The Community Foundation can serve as the charitable beneficiary of a gift when the donor is not sure what charity to help and support. The Community Foundation can then select charities from time to time to carry out the donor’s intentions. This is particularly helpful where the donor simply wants to give something back to the community at large. This is often the case with respect to a testamentary gift in an estate plan.

The Community Foundation encourages gifts designed to establish a personal legacy, by assisting with a variety of giving methods tailored to your unique personal situation.

• The easiest approach to giving is through current gifts of cash. However, there may be substantial additional tax benefits from making gifts of appreciated stocks, real estate or other property.

• A bequest in your will (or revocable trust) is a simple and powerful way to leave a portion of your estate to the Community Foundation. Such a bequest may also designate a field of interest or a specific nonprofit organization to be benefited.

• You may use life insurance to make a gift, either by designating the Community Foundation as the beneficiary or a contingent beneficiary, or by donating the policy itself. If the policy is donated, you will normally be entitled to an income tax deduction for the current value of the policy and for any premiums you continue to pay.

• Under a recent change in the law, you may also now make a charitable gift directly from your individual retirement account, without incurring the heavy income and estate tax costs otherwise resulting from IRA withdrawals.

Other more complex giving techniques include gifts of real estate with retained use for life, charitable gift annuities and charitable remainder trusts. We welcome questions about these possibilities and look forward to working with your professional advisors if one of these techniques is the best way to meet your needs.