Sports
Program.
The Nina Mason Pulliam Charitable Trust will give $2.27 million to human service organizations, which are dealing with increased
demand for food and shelter as people lose their jobs, or their homes to foreclosure
A $1.5 million Kresge Foundation grant will help The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis close in on its $74 million fund-raising
goal.
The Mind Trust, an Indianapolis-based not-for-profit that supports education reform, is sponsoring an art show March 6 at the Harrison Center for the Arts.
Although family foundations may grant as little as $50,000 in a year, these foundations wield influence over other philanthropists, and one advocate says they could help guide the spending of billions of economic stimulus money.
A panel convened by IBJ discusses the lack of funding dilemma and need for broad-based support in the Indianapolis arts community.
Some major foundations in central Indiana are narrowing grantmaking criteria so they can funnel their reduced asset streams
toward pressing needs brought on by the recession.
Indiana has its share of renowned dead writers, but the Indianapolis-Marion County Library Foundation is planning to recognize modern-day Hoosier scribes with a new and quite hefty prize.
A group of volunteers who hope to open a home for pregnant teens will soon hire an executive director, thanks to a $25,000
grant from Women’s Fund of Central Indiana.
This fall, Brooke’s Place used a $100,000 gift from the Levin Living Trust to start individual counseling.
With a $10,000 gift from the BKD Foundation, Damar will establish the BKD Dream Fund and award small grants to families for things like a vacation to Disney World or a fishing trip to Michigan.
Columbus philanthropist J. Irwin Miller’s family is poised to donate his majestic home to the Indianapolis Museum of Art,
provided it can raise millions of dollars to maintain the sprawling Bartholomew County property. IMA board members have given
CEO Maxwell Anderson the go-ahead to seek funding for an endowment to care for the home.
Nathan’s Battle Foundation, led by Phil Milto–who has two sons afflicted with the disease–has evolved over 10 years into
what Milto calls a not-for-profit biotech company that has raised money and guided research that resulted in a promising treatment
for Batten disease. Now, some of the gene therapy techniques researchers developed are being applied to other disorders.
Billionaire philanthropists Mel and Bren Simon are laying the groundwork to donate Asherwood–their extravagant Carmel estate
and golf course–to the Indiana University Foundation, potentially to house a new think tank. The couple plans to downsize
into a home just outside the town square in the nearby Village of WestClay.
A $40 million gift from the Simon family to Riley Hospital for Children will help finish a new 10-story in-patient building and launch a fund-raising campaign, Riley Children's Foundation announced this morning.
Leaders of small not-for-profits often are so concerned with day-to-day survival that they have little–if any–time to worry
about saving for the future. A growing number of local organizations are bucking that trend, taking a proactive approach to
build an endowment its leaders hope will result in more stable, predictable income.
