(upbeat instrumental music) - [Voice-Over] This is Carolina Business Review.

Major support provided by High Point University, the premier life skills university, focused on preparing students for the world as it is going to be.

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Sonoco, a global manufacturer of consumer and industrial packaging products and services, with more than 300 operations in 35 countries.

- If history is any guide, then the re-engagement of a Trump administration in DC will have a meaningful impact on philanthropic engagement and charitable giving, or will it?

Welcome again to the most widely watched and the longest running program on Carolina, business, policy and public affairs seen across North and South Carolina for more than 30 years.

This will not be all about a new president and the impact on nonprofits.

This dialogue is about the DNA of what the philanthropic role means in more than just vulnerable populations, but how leadership, how charitable support, how do they lead and remake communities?

And oh yeah, by the way, what is community?

In a moment, we have four key leaders from across the Carolinas to take a deeper dive and we will do exactly that.

We hope you stay because we will start right now.

- [Voice-Over] Major funding also by Foundation for the Carolinas, a catalyst for philanthropy and driver of civic engagement, helping individuals, nonprofits, and companies bring their charitable visions to life.

Truliant Federal Credit Union, proudly serving the Carolinas since 1952 by focusing on what truly matters, our member's financial success.

Welcome to brighter banking.

And Martin Marietta, a leading provider of natural resource-based building materials, providing the foundation on which our communities improve and grow.

On this edition of Carolina Business Review, Cathy Bessant from the Foundation for the Carolinas, Rhett Mabry of the Duke Endowment, Dr. Tonya Matthews of the International African American Museum, and Sara Fawcett from United Way of the Midlands.

(upbeat instrumental music) - Hello, welcome again to our program.

I am beyond honored to have all of you here, and I know that sounds a little pandering, but I've known of you or know you, and I know you are deep thinkers.

And Cathy, also, I wanna make sure we completely disclaim and disclose, we're glad to have you on this program as an underwriter, and that's an important distinction, but we also need to make sure it's completely known by viewers as well.

So thank you all.

Thanks for driving in.

I'm going to start with you, Cathy, not just to pick on you, but because I know you like to engage right away.

We have a new administration in Washington.

We're gonna unfold that in a little bit.

But Cathy, this whole idea about nonprofits and what they do in communities, how do you define community?

What is community?

And are you talking about that internally?

- Well, we're all talking about it.

It is a very hot topic, not to pander myself, but the reason we are underwriters is because you create a proper discourse about tough issues like this one.

The interesting thing for me, having come out of a long corporate career and being part, no longer as a volunteer, but as a CEO for a foundation, is that, community means something different to everyone.

Community, how you define your community, how you see another person's or another organization's community is a very personal thing.

And for us as a foundation, we have donors that participate and believe in and define all of their communities in different ways.

Our job is to build collective community, respect individual differences of communities, and to try to unite and respect and enjoy and embrace that difference, but realize it doesn't mean the same thing to everyone.

- So Rhett, and I know the indenture of the Duke Endowment has four specific areas, and you all are very passionate about sticking to what the founder had and what he wanted to do with this.

How do you define community?

Is that an active engagement?

Is it different now than it was even five years ago, pre-COVID?

- Well, first of all, let me say thank you for the opportunity to be here today, I appreciate that.

The Duke Endowment, as you said, established our community in 1924, a hundred years ago, when James Buchanan Duke signed the trust indenture to start the endowment, to begin the endowment.

And we are faithful adherents to his guidance.

So we support North Carolina and South Carolina in four lanes, higher education with Duke University, Davison College, Johnson C. Smith University, and Furman University.

We also help in healthcare across the two states.

We help the child welfare system, particularly families that are either at risk for entering that system, or are already engaged in that system, and we help rural United Methodist churches in North Carolina.

So that's our community.

But in terms of our grants, our grants are usually defined by our grantee's service area.

So for instance, if we fund a county hospital in Williamsburg County, South Carolina, their service area is probably that county.

So that becomes the community, all the neighborhoods within that community.

If we fund a regional hospital that's serving seven or eight counties in their region, that becomes their community.

If we're funding a smaller nonprofit that's helping to teach parenting programs, that could be a couple of neighborhoods.

So it varies by grant, and I don't know that we need to define communities, I really think the communities need to define communities and the nonprofits embedded in those communities define 'em as well.

- So, Dr. Matthews.

- Yeah.

The idea that the International African American Museum is in the Lowcountry and in Charleston.

- Yeah.

- It's more than just about art.

I know that is, but so for you, is community in the Lowcountry, is that a noun or a verb for you?

- Oh, that's a great question.

It's definitely a verb, I think, and I think that when we say community, we need to be intentional about it and transparent about how we're defining community in any given moment, because community isn't a region or a geography, it's a people, it's a group of people and how they're interconnected and their interconnected lived experiences.

