David Sharken facilitated a tremendously interesting and relevant session about the legacy “ask.” Who are the donors? How does the conversation differ from other solicitations? What are you asking for – and what are you not asking for? What if you feel uneasy about your role? These were some of the questions that propelled a lively discussion followed by a hands-on practice opportunity.

Among the valuable insights:

• The most common reason donors do not give to an organization? They were never asked! Your donors come from throughout your organization and are often those who give modestly but regularly. So be sure to include them in conversations about an after-lifetime gift.
• When discussing percentage giving for legacy commitments, point out that 95% will go to their children if they choose to leave 5% to an organization. Looked at from that perspective, the larger number is both powerful and comforting.
• Be up front. If you’re uncomfortable because you’re new to this or the conversation is with an unfamiliar person, say so. You’ll cut the tension for yourself and those with whom you are talking.

Denise Broverman, a new member of Heritage Academy’s Legacy Team, called the session “extremely valuable,” adding: “This training gave me concrete information about how to fulfill my role. I believe in legacy giving and now I’m excited to talk to the Heritage community.”

Click below to check the valuable handouts related to holding meaningful conversations with potential legacy donors.

• The Ask
• Common Objections
• Legacy Prospects
• Setting the Appointment & The Conversation

More than a hundred donors recently celebrated the success of the Create a Jewish Legacy program and planned giving to the Jewish Endowment Foundation of Western Massachusetts with an elegant catered lunch and performance at Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival in the Berkshires.

Create a Jewish Legacy, a collaboration between the Jewish Endowment Foundation (JEF) and the Harold Grinspoon Foundation (HGF), helps Western Massachusetts organizations attract planned gifts through bequests. In just two years, over 430 individuals in Western Massachusetts have signified their intent to leave bequests to synagogues, schools, social service agencies and other Jewish organizations in the region. The current estimated value of the bequests is $10.7 million.

Lunch speakers paid tribute to those who had the foresight decades ago to establish the Jewish Endowment Foundation and praised new efforts to request legacy gifts from those of any age or financial capacity who care deeply about an organization.

Donors Brenda Curtis and Dr. Mordechai Kamel spoke eloquently about their reasons for making legacy gifts to their Jewish communities. While her strongest loyalties lie in Springfield/Longmeadow where her children grew up, Curtis said she felt it was equally important to support the Jewish Federations where she now resides — the Berkshires in the summer and Florida in the winter. Kamel, born in a Displaced Persons camp in Europe after the Holocaust, spoke of the need to combat anti-Semitism in all its forms. He made his legacy gift as part of his individual effort to “help change the world.” Said JEF Director Scott Kaplan, “Gifts of this type will provide a dependable stream of future income to ensure that our organizations remain healthy, vibrant and significant for decades to come.”

Create a Jewish Legacy donor Brenda Curtis urges others to make a legacy gift

Dr. Mordechai Kamel explains his choice to make a legacy gift now

The featured dance performance Monger, choreographed by Barak Marshall, celebrated its U.S. debut. Marshall, who divides his time between Tel Aviv and Los Angeles, addressed assembled donors before the performance about the production and about his passion for the State of Israel.

Lasting just over an hour, the show wowed the audience. “Truly spectacular!”commented Jaymie Chernoff, attending with her husband Michael as legacy donors to their synagogue, the Jewish Community of Amherst.

“There was a marvelous feeling of esprit de corps at Jacob’s Pillow among all these folks who have made their personal legacy commitments but didn’t realize how many others had done so,” observed Sue Kline of Create a Jewish Legacy. “It’s inspiring to see how many people have the vision to use after-their-lifetime resources to benefit their Jewish community”

Find more information about legacy giving to Jewish organizations in Western Massachusetts through Create a Jewish Legacy or the Jewish Endowment Foundation

Bagels & Legacy with Atty. Richard Gaberman
“Practical…highly informative…invaluable”

Atty. Richard Gaberman conducted a valuable and informative training session for Create a Jewish Legacy teams on June 23, focusing on how to encourage signers of Letters of Intent to formalize the commitment with a change to their wills or estate plans. He strongly emphasized that for both donors and organizations, it’s critical to ensure that donors’ wishes are fulfilled.

