This article appeared in the October 4, 2013 Jewish Advocate

Smaller Federations collaborate to cut costs

By Susie Davidson
Special to the Advocate


The September "Connected to Give" study, previously reported on in these pages, painted a foreboding picture for the future of next-generation donating. A rosier forecast, however, was predicted by by another major study conducted in August by the Jewish Next Gen Donors project. Whether or not the outlook is dire, or if in fact Jewish Federations are holding their own and even seeing an actual increase in next-generation involvement, it is undeniable that Jewish Federations and donor-supported Jewish organizations are facing challenges of untold proportion. Staff will need to significantly innovate and reinvent, in order to reach out to the next generation of sustainers. In a sharp departure from the past, they will now need to earn their support. In addition to considering the contentions of such reports, they will need to weigh demographic changes, community needs, and the efficacy and reasonable expectations of each individually-sponsored program and initiative. Undoubtedly, and perhaps painfully, all of these factors will impact allocation decisions, and indeed, the viability of many worthy area recipients.

Many Federations are currently launching their fall campaigns, and due to the economic climate, they are also engaged in necessary cost-cutting. As one local Federation has realized, combining resources can provide one avenue for savings. “We are looking to see if there are any ways that we, by working together, can decrease expenses and/or increase revenue,” said Laurie Tishler Mindlin, Executive Director of the Andover-based Merrimack Valley Jewish Federation. “This is common practice among smaller Federations, and we are trying to do it in an organized way,” she told the Advocate. “In particular, we have talked about sharing a speaker and sharing the transportation costs, or maybe having them helping to recruit for a program that we are organizing,” she said. “The truth is that we are putting out toe in the water, seeing if there are ways we can control expenses and optimize revenue.”

Brainstorming sessions have been held with Federations of similar size. “They have similar operations, our communities have similar needs and interests, and it makes sense,” she said. For example, MVJF is offering a mission to Jewish Cuba, and Tishler Mindlin sent out mailings to her colleagues across the country, to see if their members were interested in going, so that they could round out the response for the trip.

“Small Federations can hardly be mentioned in the same breath as a large city Federation,” she explained. “They have larger resources, financials, and the amount of potential is so much larger.” Small Federations, she said, operate across the board similarly, and large Federations operate across the board similarly as well.

“When I go to the annual General Assembly of the Jewish Federations of North America and I attend a session where large city Federations are presenting ways that they have been trying to meet challenges and garner success, I have to work hard to synthesize down to what resources we have to address those issues,” she said. “It gets your interest piqued by hearing these ideas, but many are not realistic for what we do.”

A lot of that is, as noted, cutting expenditures. “We've done everything, even extended out our equipment leases (longer leases incur lower monthly costs),” she said. The MVJF has three staff people - Tishler Mindlin, who is the only full-time staffperson, Program Coordinator Michelle Soll, and Comptroller Sheila Brown. Their snail mailing list is 3000, and their website is comprehensive, offering resources on Jewish Life; the PJ Library, and Israel Identity; as well as an online Career Center; a Community Calendar and Community Directory with local resources and agencies and national and international organizations; MVJF Community News; and World and National News (both posted and available via a JTA ticker).

As for maintaining current resources, MVJF, like most Federations, is reaching out to the next generation. This is an area in which Tishler Mindlin has proven herself adept. Under her former directorship, BIMA (Brandeis University's summer arts institute for high school students) won the Slingshot award, which she accepted in New York on behalf of the founder, Rabbi Daniel Lehmann, and the BIMA Board of Directors. (At that time, the program was located at Williams College in the Berkshires. It moved to Brandeis the following year, Tishler Mindlin explained, because of the University's complementary programming such as Genesis, also for high school children.)

"The cohort that MVJF is going to be focusing on right now are the kids who have aged out of PJ Library,” she said. “We are going to concentrate on programming for them and their families.” MVJF supports many other programs for children, teens and college students. According to Tishler Mindlin, the Federation operates a summer Jewish Day Camp, offers scholarships to camps and for Israel travel, and sends donations to Taglit-Birthright Israel, UMass Hillel, and the Yemin Orde Youth Village in Israel, among other initiatives.

MVJF starts young. “Little kids bring tzedakah into synagogues so we can breed a passion for helping other people,” said Tishler Minkin. “When I first came on board, I would go to the religious schools and do a program with the kids to simulate an allocation process so they could understand the scarcity of resources and see the various choices that the organization has to make," she said, noting that they may be doing that program again this year. “They learn about tzedakah in their Jewish Values studies, and they collect it and decide where they're going to give it,” she said, adding that as a Federation executive, she hoped that they would include them. “However, there's a good chance they are going to give to seeing eye dogs in Israel – that appeals to young people,” she said.

