Patricia Marcin is a trust and estates attorney, a partner at Rivkin Radler, and the chair of the Long Island Community Foundation.
“Working with a community foundation allows professional advisors to give clients a connection to the causes that they care about. We’re helping people on both ends: the people who need the help and the people who want to help. I love it.
During their lifetimes, donors can become involved in the nonprofits that they’re interested in and develop experience in the charitable world. They can see how the community foundation works and get greater access to the people and nonprofits actually doing the work. I think it’s a much more satisfying experience than dealing with a commercial donor-advised fund administrator.
The things that we—as regular citizens—don’t know in regard to the needs of a community are astounding. As both an attorney and as the Long Island Community Foundation board chair, it’s been eye-opening for me.
Community foundations make sure donors’ money goes where they want it to go. I have clients that take great comfort in knowing that if the charity they currently are supporting isn’t around down the road, or has significantly changed its mission, the community foundation will locate other charities doing the best work in that area. Donor-advised funds provide a wonderful alternative to a private foundation, and all the costs and hassle that’s involved with them.
When I talk to donors about community foundations, I often emphasize the opportunity to leave a charitable legacy, get their family involved, and have their name attached to something that makes a lasting difference.
How does it make me feel? Fabulous. As you can tell, making these connections gets my endorphins going. So I feel great about working with the Long Island Community Foundation and The New York Community Trust. I just can’t say enough about them.”