• You are here:  
  • Home

Upcoming Diary Dates

18 Feb
RotaryGBI - The Rotary Foundation Support meeting
Thu, 18 Feb 2021 17:00 - 18:00

Our meeting in February is on Thursday 18th at the usual time of 5.00pm when our speaker will be Eric Schmelling - General Manager & Chief Philanthropy Officer at Rotary International headquarters in Evanston.

Eric leads the area responsible for facilitating contributions to The Rotary Foundation, which grants more than $300 million annually to eradicate polio and funds projects and scholarships in communities worldwide. His team focuses on implementing fundraising strategies for the Annual, Endowment and PolioPlus Funds, including all donor acquisition, retention, recognition and stewardship efforts.

Eric has over 25 years of fundraising experience and strives to support a culture of giving within Rotary. He is a member of the Rotary Club of Evanston Lighthouse, a multiple Paul Harris Fellow and a Benefactor.

As always, this meeting is open to all, with the joining details in the January 2021 Rotary GB&I Service News.

 

There will be limited time for questions so please send yours to Steve Munns  by Monday 15th February.

If you have ever wondered how the Endowment Fund can help to support projects in your district, Eric is the person to ask.

Home

Welcome to the website for all aspects of Our Rotary Foundation (Rotary's own charity) in Rotary District 1060 (a large portion of the West Midlands, all of Warwickshire and elements of Staffordshire and Worcestershire). For other information relating to District 1060, please see the main website - https://www.rotary-ribi.org/districts/homepage.php?DistrictNo=1060.

If you are unable to see the menu bar for this website, please look for a 'triple bar' icon and tap / click it to reveal the menu. This is a way of saving space on smaller screen devices such as phones and tablets.

Navigation

The Memo of Understanding generator is intended to make life easier for those looking to apply for Grants. This link - http://foundation.rotary1060.org.uk/memo-of-understanding - will take you directly to it, if you have not been able to access the menu item for it. By filling in your email, selecting your Club from a list and supplying the appropriate officer names and hitting 'submit', a pre-filled Memo of Understanding form will be sent to you for printing and signing.

Please take a look at the Download menu as it contains a number of helpful files and background reference documents.

The Training Material menu item includes the new YouTube training videos we are trying as a way to get some localised education on The Rotary Foundation.

Rotary District 1060 has been successful in applying for a Disaster Response Grant from The Rotary Foundation. Unlike the District Grant we apply for each year and the Global Grants that we are involved in from time to time, this is from an entirely separate source - the Disaster Response Fund - that is built up globally and is not related to money that our local Clubs and their members have donated to Foundation in the past. The Disaster Response Grant application was justified around the support of Food Banks, so we are restricted to using it for that purpose alone. To this end, we have created the Foundation 1060 Food Bank Fund to hold the proceeds from the Grant.

Rotary Clubs in District 1060 can apply for matched funding using the application form available under the Downloads section of this site - with a direct link to the form here -> Foundation 1060 Food Bank Fund application form - using the guidelines detailed in this article.

If you leave something to charity in your will, then it won’t count towards the total taxable value of your estate. This is called leaving a ‘charitable legacy’.

You can also cut the Inheritance Tax rate on the rest of your estate from 40% to 36%, if you leave at least 10% of your ‘net estate’ to a charity.

To illustrate how this would work, let’s say that when you died:

  • your net estate was worth £425,000
  • in your will, you left it all to your partner who lives with you
  • you have your full Inheritance Tax allowance (currently £325,000 for the 2018/19 tax year)
  • you weren’t married or in a civil partnership (the spouse exemption is not available if you are not married)
  • thus, the ‘net estate’ is £100,000 (i.e. £425,000 minus £325,000). And there is Inheritance Tax to pay on £100,000 at a rate of 40%
  • so, your estate would have to pay a tax bill of £40,000 (i.e. 40% of £100,000).

It can be a little confusing, but all our dealings with the Rotary Foundation tend to be in dollars as the targets and thresholds are set globally. There is only one Rotary Foundation and it covers the entire globe. The actual funds need to be held somewhere and that somewhere happens to be the USA. By paying funds into the Foundation, we are not 'sending money to the Americans', but contributing to a single global entity which supports Rotary Clubs in their work to 'Do Good in the World'.

In our part of the world, we can donate via the Rotary Foundation (UK) or RF(UK) for short. RF(UK) is a registered UK charity, which has a double benefit for us. Not only does it allow us to donate to the Rotary Foundation in Sterling, but it also allows us to take advantage of Gift Aid. All we have to do is to fill in a Gift Aid declaration and send it to the RF(UK) team in Alcester. They provide a reference to use for Standing Orders, or other direct bank payments, and they will handle all the paperwork on our behalf. RF(UK) act as a gateway to the Rotary Foundation itself, covering the exchange rate conversions and international transfers so that all the funds ultimately end up in the global account in dollars.

A key area of the District Foundation Committee's work is around the Stewardship of the GrantFunds we disperse. The reports that are produced from the Club's running grant funded projects need to be reviewed with the expectation that we could be audited at some point. To help Rotarians compile these reports, we have listed below the criteria that will be used in the review. This should increase the chances of the report being accepted on the first attempt and save time for both the author and the reviewer.

  • Is the report in a satisfactory form - using the official proforma?
  • Were the recipients those mentioned in the application?
  • Has the service been delivered, or the item(s) acquired?
  • What attempts at publicising the project have been made?
  • Final balance sheet required, with copies of receipts or other evidence?
  • Is the sign-off the name of the primary or secondary contact on the application?

If your report meets all the elements of this checklist, it is very likely that it will be accepted.

EU e-Privacy Directive

This website uses cookies to manage authentication, navigation, and other functions. By using our website, you agree that we can place these types of cookies on your device.

View e-Privacy Directive Documents

You have declined cookies. This decision can be reversed.

You have allowed cookies to be placed on your computer. This decision can be reversed.