Perhaps the most dangerous pitfall facing these families, however, remains the temptation to make memorial gifts very quickly after a loved one’s death, in the moment when grief is exceedingly palpable.

When Once Is Enough
A legacy grant generally implies that the family will continue to help the recipient, but it is also possible to make a memorial gift, a one-time gift in memory of someone. When a notable person passes away, the family should prepare themselves to be bombarded by requests to honor that person. Indeed, the cynics among us have noticed that some of these requests come with the expectation that the family will also make a generous gift in response to such an honor.

I know of a family that dealt with this predicament admirably. After their matriarch passed away, her heirs made a significant grant to an institution in her name, but they were smart enough to set some ground rules. They stipulated that they were making this gift although it lay outside of their usual mission, and that the organization should not expect any future gifts from the foundation. If a family foundation makes a memorial gift or any other kind of discretionary gift, it should clearly state in the next annual report or on the foundation’s website that the donation was an exception. We recommend a caveat such as this: “The following grants fall outside the foundation’s general scope and guidelines and were made at the discretion of specific trustees. The foundation does not accept proposals in these areas.”

Perhaps the most dangerous pitfall facing these families, however, remains the temptation to make memorial gifts very quickly after a loved one’s death, in the moment when grief is exceedingly palpable. Unfortunately, some grantee organizations have become very adept at taking advantage of these situations. A few years ago, I was talking with the family of someone who had passed away very suddenly, and I was shocked at how many large nonprofits had approached them and said, “You know, we were in negotiations with the deceased, and he promised us this much money.” Clearly if he really had been talking to all of them, he would have been doing nothing with his life but speaking to nonprofits. Saddest of all, perhaps, was the fact that the family found it very difficult to discern which nonprofits the deceased probably had made promises to.

The family of a woman named Jane Russell in Washington state handled this situation in a way that I admire. She and her husband, George Russell, had purchased a small brokerage and mutual fund business from George’s grandfather and developed it into the well-known investment firm, the Frank Russell Co. When Jane passed away in 2002, the family wanted to honor her in an important way, but they decided to take time to consider the best way to do so. Rather than make a quick, emotionally laden decision, the Russell Foundation and the heirs invited everyone connected to the foundation—grantees, members of the community and colleagues—to suggest ways the foundation might honor her. Then the foundation invited a group of trustees and family members to meet to slog through all the suggestions and make a choice. Eventually they decided to launch a program, run through the foundation, that they called Jane’s Fund. Russell had been deeply involved in helping community development in Tacoma and Pierce counties; today the foundation plans to use the fund to provide fellowships to individuals who want to serve the community, as well as organizations promoting the arts, education and human services. The foundation announced its first class of fellowship recipients in 2004 and plans to offer the grants every other year. The way the family planned the program gave them some time to compose themselves and make a decision that served the foundation and the community well. A job well done.