I think one of the things I've appreciated about serving in the Lowcountry and across the Carolinas is that we know how to cook.

So bear with me here, (all laughing) because, you know, approach your definitions and our approach to community is very much the similar approach to cooking, which is, you know, you don't disparage the spices, right?

You need all of that mixing and that gathering, and it's okay to call each community by name when you're having conversations.

And people really do appreciate that.

We are of course, a museum.

We're known for our art collection, our contemporary art collection, but we are a history museum.

So the bolus of our connection and collection are actually the stories of the communities, and then we are stewards.

So we have to be very explicit and we talk to our supporters.

Also, when you say community...

I'm known for saying, "So when you say community, what exactly do you mean?"

People are happy to share it, people are also happy to hear it.

So I would also say, we shouldn't be afraid of defining the communities that we serve out loud.

- Yeah, to that point, Sara, it is an overused term.

I mean, I think we can say that, but as Tonya just said, how do you define community?

Why is that important?

- Yeah, I think the thing that I would add to the discussion here is that community is an elastic term, because you can be part of multiple communities.

There are times and places where you need to think of multiple groups in one community.

It all depends on who you're serving, why you're serving them, and how are you going to serve them.

But the thing that I love the best about that thought of community is the elasticity of it.

There's not one solid defined definition that I always have to fit in.

- So how do you then pull together and this is no indictment of your organizations, but I know many people think of nonprofits and especially large nonprofits and philanthropic organizations, it's having this wealthy, unaccountable elite funding it and writing big checks and then wanting to specifically use restricted money or not.

But how do you connect with the top of your donor base with the least of those in a community?

And this is a question for anyone.

- That's a really good question.

I've been part of some discussions, in a broad term, talking about sort of the decolonization of philanthropy.

And it kind of gets into that, which is, remembering that we're trying to be in partnership, and that those who have the resources are not necessarily those that have the skills or the knowledge or the feet on the ground, and so it is those two things combining and working together.

But I also find though, that even the wealthiest or most rigid of donors are simply trying to make the world a better place in their own view and vision.

And they're looking to your organization because they think you're a part of that vision.

And part of it is getting out of your own way to be able to understand the story of the individual that you're talking to, and then perhaps give them some language to help them understand what this will actually look like on the ground, what this actually looks like in the middle.

It is a balance, but I think that if we can remember that we're still talking to people, and the people are trying to impact other people, communities or neighborhoods or organizations or visions, that's usually how I work to balance that.

- Cathy, MacKenzie Scott, the former wife of Jeff Bezos, who ended up... Or is still giving away hundreds of millions, billions, is she a force for change?

Is she a force for good change in nonprofits?

And I'm not singling her out, but does she cause nonprofits to think differently about how they grant?

- Well, look, there's the people side of philanthropy and there's the money side of philanthropy, and money at scale, well directed, always helps.

And, you know, what her foundation does is also create an ecosystem and a set of accountabilities that are very helpful.

Very different from a community foundation model where 95% of what we do in the foundation that would be attributable to grants that we facilitate, those decisions are made by our donors.

So very different model from a family oriented, large-scale foundation.

We are the sum of our donors, and we believe in open philanthropy, that means donors of all kinds and for all communities.

But I agree with you, Dr. Matthews.

I've not met a person, one of our donors or one of the people that we try to cultivate to join our community foundation, I've not met anyone who undertakes philanthropy simply to serve the elite.

They undertake philanthropy to have remarkable impact and to change the world.

- Go ahead.

- And Chris, I was gonna say, just speaking as an organization that was a MacKenzie Scott gift recipient, it did open a lot of opportunities for United Way of the Midlands.

We had been able to expand work, we've been able to take on work that requires a longer timeline to see results.

And with that kind of giving, when it's transformational giving and when there are no boundaries that are set for it, it can really change an organization.

It also allowed us the opportunity to go out and match it in our community.

So they are truly transformational gifts.

Now, you can't depend on a donor like that, you know, to continue to be an ongoing operational funding type of basis, but it will absolutely change your organization.

- [Chris] Were you gonna say something, Rhett?

- Yeah, I was just gonna say, I think we are still evolving and have evolved in this regard.

We have a long history of working with our grantees.

In fact, I don't think we've ever been a top down, we know all the answers, funder.

If we ever say that, we should get out of the business, 'cause that's ridiculous.

What we do know we have to do though, is continue to listen to our grantees and then make sure they, and we, are listening to those whom we're trying to serve.

So there may be communities, neighborhoods within a community, that for some reason, cannot access a program we're funding at the local hospital, or may not know how to navigate it.

So more and more hospitals now, with our support, are hiring community health workers.

These are people in and of and from those communities, that are trusted by those communities, that then are trained to help people of that community avail themselves to the resources we're trying to make available to all Carolinians.