CJP also starts young, as young as “Campers & Teens,” a website section which offers “fun programs for kids and teens like national youth groups, volunteer activities and Jewish overnight camp,” programming based on feedback from area youth. There is also a warm welcome and a provocative invitation to young Jews on the website, where a Facebook link joins the question, “What does being Jewish mean to you?” with this invitation: “Discover your connection to the Jewish world in a way that feels right for you. From social gatherings and adult education to summer camp and teen travel, there’s something for everyone. And that’s important to us, because you are the future of Jewish Boston.”

Other CJP youth-oriented initiatives include JewishBoston.com, with its thousands of event listings, blog posts and resources; Young Adult Opportunities; Families With Young Children; and Interfaith Couples & Families.

A study by The Jewish Next Gen Donors project, released in August by the Johnson Center for Philanthropy at Grand Valley State University in Grand Rapids, Mich. and generational philanthropy consultant group 21/64, showed some reason for optimism. Their national survey of and interviews with both Jewish and non-Jewish 21-to-40-year-old high level donors revealed that giving to religious and faith-based organizations was second only to giving to educational organizations. While the sum total of their donations to “Combination Organizations such as the United Way, the United Jewish Appeal and Jewish Federations" was less than that of their families, and while this category was less important to them than “Basic Needs,” “Health,” and “Civil Rights & Advocacy,” over half of the respondents did give some amount to the combination organizations.

"While rising Jewish major donors might mirror their generational peers in becoming less religious than previous generations, they still have a strong connection to the Jewish philanthropic community, along with a sense of Jewish identity that influences their philanthropic activities,” the report states in reference to the Jewish participants, while noting that over two-thirds of the Jewish next-generation donors said that they gave to similar causes as those their families had traditionally chosen.

“This points to continued strong influences by parents and grandparents in the philanthropic development of these rising Jewish donors,” concludes the report. Other findings showed that next gen donors were, as the report terms it, “Eager to Engage in Meaningful Ways,” and would like to have more formal roles in their families' philanthropy (the authors of this report concur on this issue with their subjects, writing that indeed, they are often left out of major decision making for too long, and suspecting that this is due to fear of change among the older generations).

According to the study, “Jewish next gen donors learn philanthropic values from their families, and they give based on those values.” However, the authors find that they manifest “A Desire to Revolutionize Philanthropy." Their data supports this methodological shift: "While 67.6 percent of Jewish next gen donors say they give to similar causes as their families, barely half (52.1 percent) say that they give in similar ways as their families," the authors write.

"The Jewish philanthropic community often expresses dismay that the next generation of Jewish philanthropists isn’t more involved in Jewish giving,” the final summary contends, while concluding that their findings indicate that the apprehension may be unfounded. Rather, the report summarizes in its closing statements, it is more the complexity of future donors that is worthy of exploration, than the prospect of their giving less than their forbears.

Indeed, their data revealed that these young Jewish donors valued “Religious and Faith-based” causes far more than their non-Jewish peers, and this study attributes this to their Jewish identities that have been formed due to family influence, values, traditions, and culture. “This has yielded next gen family members who give Jewishly of their own volition," the report states, as it continues: "...these Jewish next gen donors want to change some things about how philanthropy operates. They want to engage with nonprofit organizations in ways that are different from their parents and grandparents. They want to work more closely with peers. 

"But they also remain respectful of their family legacies and give based on the values inherited from previous generations," the authors summarize, ending on this hopeful note: "If families and the Jewish community as a whole want to engage next generation family members in giving, we believe they will find experienced colleagues who are eager to step up.”

A Wall Street Journal article of Aug. 31 by Melanie Grayce West, “Young Jews Courted as Donors: UJA-Federation of New York and Other Groups Look to Hone the Giving Instinct Early,” cites efforts by the UJA's Teen Philanthropic Leadership Council, which, in its third year, includes 40 teenagers and is run like an actual foundation, as just one example of its stepped-up programming geared to very young and future donors. Members of the Council experience fundraising, board meetings, and allocating grants.

West also reports on a revival of a national fellows program by Hadassah, where 60 young women will be trained to become community leaders, and travel to Israel and Washington. Indeed, a similar program will be promoted to Hadassah's approximately 900 local chapters. This is in the face of a reported 2 percent of Hadassah donors coming from under the age of 40. The article also describes a “young friends” fundraising and social group at the New York Museum of Jewish Heritage that seeks to increase its donor base.

“What we need to do is to start with a clean slate as we approach the next generation,” says MVJF's Tishler Mindlin. “They are skeptical of large funds, and we can't expect that they are motivated by the same things that their parents and grandparents were, or what their goals are,” she said. “I don't think my grandmother was interested in what her goal was in giving to B'nai Brith. So we need to create new divisions - to bring the mountain to Mohammed.”