UNVEILING THE MEMORIAL
ALSO RECOVERABLE GRANTS THE INTERVIEW CASH FOR REFUGEES
Yolanda King (above, center) with her parents, Martin Luther King III and Arndrea Waters King
LL OF THE SPEECHES MADE at the January 13th unveiling of The Embrace the monument to Martin Luther King, Jr. and Coretta Scott King on Boston Common were stirring, but the words of 14-year-old Yolanda Renee King, the only grandchild of the Kings, were uniquely moving.
“I love this monument,” she began, standing on the stage with her parents. “I also see the love and strength and unity in these hands and how they symbolize a beautiful marriage and partnership—one that changed the world. I feel they are somehow with me and that their spirits are joined in a quest for justice, love and peace. We are all children of Martin and Coretta Scott King. We are all challenged to carry forth their unfinished work.”
Her words resonated, especially with the staff, leadership and partners of Embrace Boston, the Black-led nonprofit that made the dream of a monument to the Kings a reality. For Embrace Boston, which has partnered with the Boston Foundation from the beginning, the monument is just the first step. Now it is calling on the best of Boston to forge a city that leads with equity, bringing people together across sectors, siloes and zip codes to build opportunity.
Governor Maura Healey acknowledged the partners who made the monument a reality: “What a momentous occasion for the community that has made the memorial their mission. The vision of Hank Willis Thomas and the Mass Design Group. The commitment of Paul English and Demond Martin. The wisdom and encouragement of Reverend Liz Walker and Reverend Jeffrey Brown. The
“ We are all challenged to carry forth their unfinished work.”
Early
leadership of Embrace Boston’s Imari Paris Jeffries. The dedication of the Boston Foundation. The generous support from individuals and organizations that uplifted stories of our local civil rights leaders.”
The “uplifted stories” refer to The 1965 Freedom Plaza, named after Martin Luther King’s speech on the Boston Common that year and honoring 69 of our city’s civil rights heroes from the 1950s through the 1970s. When she spoke, Mayor Michelle Wu also drew attention to the Freedom Plaza. “All around you,” she said, “are the names of local civil rights leaders who pushed to turn this city into what Dr. King called, in a speech here on this Common, ‘a testing ground for the ideal of freedom.’”
Among the hundreds gathered on the Common for the unveiling were the civil rights leaders honored or their relatives, many of them with close ties to the Boston Foundation. Elma Lewis, the arts educator and founder of The Elma Lewis School of Fine Arts, served on TBF’s board from 1973 to 1978. Muriel Snowden, who with her husband Otto Snowden, founded Roxbury’s Freedom House, was a board member from 1984 to 1989; and Frieda Garcia, former President of United South End Settlements, served as Chair of TBF’s board from 1993 to 1998.
“The unveiling was just the beginning of the impact the monument will have on Greater Boston and the world,” said Boston Foundation President and CEO Lee Pelton after the event. “Let’s hope that future visitors to the The Embrace , including the exhibit honoring our own city’s great civil rights heroes, will see in their reflections the endless possibilities of their own commitment to civic life.”
“Love is such a powerful force. It’s there for everyone to embrace — that kind of unconditional love for all of human kind. That is the kind of love that impels people to go into the community and try to change conditions for others, to take risks for what they believe in.”Coretta Scott King’s words displayed at the memorial PHOTO: OBINNA OJIMBA
Anumber of our city and region’s most urgent social and environmental challenges are among the most expensive to address—and channeling resources to them requires donors to think beyond traditional grantmaking. The Boston Foundation’s new Recoverable Grant Portfolios allow its donors who advise Donor Advised Funds (DAFs) to have a powerful impact today with the funds they have invested for long-term charitable giving.
“Recoverable grants really change the traditional binary paradigm of ‘giving from,’” explains TBF’s Chief Philanthropy Officer Kate Guedj. “They allow our donors to support the impact areas they care about most with the potential to recover those charitable dollars in the future and reuse them. It’s a game changer.”
The Boston Foundation has been encouraging innovative grantmaking for many years through various impact investing approaches. Now it is offering four curated portfolios of opportunities that already represent issues about which TBF donors care most. The nonprofits in each of the portfolios have been pre-vetted and have exhibited a strong record of repaying investments made by donors. During a special pilot program, donors are investing $25,000 or more from their TBF Donor Advised Funds, with the potential to be repaid in six years.
Accelerating the development of affordable housing to meet our region’s housing crisis while supporting emerging BIPOC developers
Enabling the transition to clean energy and greener homes, particularly in low-income communities
Helping individuals and families access their full potential through education and employment
We invite you to learn more by visiting recoverablegrants.tbf.org.
Karen Keating Ansara has been a close friend of the Boston Foundation since we co-founded a fund for humanitarian relief after the horrific earthquake in Haiti in 2010 the roots of TBF’s Haiti Development Institute. She has focused her grantmaking through the Ansara Family Fund, a TBF Donor Advised Fund (DAF) that she shares with her husband Jim Ansara, to address global poverty, health and equity as well as community-driven development. She also founded the Network of Engaged International Donors (NEID), serves on numerous boards and supports initiatives that strengthen Greater Boston. (See tbf.org/ansarainterview for a full transcript.)
