Carrie A. Green • Community Development Specialist • Mid-Columbia Meals on Wheels • November 2021

“I do phone calls and thank-you notes,” says Carrie, “but not many of my planned giving prospects do Zoom. Most Meals on Wheels donors skew a little older, and so that’s not in their wheelhouse.”

Then being located  in the Tri-Cities region in central Washington state posed another problem.

“Meals on Wheels has such an awesome reputation here, but we really hadn’t been able to do much with legacy giving. The Tri-Cities is very young and the whole area really needs more information about planned giving. It’s been a full community education with planned giving here.”

The fact that Carrie also has other duties further complicated her progress.

“When you’re a one-person shop you do all the other things too,” says Carrie. “You do events, and a year-end mailing… But I’m trying to focus on why I was brought in – to focus on these long-term giving options for Meals on Wheels.”

Carrie says she found the support she needed when she discovered that Robert Shafis had joined Veritus Group as the Director of Planned Giving Services. With more than 30 years of experience as a fundraiser, speaker, and attorney, Bob has built a following in planned giving circles.

“Bob is a hero of mine,” says Carrie. Years earlier, when she got her start in development at Gonzaga University, she says she “dabbled in a little bit of planned giving, and every time Bob sent out an article, or anything, I always followed him.”

“So, I got the chance to work with him this past summer,” says Carrie. “He analyzed my prospects and helped me lay out a planned giving mini-campaign for about 25 of them. These are the inaugural members of our Legacy Society, and the campaign will culminate with a members-only get-together with the executive director in February for this inaugural group.”

“I loved working with him,” she says. “It was very helpful to have someone come alongside me, especially with so much knowledge. Because there hadn’t been a planned giving program, I needed someone to steer me, and Bob was great.”

Before Carrie began working on building the planned giving program, she says “it was either people self-reporting, or we didn’t know until after they had passed that we were in their estate.”

In fact, receiving a planned gift largely depended on donors having the forethought to take the initiative themselves.

“We had one lovely couple who gifted us some commercial property,” says Carrie. “That was our first planned gift from people who did it while still alive. They did a great thing and earmarked the gift to set up a fund for the kitchen – any piece of equipment that needs to be replaced in the kitchen –- so we don’t have to draw it out of the general fund. That’s very good thinking, but that was all on their own. They came to us.”

Working with Veritus, the approach to planned giving has become far more strategic.

“Through the analysis of data that Bob helped me with, we’ve discovered Meals on Wheels has about 40 solid planned giving prospects,” says Carrie.

“Bob and I narrowed them down to the top 25 and now we have a strategy for each one of them,” she says. “If it’s someone who just retired, and they’re volunteering with us, depending on their age, then maybe the IRA rollover is the perfect thing for them. Or maybe to have us become a beneficiary of part of their retirement plans would be an easy thing to do. But for each one there are some definite strategies.”

With guidance from Veritus, Carrie has narrowed down her focus to four areas of planned giving:

• Gift by will
• Life insurance
• IRA rollover
• Beneficiary designations

Bob Shafis helped her create a leave-behind information card explaining these options. Prospects can give the card to their attorney or accountant, so their financial planner can help support the donor’s planned giving plans.

Carrie has discovered that many donors simply are not aware of many planned giving options.

“I’ve talked to a couple of board members who weren’t aware of the IRA rollover,” she says.

When people understand the benefits of options like the IRA rollover, she says the reaction is often something like, “Oh wow! This is awesome. I was going to support you anyway, why not do this?”

“I’m blessed to be here, I truly believe I’m blessed to be here, because those relationships take a long time to build,” says Carrie. “And in the meantime, we’ve had a steady stream of funding. So, I’ve had the luxury of really developing those relationships so that we have a good outcome.”

“I’ve never liked hired guns and that’s what I’ve liked about Veritus. They say, ‘You know, this is long-term relationship building.’”

“And especially when you’re doing the planning. You just want to go out and get going, but they tell you, ‘Oh no, you’ve got to do the planning.’”

“It takes a lot of time, but on the other hand, you’re better off because you’ve got this process. You know, it’s not scattershot. A successful program doesn’t happen by accident."