Inspired Stories: Newsletter Volume 8, Spring 2008

Inspired Leaders Team Member Upcoming Events Resources Making Change Happen Inspired Leaders Monthly we have invitational calls about projects so that donors and their advisors may hear first hand about cutting edge leadership and initiatives. Tracy facilitates these. If you would like to be invited please call 713.527.7671 or Tracy@inspiredlegacies.org. This Spring we are promoting program-related and social investing by foundations and individuals. Now is the time to diversify your portfolio. Why not invest in transforming the educational process for youth? We found a remarkable for-profit start-up for your due diligence: TEEN TALK, a new social network that is being launched by entrepreneurs, Amy Looper and Beth Carls, of Houston,Texas. Contact: Tracy@inspiredlegacies.org for more information. Seeking $25,000-$50,000 seed funders. $250k only will launch their platform for kids by kids. Team Member Elyse Meyer Elyse Meyer currently works for Logistical Solutions International, Inc.(LSI provides logistical support and cultural awareness training for the oil and gas industry) as an accountant and is the financial manager for IL. She began her tenure with IL while between jobs and has continued to support IL. Elyse has also served as Treasurer for several nonprofit organizations. “I appreciate even more now the work that Inspired Legacies’ does. My partner’s mother just died and we are amidst all the issues of legacy and the transfer of family values and resources that this important organization deals with daily." See also our whole team. Upcoming Events April 8-9 Childbirth Connections, Astraea Foundation--Legacy work, New York, NY 10-13 Women Donors Network, social investing, New Orleans, LA 14-15 PNC Bank for the Women's Fund, Pittsburgh, PA 17-21 CA donor and nonprofit work, San Francisco, CA 22 St. Thomas University presentation, Houston, TX 24-26 Advisors in Philanthropy Conference, Chicago, IL 26 Justice for Children, annual event sponsor, Houston, TX 30-May 3 Women's Funding Network Annual Conference, Washington, DC May 1-3 Women's Funding Network Annual Conference, Washington, DC 4-7 Council on Foundations, Leadership National Conference, Harbon, MD 8 PNC Bank's donor and nonprofit clients, Baltimore, MD 9-10 Donor educators' conference, Carmel, CA 12-13 The Community Foundation of Central Iowa, Des Moines, IA and Iowa State University, Des Moines, IA 14 Boston's Planned Giving Conference, Boston, MA 15 National Center for Family Philanthropy, teleconference call, 12-1 central 17 Astraea Foundation for Justice's 30th anniversary party, NYC, NY 18-20 Donor meetings, NYC, NY 21 Ms. Foundation for women, board meeting presentation and Gloria Awards, NY, NY 22-23 Jewish Federation of Miami, Miami, FL 27-31 Tipping Point Network conference, Essex, MA June 3-4 Community Foundation of Dubuque, IA 5 IL's key influencer lunch, Houston, TX 6-7 National Center for Res. on Women, NYC, NY 16-19 Threshold Conference, Interlocken, NY 20-22 Church Women United, Independence, MI 24 IL's key influencer lunch, Houston, TX View our calendar for more. Resources Randy Fox describes Charitable Life Estate at Wealth Management Exchange. The Heritage Institute article on Preparing for Inheritance: You Should Have Prepared Her (pdf) from Philanthropy World. Please feel free to send us links to resources that address legacy or philanthropic planning and revitalize democracy through citizen participation. Making Change Happen There are now some 1.5 million nonprofits to choose from. Each quarter we will share links to nonprofits and over the year include many that our readers share with us. We urge your own due diligence of these nonprofits. Fifth Ward Enrichment Program, Inc www.fwepinc.org Neighborhoods Centers, Inc www.neighboorhood-centers.org Green For All, an Ella Baker Center for Human Rights Initiative www.greenforall.org United for Peace unitedforpeace.org/ See the total cost of the war. See our growing list of organizations making change happen. Receive another Inspired Stories! We welcome your feedback and ideas at any time! To contribute to the next issue of Inspired Stories, please submit by May 15.

View From the Founder
Legacy Tools
Inspired Products
Legacy Partnerships
Letters to Loved Ones
Gratitudes

View from the Founder

STEPPING FORWARD FOR JUSTICE
Give your refund to transformative projects through
our Tipping Point Fund

America is having a remarkable reawakening in our democratic process! While we are at it, let’s not forget the power of our nonprofit and social change sector to lift spirits, make change happen, and carry the values of our families and communities. Here’s our newly refined mission for your consideration:

Inspired Legacies
facilitates partnerships between donors, advisors, and nonprofits to grow giving and transform society.

At Inspired Legacies our board and staff made our mission statement even stronger, inspired by the thousands we see around the country that want to align their values, live more simply, and make a difference. This is not the time to retrench. We believe it’s time to STEP UP to “grow giving and transform society.”

