Correction
The first name of our new editor-in-chief was misspelled in Monday’s Philanthropy Today. His name is Elbert Ventura.
Nonprofit News From Elsewhere Online
Boston-area real estate developer Bill Cummings is focused these days on giving away his fortune. Signers of the Giving Pledge, Cummings and his wife, Joyce, launched their eponymous foundation in the 1980s. Cummings is now 86 and is handing out grants at a faster pace. In the past year alone, the foundation gave out $102 million, including “$30 million to community-focused nonprofits, $10 million to Salem State University, and $50 million to start the Paul Farmer Collaborative in honor of the famed physician and friend who died in 2022.” For some recipients, including the Benjamin Franklin Institute of Technology (now Franklin Cummings Tech) and CommonWealth Kitchen, an incubator for food-related startups, the gifts were a vote of confidence that helped them woo other donors. “What else are you going to do with it?” Cummings said recently of his money. (Boston Globe)
Background from the Chronicle: Couple Embraces Eclectic Mix of Global Causes for $1.2-Billion Fund
As audiences vanish, donors pivot to other causes, and pandemic aid ends, theater companies are looking for new ways to survive. Many “top-tier regional theaters” have cut staff and will produce fewer shows, with shorter runs this season. Amid what one theater leader called “the hardest time to be producing nonprofit theater, maybe in the history of the nonprofit movement,” companies are mounting coproductions, sharing the costs of sets and costumes. Some are also considering merging back-office operations. And some artistic directors say this stressful era calls for more joyful, funny programming than many local theaters have been offering. (New York Times)
Background from the Chronicle: 4 Performing-Arts Groups Innovate to Survive — and Thrive — in the Post-Covid Era
More News
- San Francisco Failed to Track Pandemic Gift Cards After People Donated Millions to City (San Francisco Standard)
- The Secretive Israeli Think Tank Behind Netanyahu’s Judicial Overhaul (Washington Post)
- ‘It’s Transformative’: San Francisco Bay Area Nonprofit Returns 43 Acres to Female-Led Indigenous Land Trust (San Francisco Chronicle)
- Nonprofit Is Raising $50 Million for Affordable Housing on Atlanta’s Westside (Atlanta Journal-Constitution)
Opinion
- Democracy’s Lifeline: a Call for Philanthropy to Fund Journalism Now (Poynter)
- The Organ Transplant System Must Remain Nonprofit. I Know Because I Had an Organ Transplant. (NJ.com)
- Finding Climate Solutions in Communities Instead of Labs (EHN)
Arts and Culture
- Dwayne Johnson Contributes ‘Historic’ Donation to SAG-AFTRA Foundation Relief Fund, Says President Courtney B. Vance: ‘It’s a Call to Arms for All of Us’ (Variety)
- The Philanthropic Legacy of Tony Bennett (Observer)
Note: In the links in this section, we flag articles that only subscribers can access. But because some journalism outlets offer a limited number of free articles, readers may encounter barriers with other articles we highlight in this roundup.