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ORLANDO ARTS MAGAZINE NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2015

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As we enter into the holiday season, you have most likely received a United Arts

“Early Bird Campaign” mailer as a precursor to our traditional annual Collaborative Campaign for the Arts* that kicks off in February 2016. I encourage you to give generously during this Early Bird period. If you give now, you will not only be exempt from additional solicitations, but you can also take advantage of year-end tax write-offs and, at the same time, energize the campaign and our cultural partners with an exhilarating start. Will you help us exceed our goal again this year? We hope to continue the upward momentum in 2016 to help maintain a healthy and thriving cultural sector that so richly serves both Central Florida’s children and adults.

This year we are trying something new—participation in “Giving Tuesday,” a national day of giving, which falls on Dec. 1. United Arts was approached by Tech4Good, a local affiliate of the international organization TechSoup, which invited our agency and five other local nonprofits to participate in a Giving Tuesday pilot program for Central Florida (look for the ad on page 51 in this issue). Given that the daylong event falls within United Arts’ Early Bird Campaign, we will be matching all contributions made on Dec. 1. I encourage you to make your contribution on Giving Tuesday to help supercharge the Early Bird Campaign. Depending on the success of this effort, we hope to continue with it in years to come, and to draw on a broader donor base.

Also in this edition, we asked Mark Brewer, president & CEO of the Central Florida Foundation and a longtime collaborator with United Arts, to

write a piece about planned giving. With so many passionate cultural donors, we want to make you aware of opportunities to consider a planned gift. As Mark states in his article, “Many times these are major gifts of legacy or to create sustainability for a beloved mission.” A planned gift can be for a specific cultural group or to United Arts to benefit the entire arts community—it’s the gift that keeps on giving over the life of an institution and can provide the much-needed stability that is critical to our cultural organizations. United Arts will be working with the Central Florida Foundation to further explore possibilities for planned giving.

Please help us to pursue our mission of “enriching communities by investing in the arts, science and history” by generously contributing to the Early Bird Campaign, participating in Giving Tuesday or considering a planned gift. It is your generosity that makes it possible for United Arts to continue to forge new territory in serving our community. Happy holidays and many thanks for your continued support and engagement in the work that we do.

The Season for GivingBY FLORA MARIA GARCIA

Flora Maria GarciaPresident & CEOUnited Arts of Central Florida

*The Collaborative Campaign for the Arts is a portion of United Arts’ overall annual fundraising effort. Each year, UA invests more than $4.5 million in arts and culture through grants, designations and contracts.

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ORLANDO ARTS MAGAZINE NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2015

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Planned Giving Goes Hand in Hand With the Holiday SeasonBY MARK BREWER

It’s that time of the year again. The

holidays remind us of the joy of giving, and Dec. 31 looms as the end of the tax

year. Everywhere I go people are talking about “planned giving.” So now seems like the perfect time to review the benefits and the importance of these gifts to the arts ecosystem of Central Florida. The misconceptions of planned giving can be confusing for both sides.

The most important aspect of a planned gift is the donor’s planning, rather than the organization’s need. Donors and arts organizations connect through gifts all year long. However, a planned gift is an entirely different entity from the usual transactions that come from events, ticket sales and major gifts. Planned giving also results in specific kinds of gifts at the best time for the donor. Often these are major gifts of legacy or creations of sustainability for a beloved mission.

The planning of a gift usually starts with a family discussion or a meeting with a professional advisor to talk about a liquidity incident, income or estate-tax planning, or transfer of wealth planning. Sometimes family foundations think about completing their annual required grant distributions with special dispersals to arts organizations to further the legacy of the grantors. While it is hard to track all of this activity, indications are that a quarter of the region’s annual giving—almost $1 billion—happens at this time of year.

While generous donors sometimes surprise arts groups, the DNA of planned gifts can provide insight. The most common planned gift is still a bequest at the death of a donor to create a legacy or continue the involvement of the family in the mission. Given the choice, many bequest donors would rather give while they are still alive, but

that is where deeper planning and communication with arts organizations comes in. Donors should reach out to organizations that they care about to discuss their plans or ideas, and ways to make their gifts more useful. Arts organizations should have a strong bequest program in place to accommodate patrons and donors and make it easy for people updating wills or trusts to get the necessary language for creating or updating documents. It’s even better when this language is available online. Unlike other kinds of planned giving, bequest giving is usually a very private thing. But the trend now is for donors to make life gifts or split gifts between life and death, realizing that the joy of giving is lost on the departed.

If you’re interested in engaging in a planning process for a special gift, look for arts organizations where you can provide a bridge to success or a legacy with your gift. The vehicle is not as important as the intent of the gift. The most popular kinds of planned gifts are deferred gifts, endowments or bequests, followed by trust-driven gifts that manage assets over a longer period of time. All of these contributions provide needed capital for arts organizations and important tax advantages for donors, with the added advantage of making the holiday season a time of giving.

A great resource for more information on planned giving is the Central Florida Foundation, which serves as a philanthropic home to more than 400 charitable funds. It manages and invests charitable funds, offers personalized service and expert giving advice, connects caring people, businesses, governments and organizations to local initiatives that build and inspire community initiatives, and empowers them to make informed decisions that make a difference—now and in the future. For more information, please visit cffound.org.

Central Florida Foundation President/CEO Mark Brewer is a Chartered Advisor in Philanthropy.®

What if my legacy was that I gave back to the arts what the arts had

given to me?

How will I be remembered?

It’s time to make a

plan that matters.

Learn more about

Planned Giving

and how you can

make a difference for

future generations.

407.628.0333 UnitedArts.cc

fromthe editorL E T T E R B O X

ORLANDO ARTS MAGAZINE NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2015

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Can Convenience and Culture Coexist?

My mother is a shopper extraordinaire. She does it for fun. When I was around 10 years old, I actually fell asleep in

a dressing room because we were at the mall for so long. As a result, I like to shop where the stores are facing a sidewalk so you can enter and exit quickly, or online where things get delivered right to my doorstep. However, the latter does lack the excitement of discovering a unique find. Sometimes you need to touch and feel what you’re buying. I love artisan gifts and really rustic antiquities that you don’t see around every corner. I wonder, have we just gotten complacent in finding the perfect gift, because a stroke of a keyboard can be so much more convenient?

E-commerce sales grew by 10 percent in the U.S. last year and 19 percent globally, reaching approximately $1.4 trillion by the end of 2014. Of those shopping online, 73 percent say it’s to save time and 58 percent do it to avoid crowds. So, I have an awesome idea. What if just a small percentage of those sales were made at a local gallery or museum gift shop? You don’t have to fight crowds, and they have everything from jewelry to clothing, and gift cards to paintings. Don’t forget tickets to a concert or a play. We could generate additional funding for artists and museums just by spending a few minutes and dollars supporting our creative community. A few cultural organizations even offer online shopping.

Several creative treasures are highlighted in “The Art of Gift-Giving” (page 13), while local designers offer holiday decorating tips that are fun, inexpensive and easy in this issue’s Décor department (page 30). That stack of holiday cards needs to go somewhere, so here’s to days filled with creative explora-tion, beautifully hand crafted baubles and, best of all, no dressing rooms!

Cheers,P

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Cindy Bowman LaFronzEditorOrlando Arts Magazine