We invite you to join our bandwagon with Bolder Giving, Play Big, YES!, Women Moving Millions, and others who are counterbalancing greed, destruction, and fear through love, generosity, and faith.

While the economy slips and slides, casting the shadow of fear of past recessions, let us spring forward. Now is the time for reorganizing how our great democracy works. Business, government and nonprofits act as tools for the expression of democracy. Most of us have over invested in consumables, business, government and election processes that could otherwise be reworked to be much more ethical and efficient. Meanwhile we have UNDERINVESTED in the 1.5 million nonprofits of our country--and many globally--that scrape to deliver our greatest assets: community, hope, and happiness.

As you are diversifying your portfolio or considering how to step up in your leadership, remember now the return on investment that is possible through GREAT GIVING and engagement.

Redirect Your Refund
We suggest you move your tax refund, including the $300-$1200 or more bonus that you may receive back from the government, into transformative projects through a gift to IL’s Tipping Point Fund. (you have only to contribute or pledge your refund or redistribution of money through our pledge form--indicating which organizations or projects you want to contribute to or leave it us to simplify your giving.) Tipping Point Fund Pledge Form

If each of the 4000+ who received this newsletter send this on to just one other person and all of us gave, we could raise or nearly $500,000 which we would fully distribute within days to these projects. Help us lift the nonprofit economy!

Lets do it together. I have committed my refund to the Tipping Point Fund for equal distribution among these good groups. Will you? Click here.

Daily at Inspired Legacies, we deliver groundbreaking tools for solid planning for families and individuals so that we may all be more purposeful and strategic in our lifetime and legacy planning.

We are honored to speak or share our tools, just ask! If you would like help becoming more strategic and focused with your money, time, and leadership, call me anytime at 713.527.7671. We are here to serve you, to cheer you onward!

Our purpose is to accompany you to great giving and leadership through wise use of your time, money and teamwork. Step up with us to simple action and know we can do better together. As our teachers have always told us, in challenging times, “hold hands and stay together.”

Thank you!
Tracy Gary
Email me your story: Tracy at Inspired Legacies.org

Share your concerns and best practices.

See the services IL offers.

Legacy Tools

Currently, Inspired Legacies is evolving a Youth Giving Workshop Series workbook. In conjunction with leaders in donor education and youth empowerment such as YouthGive and Yes!, this workbook offers a unique process for engaging with young people around creating a giving circle. Participants complete the workshop series knowing how to perform due diligence on nonprofits, create fund-raising opportunities, and a have a solid awareness of social change philanthropy. The curriculum will be openly and freely available. In July we will began offering train the trainers events for those ready to use this powerful workshop tool in their communities. Email Luis@inspiredlegacies.org if you wish to receive our Train the Trainer brochure about our upcoming leaders conferences in July and early Sept.

Seeing the big picture around our revised mission helped clarify our goals and activities this Spring. Use our format to create clarity for yourself (scroll down). We answered the following questions and then refined our answers:

• Who are we?
• What do we believe?
• What do we do?
• How do we make an impact?
• What are our successes so far?
• What will we use as measurements for future success?

Reflecting on the evolution of our work in 2007, we remind all readers of the value of addressing the 12 Steps for Legacy Mentors and Leaders (pdf). One of our key insights in the steps involves incorporating Inspired Wealth Coaches for values and goals development as well as process management and accountability. See our short list of Inspired Wealth Coaches.

Use Policy: We encourage you to use our materials. We would like to know that you are using them, so please fill out our contact form or email your proposed use and full contact information. Feedback is encouraged. Please also make a donation to Inspired Legacies to compensate for the value you find in it's use. This helps us cover costs and create more tools for you and the world.

We welcome your feedback and ideas at any time!

Inspired Products

Inspired Philanthropy: Your Step by Step Guide to Creating a Giving Plan or Leaving a Legacy
Tracy Gary with Nancy Adess
Nov. 2007, Jossey Bass

With practical, step-by-step information, this third edition shows how everyone can align and integrate values, passions, and dreams for their communities and families into their plans. It explains how to make a difference by creating giving and legacy plans, tells what questions to ask nonprofits, and spells out how to help donor partners with advisors for inspired outcomes. Whether you are a donor, an advisor, or a nonprofit, Inspired Philanthropy: Creating A Giving Plan and Leaving a Legacy helps you with inspired, clear, and thorough giving and legacy planning. The resource section is available online, and it can be downloaded free and shared, when credit is given.

