Key Biscayne Community Foundation: awarding grants for good causes
By KELLY JOSEPHSEN

As Key Biscayne’s vice mayor, Jorge Mendia has a 20-20 view of the needs that face the Village he has called home for more than 30 years.

As a former marketing director for the Dade Community Foundation, fellow islander Ana Gloria Rivas-Vazquez has a clear perspective of how community foundations can make towns and cities better places to live.

Together, they knew exactly how to help Key Biscayne move in a positive direction.

Mendia and Rivas-Vazquez are two of the founding board members for the Key Biscayne Community Foundation, a nonprofit that will use donations to fund grants for good causes.  The group celebrated its creation last night at a reception at The Ritz Carlton, Key Biscayne.

Just like the different experiences of Mendia and Rivas-Vazquez resulted in something they hope is beneficial — the creation of the foundation — the different requests that will come to their group can mean a greater good for the entire community.

The foundation “is really a catalyst for all types of things,” Rivas-Vazquez said. “Sometimes it acts as a matchmaker, because it can bring different groups together to make sure services aren’t replicated. Ideally, what you hope is by bringing these groups together we could accomplish more than the groups could accomplish on their own.”

Here’s how community foundations work:

The groups, the first of which was founded in Cleveland in 1914, are a specific brand of nonprofit, Rivas-Vazquez explained. More than 650 major communities across the country have them, including Coral Gables, Broward County, Palm Beach and Key West.

“What’s a little different is that many private foundations really don’t fund-raise; the really big ones have gotten their money from an initial gift,” she said. “A community foundation, however, does raise money from individuals, families, corporations, organizations and other foundations. It raises money from a variety of donors.”

Still, don’t expect to see foundation members setting up bake sales or car washes.  Most of the money that comes into a community foundation is in the form of larger gifts.

“It’s a mature way of fund-raising, and that makes more sense for the community,” Mendia said, comparing the foundation to endowments at many universities.

Rivas-Vazquez said five funds are housed under the umbrella of a community foundation.

The first is a Discretionary Fund, which has the least amount of donor involvement. Donors give money to the foundation and let the board of directors use their judgment in doling it out to grant applicants. Next is a Field of Interest Fund, where donors tell the board they want to aid a certain area — maybe youth programs or the arts. The board will then match grant applications to those funds.

Third is a Designated Fund. A donor who wants their money to go to a specific group — like Kiwanis or Lions Club — can house an endowment for the group at the foundation.

Advised Funds, the fourth option, let a donor serve as an advisor and recommend how the money be used.  “It’s a very interactive, donor-participatory model,” Rivas-Vazquez said.  “It’s an alternative to someone setting up a private or family foundation.”

The final option is a scholarship fund.

All donations received by the foundation will be invested. 

“A community foundation tries to build a permanent endowment for the community,” Rivas-Vazquez explained. “You want money that’s sitting there earning something so you have this permanent pot of money.”

In Key Biscayne, the foundation’s board will make the investment decisions. One board member, John Devaney, will play an especially active role .   Devaney, as the founder of an investment firm that traded more than $10 billion last year, is uniquely qualified to do so.

“I’ve had a very successful track record in consulting with institutional accounts, and I provide advice to foundations all over the country,” Devaney said. “I’m suited to help an entity like this with the management of some of the funds.”

The board will also work with the Dade Community Foundation on investments.

As money builds, the only thing left for the foundation to do is benefit the community. To do so, it will accept grant applications from all charitable organizations that support Key Biscayners — which could mean education, youth activities, programs for the elderly, etc.

“The idea is that a community foundation is a permanent endowment for a specific geographic area,” Rivas-Vazquez said. “Each community foundation is very unique to its community because the board is going to reflect the different people in a community, and the grants that are applied for are unique to the community.”

The foundation’s mission can also change with time.

“The needs we have today — whether its music or drama or better education for our kids — may not be the needs 10 years from now,” Mendia explained. “The foundation can evolve and match the needs as they change. Once you get started, it moves on with the community and will always mirror the community.”

Community foundations don’t run their own programs, but can lend a hand when they see trends in grant applications. For example, Rivas-Vazquez pointed out, if three schools ask for money for a certain type of motivational speaker, the foundation can help the schools pool their resources to get the best person possible.

The foundation hopes to issue its first grants in three or four months.

“We hope to show some benefit right away in the first year,” Mendia said.

That may seem like a quick benefit, but planning has actually been going on for over a year. Mendia approached Rivas-Vazquez in December 2002, shortly after he was elected vice mayor. He knew she had experience with the Dade group, and, that as an attorney, she could offer legal advice.

The vice mayor then approached civic leaders and other influential Key Biscayners, all of whom echoed Rivas-Vazquez’ response: that a foundation is an excellent idea.

Still, work didn’t pick up until last fall — mainly because Mendia and the rest of the Village Council were focused on the community center referendum. 

As Mendia puts it, “I had an idea for the foundation when I ran for office, and one of the things I would have liked to put on my platform is to do more cultural activities in the community. But people were too worried about other things.”

However, Mendia’s months on the Council confirmed his belief in the need for a foundation.

“I became more and more aware that people used to come to the council and ask for little chunks of money for charitable things,” he said. “The Council said that that really wasn’t their purpose — the community had decided we wanted our government to take care of the basic things like safety, building and zoning and public works. The public doesn’t want the government to use taxes to do other things.

“So, I thought the foundation would be a way of doing that work, because we could use it as a vehicle for how the community can grow.”

Mendia is most excited about funding programs for arts and culture, education and the environment.  However, he is just as happy to know other community members get a say: “One of the most interesting things about a community foundation is it doesn’t decide what to do and then fund-raise. The community tells it what it wants.”

In fact, Mendia pointed out, the foundation will actually let more Key Biscayne residents than ever participate in community growth.

“It can bring in people who don’t feel like they can be part of the government — 30 percent of our residents are non-citizens, and the community foundation will welcome their input just as much as anyone else,” he said.

The diversity of the board will also help many needs get attention. The board, which is still being finalized, includes Edgardo Defortuna, John Devaney, Edward Easton, Susan Fox-Rosellini, Mendia, Anne Owens, Rivas-Vazquez, Silvia Tarafa and Stephen Sonnabend.

Mendia and Rivas-Vazquez expect the group to do an excellent job managing the foundation, but they pointed out the success of the group is now up to the community.

“Wednesday marked the end of our work in starting it, and this really becomes the public phase where everybody can participate and make it their own,” Mendia said. “I’m hoping the foundation will become part of the thread of our community.”