Yet, he said, the legal task of estate planning is the one that individuals put off the longest.

He acknowledged the value of the soft approach of Create a Jewish Legacy, asking loyal constituents to remember an organization in their will and to sign a Letter of Intent to do. But he cautioned the group that should a potential donor pass away before formalizing the Letter of Intent by making a provision in a will, the intended gift may never come to fruition.

Therefore, even though it can be difficult for Legacy Team members to broach this topic, it’s critical to know whether the promise has been formalized. “It’s not unreasonable to ask someone for verification or confirmation,” he said, commenting further that organizations could actually be “cheating themselves” by not following up.

Responding to the question of legal costs as a barrier to one’s seeing a lawyer about a Create a Jewish Legacy commitment, he assured us that costs should be minimal for adding a codicil to a will for smaller bequests. There are even websites from which one can download a codicil and have it signed and notarized to create a legal document. Of course, when provisions are made for higher amounts, the legal arrangements can be more complex.

Atty. Gaberman did point out that bequest provisions can be vague and therefore difficult to carry out, particular when donors opt to bequeath a percentage of their estate. He carefully explained the importance of a donor’s defining exactly the portion of the estate to which the designated bequest percentage should be applied.

He praised the plan of the Sinai Temple team to send a letter in June gently reminding Letter of Intent signers to see their attorney. A good form of bequest verification would be a letter from the attorney stating that the organization is in the donor’s will. Even better would be the inclusion with attorney’s letter of a copy of the portion of the will pertaining to the bequest.

According to Atty. Gaberman, once an individual has made the provision, there is a high likelihood that it will remain in the will and even increase, depending on the quality of the stewardship and other factors.

An advocate of endowment and specifically legacy giving, Atty. Gaberman closed by offering to continue to be an informational resource for Create a Jewish Legacy teams.

Click to Enlarge Please mark your calendars for our second “Bagels & Legacy” session on Wednesday, June 21, 8:30 a.m., again taking place at the Hatikvah Holocaust Education Center (Springfield Jewish Community Center). On the 21st David Sharken of the Grinspoon Institute for Jewish Philanthropy will guide CJL teams in role playing the crucial “ask” and other Legacy conversations.

Bagels & Legacy, a summer series of monthly not-to-miss training sessions, kicks off with Attorney Richard Gaberman, who will speak on Wednesday morning, June 23, 8:30-9:30 a.m. on “What happens after your organization receives a Letter of Intent?” Dick is a brilliant, widely respected attorney with long experience – truly an invaluable source of information. He’ll talk about ways to keep in meaningful contact with those who have signed Letters of Intent and move them to formalize the commitment in their will or estate plan. This session is open to all current CJL participating organizations and will be held at the Jewish Federation board room. Please RSVP by June 16 to marcus@hgf.org.

If you have any questions you would like Atty. Gaberman to answer please post them in the comments section below:

The Jewish Endowment Foundation (JEF) and Create a Jewish Legacy of Western Massachusetts (CJL) invite all CJL donors to a Jewish Legacy Celebration at Jacob’s Pillow on Sunday afternoon, July 11, when an Israeli dance troupe will perform the U.S. debut of choreographer Barak Marshall’s “Monger.” Barak Marshall is described as one of Israel’s most innovative choreographers. “Monger” was lauded in the Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz as “…a highly original work danced by ten virtuosos. The power of the piece lies in its original movement language and theatricality…The result is unique, refreshing and powerful.”

At noon under the tent at Jacob’s Pillow, a kosher catered lunch featuring a gourmet Israeli menu will be served. During lunch, acclaimed Israeli Choreographer Barak Marshall is eager to find a few minutes to address our group. The Jacob’s Pillow Jewish Legacy Celebration will be jointly funded by the JEF and CJL with a cost to attendees of $36.

