What is a Community Foundation?

Just what is a Community Foundation, anyway?

A key difference between a community foundation and other types of charities is that unlike other philanthropic organizations, we do not ask you to support our cause; instead, we ask what causes you would like to support and we help you do that.

Community foundations are independent organizations that manage the gifting of philanthropic resources from individual donors to community-based organizations. Community foundations enable individuals, families and institutions (churches, universities, businesses, nonprofit agencies, etc.) to create charitable funds to address a wide range of interests and issues, usually within a given geographic area. Because they build endowments through contributions from a broad cross-section of society, community foundations are designated “public charities” rather than “private foundations” by the IRS.


What is the personality profile of a community foundation?

Community foundations are uniquely positioned to take a leadership role in public life because they are guided by a commitment to improve the quality of life in a community.

  • Their principled-based leadership is inclusive and nonpartisan, allowing them to transcend a single-issue orientation.
  • Their endowments put community foundations in a stable position to focus on long term, sustainable results rather than stop-gap measures to address a problem.
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  • Because they work with both providers and recipients of services, they are among the first to understand the changing needs of a region as it grows and evolves.
  • Community Foundations are increasingly becoming the hub where the expertise, efforts, and energy of citizens converge to create solutions to issues of concern.