. good morning, and welcome to mosaic. i'm honored to be your host this morning. we're joined in a conversation about a community legacy project. it's a project to encourage people to leave a legacy to organizations and synagogues that they value in the community as a way to ensure the community's vibrancy from generation to generation. welcome to our guests. elliott levine, the fund

raising organization's president is with us. marvin and elliott, welcome. the community legacy project is a long phrase for what? >> it's a project we started here in the bay area a year ago. a little over a year ago. and, it is funded by a national group as well as the federation, the partners who provide funding to start innovative projects around the country in the jewish community. they're funding five communities to start a legacy program in the communities. the federation here has helped that happen by doing a lot of funding and support themselves. the legacy project is a project, as you said to help institutions learn how the raise money in different ways. it's been a very successful start up of about the last,

well, i said, little over a year. >> it's specific focus is to encourage supporters of organizations to actually name that particular organization and set of organizations under a state plan. >> right, it's a opportunity for people who have been making donations to organizations with their time and financial resources. it's a opportunity for them to think beyond their life and help the organization maintain its viability in the years to come. we have been trying to make it easy to make sure that the organizations live and survive in the years to come. >> elliott, most of the time, i think most of the organizations think of giving as something you do in your own life. you were grateful because you belonged to the synagogue.

you give a donation to the synagogue each year. and the same thing for other organizations. why is it important to think about giving beyond one's own lifetime. gifts like these are in as much an exchange of value as money. a planned gift is in which one looks at what they might leave to the organization, that's a different animal all together. an annual gift is something that one makes often from what they have available. there's also a special gift from an emergency program in which one would go to their savings, perhaps. a legacy gift is a opportunity to take a look at one's entire portfolio and estate and in that way, people can make gifts

they couldn't conceive possible in their lifetimes. >> most of the people think we give out of discretion their income after we've paid rent or mortgage or after we've bought groceries and made other decisions about the entertainment budget and out of that, we give from what's left. this is about understanding what you have in your entire set of assets, so to speak and that you can give beyond what you have left, so to speak. >> that's it. that's why people can make commitments that they've never dreamed possible in their live times. >> it's an interesting time to start in the financial crisis in the world. it allowed people who weren't able to get in the particular moment because they didn't have

the ready assets to give. into the distance and the future, they were able to put aside money and values. this is about people being able to share their values with the next generation. >> we'll take a break and return back on mosaic. join us in a moment to continue this wonderful conversation about philanthropy. ♪ ♪ ♪ [ male announcer ] your glass of tap water can go farther than you think.

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decision to give beyond their own lifetime. i just relate to it personally. my wife and i decided that we wanted to leave something to organizations where we live that are important to us. and we sat and talked with the kids about it. they know that this was something that we valued and was very important to us that was in a manner of speaking, it could potentially impact them. i think we're giving because these organizations have been wonderful to us and did so much for the community. we wanted to make sure that after we die that those organizations are able to continue to thrive and flourish. >> you bring up an important point. naturally, people think about it but don't feel comfortable talking about it.

typically, let's say if people have children, they want to leave their estate to children, this says, i'm saying, as an example, you may leave 90% to the children and 10% is going to the organizations i care about. not only to the organizations i care about, but that's as a value statement that it's its own inheritance. that's the part that people don't understand the difficult conversations they'll have in families. >> the decision to make a commitment like this, personally, it's profound. outside of the mechanics of looking at one's portfolio and estate. it's a statement of what's important and what do i want my legacy to be. people have all kinds of

legacies. they have legacy of their memories and legacies of what their children mean to them. it's also a legacy about their communities and what they want to support and a recognition that someone did it before them. where i sit today and the service i receive, someone planted that seed. it could have been ten generations ago or a year ago. there's a lot of reflection that goes on about what do i want my legacy to be. >> it brings us to a spiritual level. it's a leap of faith in many ways to make those decisions. >> and it's the ultimate kind of charitable gift. it deals with value and what's in your gut. it's a opportunity to let the world know that there's something that's valuable to you that you want to support in

this ultimate way. >> how many organizations in the community are a part of the project? >> there are 16 teams. one team has two organizations. there are 17 organizations and 16 teams. >> what do the teams actually do? >> well, people like elliott go to each of the teams. they have a coach and they get trained and they learn how to go out and have a conversation with somebody and try to elicit from them what it is that makes the organization so special to them and get to the point of saying, well, would you consider leaving a legacy to your organization. >> it's interesting. a matter of truth, this was one of the teams and elliott was our coach and he's been successful with us on lots of

different levels. one of the things that surprised us and is common, we didn't realize how many people were already on their own thinking about leaving a gift and and or already had and had not told us. they actually valued the value of being anonymous and were assuming it would be a surprise to us once we found out. given the opportunity, saying, oh, you know what? we've actually done this. >> people think of fund raising and sales. in a legacy program, organizations like yours and others in the group have found that that's really not the case. that this is a opportunity for people to express what they've already done as in the case of your organization. they make that commitment and make that commitment somewhat public in a way that inspires

others to do the same. >> it would be nice if we knew the people who made legacy gifts. we would like to be able to honor them and thank them and they would also be an inspiration to friends and neighbors. we would love to know who has been given gifts and understand that there's a lot of desire to be anonymous. there's also a wonderful opportunity for them if they let us know. >> we're going to continue in a moment. we'll say good-bye to elliott and be joined by another guest to talk with us. please join us in a moment back here on mosaic. ,,