“ I’m a big fan of TBF and its flexibility in allowing me to make Recoverable Grants over the last 10 years or so,” says Karen Keating Ansara, “and I’m very excited about its new Recoverable Grants Portfolios. Just today, I authorized a $250,000 investment in the BIPOC Small Business Lending Portfolio and $250,000 in the Equitable Housing Portfolio—and I’m considering another $500,000 in the near future. With Recoverable Grants, we can move so much more of the money in our DAF toward objectives that we really care about, but we don’t necessarily have to count them as part of our grantmaking budget. This means that we can extend our grantmaking budget enormously. (See page 6 for more about the portfolios.)
“Another way to think about it is this: As a donor, let’s say you have $100,000 in your DAF. If it is traditionally invested, you’ll earn about 5% in annual interest. If you grant it out as a $100,000 Recoverable Grant, you only forfeit roughly $5,000 a year in interest and put far more money to work in our communities.”
She explains that for many nonprofit organizations, it’s a way to access bridge funding: “For instance, we granted $150,000 about eight years ago to an affordable housing organization on the North Shore
called Harborlight Community Partners. It’s a very stable organization, but they have to spend a lot of upfront money designing affordable housing and lobbying local zoning boards. So, that’s what we give them. And we ask them to pay us back in a year.” So far, Karen says, it’s worked beautifully and they continue to invest $150,000 a year. “Otherwise, they would have to borrow money from a bank as working capital and pay interest on it,” she adds.
“What’s exciting to me about TBF’s new portfolios is that I don’t have the bandwidth right now to research ways to invest in BIPOC-owned businesses in Greater Boston, but I really want to support entrepreneurs of color because I believe their work is a crucial engine for growth and equity. It’s the same with affordable housing. And I know the Boston Foundation can do this research for me. There’s no better entity to do this; they’re pioneers in this work. ”
When Russia invaded Ukraine a year ago, two members of TBF’s donor community with ties to Ukraine took immediate action: epidemiologist Natasha Dukach, who’d studied violin in Kharkiv, and her husband, Semyon Dukach, managing partner at One Way Ventures, who had established a Donor Advised Fund (DAF) at TBF in 2019. Within days of the first attack, they traveled to the Romanian border to help. Romanians were organizing shelters, medical clinics, food and warming stations, but couldn’t provide one thing refugees direly needed: Cash. Most had fled with little money and couldn’t access their bank accounts.
The Dukaches maxed out their ATM withdrawals and began giving cash (the average bus fare to points in the EU: $100–200) to everyone they met who was in need—particularly mothers and grandmothers with small children. “We are not solving their problem,” Natasha says, “but it is helping.”
Because Semyon already had a DAF at TBF, they initially directed supporters to make donations to TBF, collecting the first 81 contributions to seed the effort with more than $50,000 before Cash for Refugees received its 501(c)(3) nonprofit status.
Support comes from volunteers, as well as donors, including BlueCheck Ukraine, co-founded by actor Liev Schreiber to support humanitarian work on the front lines. Natasha’s COVID-era experience organizing and analyzing crisis teams prepared her to ramp up the work. As to how to keep people involved, she says, “Unfortunately we’ve reached ‘herd immunity’ on bad news from Ukraine. Now whatever bombings or atrocities that happen are just expected. Given that, I simply made a promise to myself: Any money we accumulate we deliver. If people lose interest, well… I play the violin—I can play on the street to collect money.”
To contribute, go to cashforrefugees.org.
T
honoring Boston’s civil rights heroes from the 1950s to the 1970s, will see in their reflections the endless possibilities of their own commitment to civic life.”
I cannot recall a time when so many people of such diverse backgrounds gathered on the Boston Common to celebrate and acknowledge that, while we still have much to do, our work will not be in vain. As I said after the unveiling, “Let’s hope that visitors to The Embrace and the 1965 Freedom Plaza,It takes a tremendous amount of effort to create such a historic moment. And, as Embrace Boston’s Imari Paris Jeffries said at the unveiling, this event did not mark the ending, but rather the beginning of something big and important. The world was watching on January 13th, and it was a proud day for Embrace Boston, the Boston Foundation and Boston itself. It also signaled a sea change that I hope will influence our own and others’ perceptions of our city’s character for many years to come.
Zamawa Arenas
Andrew G. Arnott
Vanessa Calderón-Rosado
Elyse Cherry
Brian J. Conway
Pam Eddinger
Betty Francisco
Paul W. Lee
Linda A. Mason, Chair
Dr. Myechia Minter-Jordan
J. Keith Motley
Ronald P. O’Hanley
Tracy Palandjian
Dwight Poler
Raj Sharma
Scott E. Squillace, Esq.
Jane Steinmetz
C A. Webb
Senior Staff
M. Lee Pelton President and CEO
Jane Dixon Vice President, Human Resources, Culture and Talent
Leigh Gaspar Vice President and Special Assistant to the President and CEO
Kate Guedj
Senior Vice President and Chief Philanthropy Officer
Keith A. Mahoney Vice President of Communications and Public Affairs
Imari Paris Jeffries
Executive Director, Embrace Boston and Senior Advisor to the President and CEO
M. Lee Pelton, ex officio TBF
TBF
Donors THANK YOU
Together,
Al F. Van Ranst Treasurer and Chief Financial Officer
Orlando C. Watkins
Vice President and Chief Program Officer
Editors / Barbara Hindley and Sandy Kendall
Designer / Kate Canfield
