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Friday August 17, 2007

It’s time to encourage more local mega-gifts

Larry Ellison went to Israel, and a great miracle happened there.

In his very first visit to the country last week, the Jewish billionaire founder of Oracle visited a community center in Sderot, a southern Israeli town targeted by Palestinian terrorists almost daily. It didn’t take long for him to promise $500,000 to reinforce the center to withstand Kassam rocket attacks.

One of the world’s richest men, Ellison has been criticized for not devoting more of his fortune to philanthropy. In fact, he has given away many millions of dollars and has established his own charitable foundations. Still, compared to mega-philanthropists such as Bill Gates and Warren Buffet, the Silicon Valley pioneer may have lagged behind.

But we applaud Ellison’s Sderot gift. We hope it’s the beginning of further philanthropic involvement with Israel and the Jewish community.

This case underscores an ongoing concern within the Jewish communal world: How can we persuade more mega-rich Jews to donate to Jewish causes?

Our region is home to some of the world’s most generous Jewish philanthropists. They have spearheaded unprecedented growth of the Jewish community throughout the Bay Area.

However, in a recent study, the Institute of Jewish Community & Research described numerous wealthy Jews here and around the nation who give relatively modestly to Jewish causes. Gary Tobin, who oversaw the research, wrote in j. last fall that there are “hundreds of wealthy Jews in the Bay Area, and thousands more throughout the world, who have yet to become fully engaged in Jewish giving. There is an enormous opportunity to engage these Jewish givers.”

We like the spirit of Tobin’s conclusion. Communal organizations, such as Jewish federations and foundations, must work hard to bring those individuals into the fold and convince them that giving more to Jewish causes pays enormous dividends.

There’s plenty of good news. Mega-donors such as Sheldon Adelson and Ronald Stanton have pledged $100 million-plus gifts to key Jewish institutions within the last year.

Tobin also noted that Jewish community foundations across the country have grown enormously in assets in recent years, with combined assets topping $30 billion. Our own Jewish Community Endowment Fund is closing in on $3 billion.

That’s real tzedakah power.

The local and global Jewish community has many outstanding problems. For some of these problems, money is the remedy. As long as we all contribute to the best of our ability, the Jewish community will prevail.

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