- Let me come back to something.

Cathy, I wanna come to you 'cause you're the newest in the job of everyone here.

So you've gotta be strategically going through things internally, but more specifically, what sets your North star as not just a CEO, but what sets your North Star as an organization where you can rally all of your team members to say, "This is what we believe, this is how we're gonna deploy it, and this is how we're gonna bring everybody together."

- It's a very important thing for any organization to have.

And if you think about it, I think we'd all agree, the philanthropy of the last five years is not the philanthropy of the next 10.

And so our North Stars have to evolve and change and have to be of our communities, I believe, versus to our communities.

But it's very important to have them.

I said earlier, we believe in open philanthropy, meaning donors can give to the causes to which they choose to give, because that inspires more philanthropy.

We believe in remarkable impact and we also believe that the best results are those achieved through partnership.

That partnership and relentless efforts to build partnership always create a better result.

And those, if you were asking me to declare a simple North Star- - Right.

- That's the direction in which we're headed.

Then from there, of course, it's really important to be careful that not everything can fall under a broad base North Star, but North Stars are important and man, are they changing.

- Yeah.

Tonya, what is that moral compass for you internally?

- So it's interesting, you know, as you're talking also around sort of open philanthropy, it also reminds me, we talk a lot about access and exposure for those we serve.

We don't talk about it as much for those who also give, right?

So when we talk about why and when communities need to intersect, our donors also lack exposure.

I've got wealth, I wanna share, I wanna make the world a better place.

Many walk in and say, "I don't know, how can I help?"

So there's also a level of education and access, and so when I think about the International African American Museum, one of the thing that I'm most proud of is the response of the quote unquote "unusual suspects."

When they walk in the door, and they can find stories that they relate to, things that they think are beautiful, their imagination, their curiosity is sparked.

It's a moment of exposure.

I may or may not be changing their life, but I am actually adding something to the life experience in that space.

And so I think for me, a big part of that North Star is showing that you can immerse yourself in someone else's story and still feel comfortable, still feel welcome, and resist the need to take over while you're in that space.

And so I think that's been a big North Star for us.

- So Sara, this may not be fair, but I'm gonna ask it of you anyway, so to follow what Dr. Matthews just said, we have...

There is a new administration, there's a Trump administration, version 2.0, and it's been widely touted, but so do nonprofits now, is there an appetite for nonprofits to become the convener of those things that cannot be agreed upon politically?

And I'm talking about community, about kindness, about helping, about funding, even the least of these in the community.

I mean, is that your role?

- Yeah, absolutely it is.

And I think that I saw it even before this new... You know, just in the last four years, I feel like our nonprofit community has been moving in that direction anyway, because there does need to be an entity that can on equal footing and with equal access and with equal voice, bring the community together to try to solve these problems.

Because if we don't do that, the problems are only going to get worse.

You cannot solve a problem by kicking it down the road, you can't solve it by pushing it off on somebody else or expecting them to take care of it for you, and nonprofits, I feel, are best positioned to bring together the private sector, the public sector, the philanthropy sector, to be able to come up with those collective solutions.

And they do need to be, to Cathy's point, they need to be collective.

- Okay, we've got about 10 minutes, I wanna make a note here that coming up on this program, Harry Sideris is the president of Duke Energy, and to say that they have their plate full around the rebuilding of western North Carolina, upstate South Carolina, among other places like Florida, that they're still active in.

Harry Sideris will join us about what those rebuilding efforts look like, what they've learned and many other issues, but that's coming up on this program.

Rhett, so the idea of relief funding as we talk about that in response to Hurricane Helene for sure.

Has that changed the way that you budget?

Does that change the way you think about granting more than just a one-off, to send a check to western North Carolina?

- Yes.

Our first disaster relief was in 1999, Hurricane Floyd.

And at that time point, I'll never forget, we were in a hotel lobby and we decided to give away $6 million and we gave it away to our grantees.

And that was the- - Unrestricted?

- Unrestricted, that was the extent of the depth of the thinking.

As we've supported other hurricanes over the last 25 years now, we've learned a couple things.

One is, we normally try to stay away from the response phase.

That's when all the federal dollars are coming in and it's somewhat chaotic, except with Helene, because of its magnitude, we did approve $15 million for western North Carolina and upstate South Carolina.

So we made an exception there.

But generally, we think we're more effective in the recovery and the rebuilding phases.

Secondly, we've moved away from funding our traditional grantees in the lanes that Mr. Duke articulated, and we're looking for intermediaries.

And what's important about that is, we want intermediaries that are close to proximal to communities that we know will be hit the hardest.

It's inevitable that those with fewer resources are going to be hit the hardest regardless of the disaster.

