Corporate Giving
1
Online shopping
Montgomery Asset Management set up a
holiday gift program at its Web site
http'yAvww.montgomeryfunds.com>. A por
tion of proceeds generated by online sales of
the firm’s investment books will be donated
to the United Way throughout the year.
12 • PhMthn^yJournal of North Carolina
January 1998
Nonprofit teaches art of public relations
Ramada sponsorship
of Childreach
a two-way street
oicsr
ITS NICE TO STAYWn'H
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ifts An
The hotel chain helps Childreach
enlist more sponsors, while Childreach
helps franchise owners reach out to the
community.
By Kelly Prelipp Lojk
When the nonprofit Childreach
announced in 1994 that Ramada
Franchise Systems Inc. would be its
“Founding Corporate Sponsor,” the staff at
the child-sponsorship organization was
thrilled, but realized its work had just
begun.
But the decision by Ramada’s corpo
rate headquarters to support Childreach
didn’t automatically translate into support
from the individud franchise owners of
the chain’s 900 hotels.
Instead of viewing the company’s fran
chise structure as an obstacle, however,
Childreach used it as an opportunity to
form mutually beneficial partnerships
with Individual Ramada franchises that
had Uttle experience in public relations,
says Steven R. Sookikian, public relations
manager at Childreach.
“We walk on the scene and say, ‘We
can help you reach out to your communi
ty’” he says, “and then we help them
incorporate Childreach and the value of
child sponsorship into their corporate
identity”
To date, 197 hotels have become
involved with Childreach, and Ramada’s
owners, managers and employees
sponsor 624 children throughout the
world. Sponsorship is S22 a month
and on average lasts for seven years,
Sookikian says. Ramada sponsor
ships total more than $1 million in
pledges.
Staff at the Ramada Plaza Hotel In
New York City sponsors 120 children
alone.
Last spring, Whit Kenney, who
owns Ramada Inn Blue Ridge and
Ramada' Inn Crabtree, both in
Raleigh, and a Comfort Inn in
Pinehurst, decided to get uwolved.
Kenney says that at a Ramada Inn
National Association in Las Vegas, as
he and his wife walked by a
Childreach booth, his wife picked up a
child’s picture and told him that he
was going to become that child’s spon
sor.
“That’s where we got started,” Kenney
says. “Then I got talking to [representa
tives] at Childreach and thou^t about
introducing a payroll deduction plan for
employees who want to participate.”
The Kenneys now sponsor two chil
dren and the hotels’ staffs sponsor 11.
Last February a Childreach represen
tative visited the staff at the Ramada Inn
in Goldsboro and, after explaining the
sponsorship program, signed up several
staff members “right on the spot,” says
Kat Crews, the hotel’s assistant manager.
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When a Ramada franchise signs up to
sponsor more than two children, as
Raleigh's Ramada Inn Blue Ridge and
Ramada Inn Crabtree did last year,
Childreach places a promotional ad in a
local newspaper to thank the hotel.
Crews and her husband now sponsor a
couple of children — one from Vietnam
and a four-year-old from Peru who “looks
like he’s going to grow up to be a rock
star,” she says.
The housekeeping staff in Goldsboro
also pooled its money and sponsors a
child.
Ramada franchises in Kill DevU HUls,
New Bern, Ashe\'ille and Thomasville also
sponsor children through Childreach.
l^Tiit Kenney, owner of the Raleigh
Look for CHILDREACH, page 13
Reconnecting with employees
IBM boosts United Way campaign
Big Blue worked hard to educate
employees about the United Way. The
effort paid off in the Triangle.
Research Triangle Park
IBM Corp. employees in the Triangle this
year gave $2,043,506 to the Triangle United
Way — the biggest employee contribution
ever to the United Way from a single IBM
location.
That contribution, which helped the
United Way campaign post a record-high
total of $20,007,000, was the result of a con
certed effort by IBM to generate employee
support in the face of recent rapid and large-
scale turnover among the company’s
Triangle workforce, says David Benevides,
IBM’s community relations and public
affairs manager for the Triangle.
The Triangle is home to the North
American headquarters for IBM’s personal
computer company, and houses a big opera
tion for IBM’s networking hardware and
software development.
As a result of transfers and people leav
ing the business, nearly half of Big Blue’s
13,000 employees in the region have worked
for the company for only a few years. As a
result, many have little connection with or
awareness of the United Way, Benevides
says.
“We went back to educating folks about
the United Way,” he says.
IBM offered better training sessions for
its United Way canvassers and conducted
more extensive communications with
employees than it had in the past, Benevides
says. The company, for example, made bet
ter use of its online capabilities, distributing
notices about the campaign to employees
over the company’s electronic bulletin
board.
