BATON ROUGE AREA FOUNDATION ANNUAL REPORT 2012 TABLE OF CONTENTS 6 Letter from the Chair 9 About Us 10 Finances 12 Civic Leadership Initiatives 20 Barton Award Winners 22 Governance 24 Affiliates or Supporting Organizations 28 New Funds 29 Funds 40 Grants 52 Membership 58 Memorials 60 Honoraria 402 N. Fourth Street Baton Rouge, Louisiana 70802 | 225-387-6126 | braf.org Created by the Foundation and partners, The Water Institute of the Gulf begins its work. Matthew McKay, Chairman of the Board OPTIMISM COMES EASILY AFTER A YEAR LIKE 2012. investing in new locations and enhancements designed to ensure that At a recent board meeting, we reviewed all that had been achieved in local libraries remain the community’s clearinghouses for knowledge our community over the past year, and we looked at the part played and ideas and an anchor for the neighborhoods they serve. Taxpayers by the Baton Rouge Area Foundation. Looking back like this gives us approved a reliable source of revenue to expand mass transit services, good reason to also look ahead, now with more hope than ever. ultimately reducing the time that residents waste waiting on buses to take them to work or home to their families, and eventually thinning the Neighborhoods that have long been fraying around the edges are once traffic that clogs our roads. again being discovered by people willing to make a bold bet on the future by moving there. The public school system in Baton Rouge and We’re proud to say that the Foundation had a hand in the strides the state’s Department of Education are no longer stalled over their forward taken by our community. Generous donors placed $30.5 million differences; instead, they signed a cooperative agreement to move in their charitable accounts last year. Guided by their recommendations, forward together in improving public schools. In a departure from the Foundation granted $37.6 million to deserving projects and decades of ignoring our infrastructure problems, officials are seeing to it nonprofits. One of those grants, for instance, provided $600,000 to that roads are smoothed and leaky sewers are outfitted with new pipes. Pennington Biomedical Research Center Foundation for building new Thanks to BREC, we’ve seen dramatic improvements to our parks, sources of revenue derived from the innovative findings generated by and once again children are drawn to the playgrounds, dog owners to their scientists’ research. Each of the Foundation’s other grants are green spaces, and tennis players to the courts. Our library system is listed in this annual report. 6 BATON ROUGE AREA FOUNDATION | annual report 2013 Donations to the Foundation reach $30.5 million. Working with a wide range of partners, our civic leadership initiatives must be sustained and expanded. Citizens need to feel safer, no staff launched The Water Institute of the Gulf, which is dedicated matter where they live in town. And all people, especially those on the to finding answers to the urgent problems of adapting to climate desperate margins, must be able to wake up each day knowing that change—answers for our own eroding coastline, yes, but also for those something better awaits them. facing the same crisis of rising seas in Vietnam and Bangladesh, as Indeed, we know something better awaits all of us in this community. well as for our neighbors in Miami and New York City. Here at home, Here at the Foundation, we’ve seen the proof through the many the Foundation-fostered East Baton Rouge Redevelopment Authority advances achieved in the past few years, and especially in 2012. In pushed ahead with the Smiley Heights learning community, thanks to fact, we have never been more hopeful about the future of our region a commitment by state government to build an advanced auto training than we are today. That’s because, in the midst of so much self-seeking center in the developing neighborhood. We continued our labors to in other places, the Baton Rouge Area Foundation bears witness to the realize the longstanding hope for a commuter rail linking New Orleans many generous people who have taken responsibility for making this and Baton Rouge. And we shepherded the fundraising plans of many region a place of opportunity, and a better home for all who live here. other nonprofits, each working to address the varied needs of our region. Of course, we know there is much more to do. The crushing burden of poverty must be eased, and the gains we’ve made in education 7 Our mission The Baton Rouge Area Foundation unites human and financial resources to enhance the quality of life in South Louisiana. To achieve our mission, we > serve our donors to build the assets that drive initiatives and solutions; > engage community leaders to develop appropriate responses to emerging opportunities and challenges; > partner with entities from our service areas, as well as with other community foundations, in order to leverage our collective resources and create the capacity to be a stimulus of positive regional change; > evaluate our work and share the results with our stakeholders. 