Legacy Partnerships

We are honored to have strategic partners in our work:

Women Moving Millions
As chair of the WMM Development Committee, Tracy as the Inspired Legacies' leader is charged with helping to raise the capacity building money for the Women's Funding Network (WFN) to support it's member funds (125 women's funds globally). We do this with a team of remarkable leaders including philanthropist, Helen Hunt, President of the WFN, Chris Grumm, and donors, Ambassador Swanee Hunt, and Barbara Dobkin, plus an amazing staff and consulting team from the WFN. See www.wfnet.org)

So far we have raised nearly $900,000 towards expenses and nearly $100m has been raised by the funds since only April of 2006. The campaign seeks $100-$250k donations to help raise $150 m. Quite a return!

Bolder Giving, Inspired Legacies, Play Big and Leveraging Privilege of YES! facilitated a shared discussion at the Threshold Conference this winter, and we continue to honor the founders of Bolder Giving, Anne and Christopher Ellinger, and their staff and consulting team for their generous partnership and outstanding media campaign which have included Inspired Legacies. See their inspiring stories of 100 donors who have given 50% of their incomes or 50% of assets, including our own, in addition to press around this work.

The Tipping Point Network
is an invitational initiative of leaders from varied sectors of the for profit, nonprofit and government, who seek to make a cultural transformation. We have had Tracy as a member now for three years, meeting many times a month with over 50 leaders by phone and in person twice a year. Over $2 million has been moved to many projects, including several in our Tipping Point Fund. The Fund itself was seeded by members of the Tipping Point Network.

To become a Mission Partner for IL, contribute to us $25k per year or trade in services of an equivalent amount.

Photo Credit: Wheelock Whitney, Jr Jr. High pals reunion, thanks to the MN Women's Fund's hosting Tracy on Legacy (L-R, Muffy MacMillian, Tracy, and cousin, Sarah Pillsbury)

Letters to (or from) Loved Ones

Tracy,
It was so wonderful to hear you speak again. I had forgotten how inspiring and genuine you are in your presentation. I just reviewed my notes from your keynote last night and I was moved once again by your words. This is indeed a moment in history where everything matters. Your message was exactly what I needed to hear at this juncture in my professional and personal journey. I’m ready to work on a bigger stage and that prospect excites me to no end. I have never felt more ready.

Again, I feel blessed to have had the privilege of being in the presence of great philanthropically driven people and hearing their stories. But none have been as compelling and moving as yours. Thank you for being you and sharing yourself with the world.

Christie

Christie Lewis
Vice President of Nonprofit Capacity Building
The Community Foundation of Sarasota County

Gratitudes

INSPIRED LEGACY GIFTS! Thank you each!

Inspired Legacies has received inspired legacy gifts! $100,000 on October 1, 2007 from The Harnisch Family Foundation championed our launch, gave us pizzzaz and a full team to publicize our new tool Inspired Philanthropy, as well as allowed us to distribute to key influencers and donors through the Donor Diva Challenge (buy one, get one free). Thanks to Ruth Ann Harnisch for her bold leadership and the hundreds of donors and organizations that benefited.

Also we wish to thank, the Cristina Callan Charitable Trust for their $50,000 legacy gift at the end of 2007, with thanks to Loring, Walcott, and Coolidge, trustees. Inspired Legacies is using Cristina's legacy gift to enhance our work with women. Women's giving circle leader, and co-author of "The Transformative Power of Women's Philanthropy," Sondra Shaw Hardy will be joining Inspired Legacies' team to expand our women's philanthropy work.

Lastly, we make a deep bow of gratitude as well to our sustaining funders and friends: Kim Lund, Jean Beard, The LaFetra Foundation, Marion Weber and the Flow Fund, Mudge Schink, Grant Abert, Trish Houck, Joanne Reich, Phil and Katie Cubeta, Bob and Marguerite Belkin, and The You Have our Trust Fund of the New Hampshire Community Foundation, for enabling Inspired Legacies' to thrive in it's second year. A total of 40 donors funded 60% of our $390,000 budget in 2007, enabling the successful launch of our new book! We endeavor to grow this year to $545,000, to expand giving and legacy support for the field during these times. (A full list of our 2006-2007 donors will be in our October bi-annual report.) Please help us step up with a gift or pledge to Inspired Legacies or to our Tipping Point Fund. You can use our online donation form.

The Easter Bunny, aka, Co-founder, Tracy Gary, and the new IL Board Chair, Joanne Reich, meet on Easter to get Tracy in line!

Inspired Legacies' Mission Partners for 2007-08 are:

• The Women's Funding Network's Million Moving Millions Campaign
• Astraea Foundation for Justice
• Bolder Giving
• Our Giving Community
• Tipping Point Network

These and about 40 other institutions, including PNC Bank, NY Life, US Trust and other community foundations, planned giving councils, regional grantmaking institutions, United Ways, women's funds and social change funds, sponsors or partner with us to produce with them some 125 workshops and keynotes annually. This represents about 40% of our income, including book and product sales.

If you would like to know more about consulting or coaching work with Inspired Legacies, call Tracy Gary or Karma Shipman at 713-527-7671.