“We really took advantage of our own
technology,” he says.
IBM’s campaign was headed by retiree
Ernie Hand, who received a lot of assistance
from Bari-j' Eveland, IBM’s state executive
for North Carolina. Eveland, for example,
hosted breakfasts for IBM executives to talk
about the campaign and encourage them to
participate.
Bill Kress, IBM’s retired state executive,
was chairman of the overall Triangle United
Way campaign.
Look for IBM, page 13
Congress to muU
new giving rules
By Kelly Prelipp Lojk
H.R. 944
Would require public
corporations to dis
close to shareholders
a list of its charitable
donations.
H.R.
945
Would
require corporations
to provide sharehold
ers the opportunity to
designate recipients of
charitable donations.
When the House of Representatives reconvenes this
month, it will consider two bills that may require some
businesses to significantly restructure their corporate
giving programs.
Both bills, introduced by Rep. Paul Gillmor (R-Ohio)
last March, would apply to corporations registered with
the Securities and Exchange Commission.
H.R. 944 would amend the Securities and Exchange
Act of 1934 to require public corporations to disclose to
shareholders prior to shareholder meetings a list of who
received charita
ble contributions
and the amounts
given to each orga
nization in the pre
ceding fiscal year.
Disclosure would
apply only to cor
porate charitable
contributions and
not to lobbying
expenses or politi
cal contributions.
H.R. 945 would
amend the same
act to require a
corporation to pro-
\1de its sharehold
ers the opportunity
to designate recipi
ents of the corpo
ration’s charitable
gl\ing.'The bill, as
currently wi-itten,
does not preclude corporations from funding additional
nonprofits not designated by shareholders. Exactly how
shareholders would vote on which nonprofits would
receive funding is unclear, although the bill states a
shareholder’s pai’ticipation would be “proportional to
the number of shares owned or controlled by such
shareholder.”
Both bills allow the SEC to exempt from the require
ments property gifts, gifts to public or private nonprofit
educational institutions and gifts to “local charities con
sistent OTth the public interest.”
Upon request by Congress, the SEC is studying the
feasibility of these proposais and plans to submit a
report to Congress within the next couple of months.
0MB Watch, a nonprofit research and advocacy
organization, supports corporations disclosing their
charitabie gifts, but questions why the requirement is
limited to charities.
“For one major U.S. corporation, this iegislation
would force management to disclose how it spends less
than one penny of every dollar it pockets in profits,”
writes Gary Bass, 0MB Watch’s executive director, in a
letter to the SEC. “If the intent of the disclosure bill was
to increase corporate accountability, it is interesting
that disclosure would only apply to corporate charitable
contributions.”
Of more concern, says Rick Blum, OMB’s public
affairs liaison, is the vague language and unclear intent
of the bill requiring shareholders to designate which
nonprofits receive a corporation’s charity While the
SEC could put the bill into effect in a variety of ways, vir
tually any approach would require significant changes
in corporate philanthropy, Blum says.
Look for CONGRESS, page 13
Hospice gets $1,000
from RJR for romp
R.J. Reynolds Tobacco
Company awarded Hospice
of Winston-Salem/Forsyth
County a $1,000 community
invovlement plan grant,
which will be used to buy
materials to build a portable
ramp to access patients'
homes.
New tax break for
computer donations
Starting this month, compa
nies that donate personal
computers less than two years
old to schools can deduct the
full cost of the systems. The
21 st Century Classrooms Act,
a provision in the Taxpayer
Relief Act of 1997, is designed
to trigger donations and to
encourage businesses to
upgrade their systems quickly.
Lowe's Home Centers gives $1.5 million to
YMCA camp for teens in western North Carolina
SAS employees make gifts
Lowe's Home Centers Inc.,
based in North Wilkesboro,
made its single-largest chari
table donation ever to The
Ridge, a new YMCA teen
adventure and family camp.
The $1.5 million gift,
announced in early
December, was made from
the company's Charitable
and Educational Foundation.
Construction on the camp,
the first of its kind in North
Carolina, begins this year,
with the first phase scheduled
to open in the fall of 1999. It
will be located on 1,438
acres between North
Wilksboro and Lenoir. When
it is finished, the camp is
expected to sen/e 25,000
campers a year.
Employees of software devel
oper SAS Institute in Cary
provided more than 1,000
gifts of toys or clothing to
more than 650 youngsters
through the Christmas Angels
program of the Salvation
Army. SAS employees also
worked with A Growing
Place, which provides a
kindergarten-through-third-
grade classroom for children
of homeless parents, to buy
gifts for 12 students, their sib
lings and parents. Golden
Corral, Honey Baked Ham
and McDonald's restaurants
also donated meal certificates
to the families.