We are so excited by this opportunity to put Create a Jewish Legacy on front and center stage- and simultaneously share a remarkable cultural experience in the Berkshires! “Monger” is a physical-theater work for 10 dancers, which tells the story of a group of servants, trapped in the basement of the house of an abusive mistress. The score for “Monger” combines elements of Gypsy, Balkan with classical and rock music, exploring the dynamics of hierarchy, power, free will and the compromises one makes in order to survive. Marshall’s movement is physical, sharp, fast, contains ethnic-contemporary motifs and is known for being highly emotive, visual and theatrical (description courtesy of http://web.me.com/barakmarshall/MONGER/MONGER.html). “Monger” was premiered October 25, 2008 at the Suzanne Dellal Centre and opened the 2008 International Tel Aviv Dance Festival.

Save the Date cards were sent to all Legacy donors in May, with the formal invitation following. There’s already quite a buzz about the event! Our tickets are limited to 150 people, so be sure your CJL donors respond early.

For questions, contact Bea Boryszewski at the Jewish Endowment Foundation at: beab@jewishwesternmass.org or 413-737-4313 x137.

For more information about Jacob’s Pillow and Barak Marshall’s “Monger,” visit http://www.jacobspillow.org/festival/2010/07/barak-marshalls-monger/.

Click to Enlarge We also invite you to see SAFAM in concert on the 11th in Lenox, 7:30 p.m., sponsored by the Jewish Federation of the Berkshires. The performance benefits a program of The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee which addresses the basic needs of nearly 25,000 poverty-stricken Jewish children. Tickets will be held at the door for pickup. Contact: Arlene D. Schiff, 413-442-4360, ext. 12. Please see the flyer for more information.

Create a Jewish Legacy of Western Massachusetts held an orientation meeting in early February for seven new organizations, bringing to twenty the number of groups  involved in this highly successful bequest-giving program. Consultant and program adviser Gail Littman, director of endowments at the San Diego Jewish Community Foundation, facilitated the dinner meeting at the Longmeadow home of Harold Grinspoon for Congregations B’nai Torah, Beit Ahavah and Sons of Zion, day schools Sinai Academy of the Berkshires and the Lander-Grinspoon Academy as well as the Greater Springfield Chapter of Hadassah, and Rachel’s Table, a program of the Jewish Federation of Western Massachusetts. She emphasized how important it is to seek bequests and other endowment gifts to sustain organizations, both large and small, over the long term.

Commented Beit Ahavah vice president Don Frank: “Tonight’s session makes our future and our fundraising look doable. Gail broke down the process so we can see how to get from here to there – something that in the everyday life of our synagogue may seem overwhelming.”

In her presentation, as inspiring as it was pragmatic, Littman emphasized that the huge generational transfer of wealth – estimated in trillions — is already underway and that those agencies that do not ask for support from loyal donors will not be able to secure their own future. She commended Western Massachusetts organizations for already securing 237 legacy gifts and an estimated $6.7 million since the program launched in June 2008, and she encouraged the new organizations to begin discussing legacy giving with loyal members, volunteers and donor families.  “This is all about the size of the heart, not the size of the gift,” she said.

In a good-natured exchange, Smith College Jewish Studies professor and Lander Grinspoon Academy president Justin Cammy agreed to make his legacy gift on the spot. . As he signed his Letter of Intent, Cammy noted: “It’s not enough to pursue Jewish life through academics. The way you become whole is to live your life Jewishly and make it personal.”

Create a Jewish Legacy of Western Massachusetts has two funding partners: The Harold Grinspoon Foundation provides staffing and administration, and the Jewish Endowment Foundation provides annual incentive grants to organizations reaching their goals and technical support in charitable gift planning. In addition, the Jewish Federations of Western Massachusetts and the Berkshires are active program partners. All participating organizations receive coaching and training, marketing material, advertising. Susan Goldman, fundraising vice president of the Greater Springfield Chapter of Hadassah, summarized the initial training session as “direct, simple, and heartfelt.”