8 BATON ROUGE AREA FOUNDATION | annual report 2013 ABOUT US 2012 BOARD MEMBERS WHO WE SERVE Matthew G. McKay, Board Chair The Foundation and our affiliates, the Northshore Community All Star Automotive Foundation and the Community Foundation of Southwest Louisiana, John G. Davies, President and CEO serve all of South Louisiana. The Baton Rouge Area Foundation John M. Steitz, Vice Chair* Albemarle Corp. reaches across the entire region, while the two supporting nonprofits Suzanne L. Turner, Secretary have their own service areas. Parishes served by the Community Suzanne Turner Associates Foundation of Southwest Louisiana are Allen, Beauregard, Calcasieu, William E. Balhoff, Treasurer Cameron and Jefferson Davis, while the Northshore Community Postlethwaite & Netterville Foundation serves St. Helena, St. Tammany, Tangipahoa and Alice D. Greer, Past Chair Community Activist Washington parishes. Albert D. Sam II MD, At Large Tulane Heart and Vascular Institute HOW WE ARE GOVERNED Annette D. Barton Members of the Foundation elect up to 15 directors to three-year Bank One (retired) terms. Directors may serve two consecutive terms. The immediate Lee Michael Berg Lee Michaels Fine Jewelry past board chair serves as a member of the executive committee and S. Dennis Blunt member of the board, as does the CEO of the Foundation. Members Phelps Dunbar elect directors at the annual meeting held in March. Donald H. Daigle Exxon (retired) Yolanda J. Dixon Louisiana State Senate G. Lee Griffin LSU Foundation Rev. Raymond A. Jetson Foundation donors Star Hill Baptist Church C. Kris Kirkpatrick distribute $37.6 million Long Law Firm C. Brent McCoy Lamar Advertising to nonprofits. R. Ryland Percy III Percy Stromberg Bush Lanoux *Mr. Steitz resigned mid-year 2012 to move to Pennsylvania, where he is CEO and president of Avantor Materials. 9 FINANCES $563 million Total assets at year-end, down from $603 million the year before for two reasons: 1) large grants made from the Future of the Gulf Fund from a $100 million BP donation and 2) a decline in real estate assets because of the recession. 9.87% Return on Baton Rouge Area Foundation’s investments in public markets in 2012. JP Morgan Chase and Goldman Sachs manage the portfolio, with earnings available to donors for making grants to nonprofits. $37.6 million Total grants in 2012, representing the second-most in Foundation history. Each grant is listed in the grants section, which begins on page 40. $3.9 million Operating budget for 2012. The Foundation pays for daily operations from fees collected for managing charitable accounts, earnings on its own investments and from memberships, which fund our civic leadership initiatives and staff. More on civic leadership projects is on page 12. 10 BATON ROUGE AREA FOUNDATION | annual report 2013 STAFF Cherryl Alford, Senior Accountant Jeanne Bagwell, Accountant Jessica Boone, Senior Donor Services Officer Andwed Burns, Conference Center Manager Patricia Calfee, Project Manager John K. Carpenter, Director of Donor Services Amber Cefalu, Executive Assistant Gloria Chapman, Receptionist Emmy Comeaux, Executive Assistant to the President John G. Davies, President and CEO Ellen Fargason, Donor Services Officer Edmund J. Giering IV, General Counsel Courtney Gustin, Controller Jana Holtzclaw, Donor Services Associate Twanda Lewis, Donor Services Program Officer Debbie Pickell, Director of Finance Raymond Prince, Financial Operations Manager Dennise Reno, Art Director John Spain, Executive Vice President Lois Smyth, Donor Services Program Officer Mukul Verma, Director of Communications Linsay Williams, Receptionist 11 12 BATON ROUGE AREA FOUNDATION | annual report 2013 CIVIC LEADERSHIP INITIATIVES COMPANION ANIMAL ALLIANCE Despite some initial leadership issues, CAA tripled the number of dogs and cats saved from euthanasia at the animal shelter. Created by the Foundation and operating as an independent nonprofit, CAA found homes for more than two-thirds of the adoptable animals in its care. EBR Parish government approved another $114,000 per year to continue CAA’s work. GAINES AwARD For his novel How to Read the Air, the Foundation selected Dinaw Mengestu as the fifth writer to win the Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence—a foreshadowing of the $500,000 “genius grant” that he received from the MacArthur Foundation later in 2012. Mengestu follows Victor Lavalle, winner of the Gaines Award the year before, whose newest book was chosen by The New York Times for its list of notable novels in 2012. The Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence marks five years of honoring authors’ achievements. 13 CIVIC LEADERSHIP INITIATIVES COMMUTER RAIL In partnership with the Capital Region Planning THE WATER INSTITUTE OF THE GULF Throughout 2012, Commission and the New Orleans Metropolitan Organization, the the headlines blared bad news for the planet.