Information for Professional Advisors
Information for Professional Advisors
Please click on the following links for information on how you, as a professional advisor, can help your clients benefit from a donation through the Mackinac Island Community Foundation:
Is giving through a community foundation right for your clients?
Listening for Charitable Opportunities
- Do I have clients who care deeply about their local community?
- Do they give to more than one charitable cause?
- Are they interested in creating a personal or family legacy in their community?
- Are they considering the creation of a private foundation, but are concerned about cost and administrative complexity?
- Would they like to stay personally involved in the use of their gift dollars?
- Do they want to receive maximum tax benefit for their charitable contributions under Michigan and federal law?
- Do they place a priority on sound financial management of their contributions?
If you answered yes to any of these questions, your clients would benefit from knowing more about the Mackinac Island Community Foundation. For more information and assistance in helping your clients give through the Foundation, contact our Executive Director at 906-847-3701.
For more information and assistance in helping your clients give through the Foundation, contact our Executive Director at 906-847-3701.
Philanthropy is a very personal decision. You can help your clients realize their charitable objectives by listening for charitable giving opportunities, explaining options, and suggesting solutions. You can also help them by identifying financial situations when a charitable gift to the community foundation would be in their interest:
- Year-end tax planning identifies a need for greater tax deductions.
- Estate planning identifies the possibility of significant estate taxes.
- A charitably minded client is uneasy donating the principal of retirement savings.
- Your client is interested in setting up a charitable foundation.
- Your client is passionate about helping meet a specific community need and is ready to make a significant gift.
- Your client wants to establish a scholarship for a special interest, but doesn't know how to begin.
- Your client owns highly appreciated stock in a company that is about to be acquired.
- Your client currently has a private foundation that may not be distributing minimum grants.
- Your client has most of his/her assets tied up in a closely held company.
- Your client has a substantial IRA and 401(k) assets within his/her estate.
Advisors who can comfortably discuss charitable giving benefit their clients and our community and strengthens their client relationships. For more information and assistance in helping your clients give through the Foundation, contact our Executive Director at 906-847-3701.
Legal language templates regarding donor gifts are provided to assist you in establishing legal documents. For more information or assistance, please contact the Mackinac Island Community Foundation.
The model documents were developed by Duane L. Tarnacki, Esq., counsel for the Council of Michigan Foundations and attorney with Clark Hill P.L.C. in Detroit, Michigan.
The documents were made possible through the community foundation project of the Council of Michigan Foundations supported by grants from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation and the Council of Michigan Foundations' community foundation members.
The following language is suitable for inclusion in the will of a donor who wishes to leave a bequest (technically called to "devise" under Michigan law) to the Mackinac Island Community Foundation:
I devise to the Mackinac Island Community Foundation, a Michigan nonprofit corporation, ____________________________(describe devise - for example, "One Thousand Dollars" or "all of the residue of my estate") to be used in all furtherance of the charitable purposes of the Community Foundation as defined in and subject to the provisions of its Articles of Incorporation and Bylaws.
If the amount of the devise meets the minimum contribution requirements of the Community Foundation, the donor may create a separately identifiable fund by name and purpose by adding language from one of the four options that follow.
Named Fund/Unrestricted Purpose
This devise will be used to establish a component fund to be known as the___________________________Fund. I direct that the annual net income of the Fund be used exclusively for the charitable purposes set forth in the Articles of Incorporation and Bylaws of the Community Foundation as determined from time to time by the governing board.Field-of-Interest Fund
This devise will be used to establish a component fund to be known as the__________________________ Fund. I direct that the annual net income of the Fund be used for_______________________ (specify charitable purpose-or example, "supporting youth programs" or "senior citizen health care").Designated (Agency) Fund
This devise will be used to establish a component fund to be known as the ___________________________ Fund. I direct that the annual net income of the Fund be used to support _______________ (insert name of particular charitable agency to be supported-for example, "the Mackinac Island Medical Center " or "Mackinac State Historic Parks," "Ste. Anne Church," etc.).Donor Advised Fund
This devise will be used to establish a component fund to be known as the__________________________ Fund. I direct that an Advisory Committee consisting of ______________________, _______________________, and___________________ may make written recommendations from time to time to the governing board (or Distribution Committee) concerning grants from the Fund, provided the proposed grant is in furtherance of the general charitable purposes of the Community Foundation. I recognize that these recommendations may be accepted or rejected, in whole or in part, by the governing board (or Distribution Committee) in its sole discretion.