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welcome back to mosaic. we're continuing our conversation about the community legacy project within the contest of the jewish community. we're joined by reverend marvin goodman. and welcome irene odis. she's a team leader of the congregation's legacy league. >> this is a time to ask you, how do you work in your congregation on the particular issue and what does a coach do? where are you in the process? >> the coach came to us around the middle of last year. i think it was probably around april or so. it seemed that in order to launch our project, there were a lot of administrative things

we had to do. we had to create a case statement. it took a long time. we had a lot of participation from our members and we dug into the history and came up with a case statement that then, eventually got edited by dozens of people. that was a big project and then, we had to create a letter of intent and set up sort of systems for how to launch this project. we had to announce it and get the board to approve it. the coach was there along the way saying, have you done this and set up your flowchart and have you done your project plan? have you done your letter of intent. the coach was there to administratively launch us. once we launched, he then came, spoke to the board, spoke to

the team, and gave us tips on how to talk to people and what's important. what it is that motivates people to give this kind of gift and helps us really begin a different way of thinking and getting us ready to go out and ask the members for the legacy. >> i think some of the things that frighten people about asking for money or thinking of this, they think about what steps are. so, it may be important for us to say, a case statement is a fancy phrase for a piece of paper in which someone writes down why an organization is an important part of their life or why a synagogue is important for a person's life and it enriches their life and a letter of intent is a letter given to someone who intends to

name that congregation in their estate plans. they want to know if you've named the synagogue in your life insurance policy and as a beneficiary of your retirement funds or have you put the synagogue as a percentage that will be generated out of your estate. it's a letter of intent from someone who intends to leave money to the organization. >> one of the things that the coaches do is they help the organization to be able to sustain the coaches we've hired for two years. at the end of the two year period, the end of 2012, the institutions with the federations support will be on their own. hopefully, the coach will have trained and the work that

people have done and the success that people have had will inspire them. >> what's considered success in this contest? >> what's been success? >> well, for sure, as a hub, the success has been changing the culture from one that was about getting through each year and balancing the budget to being able to look forward to having an endowment fund that could enrich the programs, could enrich all kinds of activities that we have taken part in in the past and haven't had the funds to keep up. so, i think it's changed how our membership is thinking about the future. there's a level of excitement now that there has not been in the past. we've had a fund since the

beginning of the congregation. 33 years is -- the funds in the past were happen hazard. we never new when and if they were coming. now, there's a sense of, oh, there's going to be money coming into the fund from our members. they've made this commitment. >> we'll take a break and come back and finish the conversation about leaving a legacy in the community. join us in a moment here on mosaic. music track ♪

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welcome back to mosaic. i'm honored to be your host. we're in the middle of a wonderful organization. we were talking about the differences among the different

organizations and how they really fashion this issue for themselves. what are some of the things that the congregations feel are unique that you needed to articulate and position? >> i think there were two really driving forces. one is a recognition among our long time members that when they came to san francisco and many did come to san francisco from other places, there was no way for them to feel welcome. there was no way they could feel at home. so, for them, i think that because they've been a big part of their life for the last 30 years, they want to feel there's going to be this available for other young people coming to san francisco,

leaving their families of origin and wanting to find a jewish home for them that accepts them and enables them to enrich their lives in many, many ways. i think that we have another interesting aspect. that's the changing demographic. in other words, we have about 150 children in the hebrew classes. no one would have predicted that in the beginning of our time and the children are growing up with this as an example of diversity and acceptance and they'll be the emissaries for us and going out into the world and taking what they learn out into the world for them. that's a wonderful thing. >> that's quite a wonderful understanding of what legacy means. >> this is a two year project and we're in the middle of the first.

we're in the beginning of the second year. what's the commitment? is this going to be available into the groups of the future? >> it's going to be continued and we'll continue this for the organizations that are part of the first legacy of institutions. our intention is to continue to expand it and allow and encourage others to participate in it. we don't think there will be the same kind of funding as we have now. we're staffing at the jewish federation in order to be able to support the existing communities as well as new institutions. >> and i'm sure that some folks are listening to the conversation and thinking, wow, i would love to bring this to my priest or pastor or broader community of faith.

can they call and get consultation from you on how to think about this issue? >> sure, can i give my phone number? >> please. >> it's a direct phone. (415)369-2860. >> it would be wonderful to help with the communities to think through this issue as well. >> as we were saying before. they've been successful. it's one of the most successful organization investigations in the program. of the 16 teams, 14 set goals and met the goals for the first year and the other two are working on the goals to complete them late, but complete them. we estimate that in the first year, we've raised, in legacy commitments over $17 million.

in cayosh, some decide to give their money now while they're alive, that's about 1.7 million. about 10% of the money is coming in as cash gifts. >> when people are making the decisions to leave this legacy, what are the ways in which the people are expressing their appreciation for the opportunity? >> it's so interesting. what i've heard the most is i've been waiting to be asked. you know, so many of the members have been patrons of the arts. they're particular with being asked for donations and legacy gifts to the symphony or public radio and museums. it didn't occur to them that they needed to think about that level of commitment to their cig going. so now they're saying, wow,

this is great. you've asked me and now, i'll go and change my will and take care of this. >> thank you so much for a wonderful conversation. have a wonderful day.