So, what happened to tax reform? And what does that mean for charitable giving strategies?
Last year’s heavily-debated versions of the Build Back Better Act called for tax increases that potentially could have impacted charitable giving.
Think Big for Kids Grant Recipient, Saint Louis Story Stitchers
Through a $120,000, two-year, Think Big for Kids grant from YouthBridge, Story Stitchers is creating a series of public service announcements (PSAs) to help change the stigma around mental health care and provide information on accessing it.
January 2022
Bringing to Light the Darkness of Human Trafficking • YouthBridge Connections: College Bound • YouthBridge announces 2022 grant programs • Giving hard-to-value assets: It’s not just for real estate anymore • Philanthropy and the family business: Ripe for great questions • Transfer of wealth: Following the money
Bringing to Light the Darkness of Human Trafficking
Every January since 2010 has been recognized as National Human Trafficking Prevention Month. Human trafficking, especially sex trafficking, is a very real problem in Missouri, which ranks in the top 10 states for reported cases per capita.
YouthBridge Connections: College Bound
Making meaningful connections is a specialty of YouthBridge. “When I first shared the vision of College Bound with YouthBridge, they loved the concept. At the same time, they were honest about the grants and funders in their portfolio that they thought would and would not … More →
Giving hard-to-value assets: It’s not just for real estate anymore
You are no doubt familiar with the many benefits of giving hard-to-value assets to a charity–and especially to a client’s donor-advised fund at YouthBridge Community Foundation. Because YouthBridge is a public charity, your client is eligible for the maximum allowable tax deduction for their contributions.
Philanthropy and the family business: Ripe for great questions
More than half of the country’s GDP is generated by the 5.5 million family-owned businesses in the United States. Profits aren’t the only priority for most family businesses; indeed, the vast majority of family business owners report that other factors, such as culture, community, charity, and values, are also important to the business.
Transfer of wealth: Following the money
“The greatest wealth transfer in modern history has begun,” according to a mid-2021 report in the Wall Street Journal. And, with tax reform’s big bite into estate values off the table, at least for now, many of your older clients may be thinking seriously about their legacies.
Lift For Life Academy Empowers, Uplifts & Educates
Lift For Life Academy had a good problem to solve. A donor expressed the desire to establish an Endowment Fund for the school, but “the problem was, we had no idea how to set one up,” says Marshall Cohen, Lift For Life Executive Director and Co-Founder. Cohen says the Finance Committee of the Board decided to send out requests for proposals to three potential managers, including YouthBridge.
First Capacity Building Grants Awarded
In 2022, we have selected the first recipients of our Organizational Capacity Building grant: HOME WORKS! and Springboard to Learning. Through these one-time matching grants, YouthBridge will cover 75% – or up to $7,500 – of costs related to projects intended to strengthen the capacity and sustainability of nonprofit organizations.
And (not so) suddenly, it’s a thing: What’s up with donor-advised funds?
For nearly 90 years, charitably-minded individuals and families have established donor-advised funds to help carry out their philanthropic wishes. Popularity of the donor-advised fund steadily grew, especially beginning in the 1990s, eventually resulting in official recognition in the Internal Revenue Code under 2006 tax law updates. Today, over one million donor-advised fund accounts hold nearly $160 billion in charitable assets, according to the latest numbers.
Helping families stay connected across the miles and generations: There’s a gift for that!
Your philanthropic clients will thank you for suggesting they consider giving the gift of giving (say that three times fast!) in the form of a charitable fund instead of the more typical “I made a gift to my favorite charity in your honor.”
The ever-popular, handy-dandy, year-end charitable giving checklist
We’ve heard that many of you appreciate a quick checklist for charitable giving reminders each December. We know you receive this type of information from many sources, and frequently in great detail. It is our goal to break things down into a few simple points (below are three).
Standing Strong across St. Louis and St. Charles
Progress 64 West hosted its 33rd Annual Excellence in Community Development Awards Banquet on November 24 in Chesterfield, Missouri.
November 2021
Veterans Find the Lives They Deserve Through FOCUS • St. Louis Area Diaper Bank Making a Basic Need More Accessible • Holiday Gifts for Employees, Clients, Family & Friends • What’s off the table and what’s still in play • The buzzword is “billionaire” • Year-end giving
St. Louis Area Diaper Bank Making a Basic Need More Accessible
2020 was a pivotal year in a lot of ways. For the St. Louis Area Diaper Bank, it marked six years of serving the region, more than six million diapers distributed through 60 partner agencies, and the launch of a new initiative to expand resources for low-income women.
Veterans Find the Lives they Deserve through FOCUS
We honor our veterans this month and salute the organizations dedicated to helping them live productive and rewarding lives after service, such as FOCUS Marines Foundation. YouthBridge partner Wayne C. Kaufmann Foundation has faithfully funded FOCUS since 2016, helping the organization to continue its mission of serving our nation’s veterans in their transition to civilian life.
Year-end giving: Repeat, repeat, repeat
It’s the season for email newsletters hitting your inbox with tips for tax planning. We get it! With so much information flying around for your clients, too, we highly recommend that you cut through the noise and mention four key tax strategies to your clients at least twice, and ideally three times, before late December.
The buzzword is “billionaire”: How tax reform discussions have pulled complex charitable planning strategies into the spotlight
Forbes reports that the latest headcount of American billionaires checks in at 724. That number surprises some people, and for different reasons. Many are surprised to learn that the number is so low, when the word “billionaire” has been used so frequently lately in discussions about changes to the tax laws.
Relax a little (maybe?): What’s off the table, what’s still in play, and what your charitable clients need to know now about tax reform
Late last month, the White House released a proposed $1.75 trillion revenue package, putting to rest (at least for now) some of the uncertainty as to how sweeping tax reform could upend wealth planning strategies via changes to top marginal rates, a restructuring of the capital gains tax, and lower estate and gift tax exclusions, all of which have been heavily discussed and debated over the last several weeks. For now, those particular big changes appear to have been dropped.