So what we feel like we have to do is create strong relationships with these intermediaries, make sure they're trusted by those communities whom we're trying to serve.

And our latest thinking is, we can't do that in the moment when the disaster just hit.

We've gotta do this years out in advance.

And we may even need to think about, I hope we do, but we may even need to think about giving these intermediary organizations funding throughout the year so that their capacity is at a level that they can respond in a quick and meaningful way.

- Cathy, does it change strategic DNA planning for you?

- Well, I'm not certain it changes that, but I will say this, in any disaster, there's a rush to help.

It's a great thing about the spirit of people, there's a rush to help.

There's also quite a bit of chaos.

Who's doing what?

- Sure.

- Who's channeling what?

- Right.

- And so maneuvering, and what Rhett is saying is so important, maneuvering the cast, channeling donors that want to rush in and help in a deeply human way, very important.

The other piece of the discussion that we often miss is prevention, and disasters and the need for belief is a lot like anything else, there's an element of prevention that sometimes is at the end of or not in a conversation, that I think all of us as community partners need to think about as well.

- Yeah, I wanna move on a little 'cause we're gonna run out of time.

Tonya?

- Yeah.

- Affordable housing, it's been called workforce housing.

It's affordable housing.

Is that job one, two, or three for nonprofits?

- That is actually an excellent question.

I think it's job one, two, and three from all different perspectives, because that's what you actually have at the table here.

You have resource providers, you have infrastructure builders, and then you have those that keep the story in mind, the history of where these communities were, and what has happened around in those communities.

Rhett has mentioned a couple of times the word trust, which is what I think nonprofits are very good at as intermediaries, because no matter how desperate a community is, if there's a sense of fear or instability, trust becomes paramount.

And communities are often able to reject well-intentioned support if they can't trust where it's coming from.

So it's how, say the International African American Museum, "You're just a history museum."

It's how we become a convener around a discussion of low-income housing, because we're a trusted entity and we can serve as an intermediary where folks can be candid on both sides in terms of that.

But I do think that unless we are supporting the bare basic needs, it's very hard for folks to get into nice big questions about community and repair and relationship and healing if you don't have a roof over your head.

So I think these things are very important.

- What is the priority in the Midlands for housing?

- Really...

Excuse me, it's across the board.

In fact, on to Dr. Matthew's point, we have committed half of our MacKenzie Scott money as well as half of the match money towards seeding innovative approaches to affordable housing.

So already, we've been able to... And to do it in different ways, making sure that we're including the communities that we are either developing in or that we're trying to serve.

Making sure that they're included in that conversation as well.

But around workforce housing, housing for teachers that is in the communities that they're serving.

Housing for vulnerable families, housing for chronically homeless, single adults, ways to make home ownership, first time home ownership, more attainable.

- Are all those working?

- Well, the ones that we have in place that...

Some of those are on our wishlist, some of them are already working.

The teacher village that we help to fund in Fairfield County is a smashing hit, and we are looking forward to seeing the expansion of that village, and we'd love to see that model copied in other places.

Looking at housing for vulnerable families.

We've got two projects that we are a partner in, not an investment partner, but a funding partner in the Columbia area already, that are well underway.

The other two are still on my wishlist and we're working on it.

- We've got about a minute and a half left.

Rhett, you're gonna get the last question on that same thing around affordable housing and housing in general.

How does it not get lost in the wake of what happened in the act of God or the natural disaster?

How does housing remain as a priority?

- Well, I think we're gonna have to do both.

That's the simple answer.

And from our perspective, you might say, "Well, your four lanes," that I named earlier, "Housing does not fit into that," which is the right answer.

Housing is a social determinant of health.

It also predicts the welfare of children.

So far what we're doing is, working with projects that are building housing and we're trying to support the wrap support that we can put into those housing communities.

So community health workers or parenting programs or financial management programs, so that we embed those housing structures that we're not directly contributing to.

We embed it... We strengthen them with wrap support from our hospitals and our child service agencies so that the people living there get additional services that are near and accessible.

- Thank you, that's the last word.

I know you've done so much on housing out of the gate and I wish we had a chance to chat about that, we will.

But thank you, thank you all.

Thanks for being here and hauling it up from Charleston.

God bless you.

(all laughing) We all love going down there, but who loves leaving?

But thanks for being here.

- Thanks for having me.

- Sara, good to have you here from Columbia.

- Thank you so much.

- And Rhett, as always.

- Thank you, Chris.

- Thank you.

Until next week, I'm Chris William.

We hope your weekend is good.

We're past the election, so breathe easier onto the next thing.

Goodnight.

(upbeat instrumental music) - [Voice-Over] Gratefully acknowledging support by, Martin Marietta, Truliant Federal Credit Union, Foundation for the Carolinas, Sonoco, BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina, High Point University, and by viewers like you.

Thank you.

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