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Shipley Foundation announces $500,000 Challenge Grant for SCCF

By Staff | Dec 21, 2010

Richard Shipley, second from left, pledges $500,000 Challenge Grant to SCCF Campaign Committee Co-Chair John La Gorce, left, Executive Director Erick Lindblad and Board President Paul Roth.

Richard C. Shipley, President of the Shipley Foundation, gave the Sanibel-Captiva Conservation Foundation (SCCF) a second major push in its $5.3 million fundraising campaign to purchase the 28.3-acre Bailey Family Homestead on Periwinkle Way. Shipley recently made an outright campaign gift of $500,000, the largest single gift received since the campaign was announced on Oct. 28.

Now, he has pledged to give SCCF an additional $500,000, but only if the same amount is donated in other new gifts and pledges by March 31, 2011.

“The preservation of the Bailey Family Homestead is, for me, one of the most important opportunities in Sanibel’s history,” said Shipley. “I hope that making this challenge will encourage others to support this effort. The success of this campaign will benefit all islanders, not just current SCCF members. The sheer size of the goal demands that as many people as possible donate as generously as they can.”

The gifts must be made in response to the Shipley Foundation challenge. In order to be recognized as “new money,” the gifts must fall within one of three criteria. Gifts must be from either:

(1) Donors that have not made prior gifts to SCCF (that is, first-time donors to SCCF);

(2) Donors that make matching gifts in excess of any single gift such donors had made to SCCF previously, and then only to the extent of such excess, (for example, in response to the challenge, a prior donor whose largest gift to SCCF was $100 makes a $500 pledge; $400 of that pledge will be recognized as matching); or

(3) Donors who have previously given to the Honoring The Past – Protecting The Future Campaign who are now making second gifts specifically in response to the Shipley Challenge Grant. (If any of the approximately 200 donors who have already given to the campaign are motivated to make a second gift because of the Shipley Challenge, 100 percent of that second gift will count as a match.)

“We are just overwhelmed by the decision of Richard and the Shipley Foundation to make this challenge to the island community,” said SCCF Executive Director Erick Lindblad. “We sincerely hope folks who may be making end-of-year tax-advantaged decisions about making a gift realize it will be of even greater value if made in response to the Shipley Challenge.”

The $5.3 million fundraising campaign has four main components:

• Acquisition of the 28.3-acre Bailey Homestead for $4 million.

• Restoration of the Bailey Family Home as a place to tell the Bailey family history and as a Center for Conservation History. The initial restoration costs, included in this campaign, total $225,000, not including the sweat equity of SCCF’s volunteer carpenters, the Hammerheads.

• Wildlife Habitat Restoration. Consistent with earlier land acquisitions, SCCF needs to raise an additional 10 percent — or $400,000 — to support the initial restoration and ongoing management of the land in perpetuity.

• SCCF’s conservation work for the islands. The last component supports the quality work being done in all program areas and addresses SCCF’s operating expenses, specifically those not covered by grant monies and other income generated by SCCF staff. To balance the annual operating budget, $675,000 must be raised as part of this campaign.

The Sanibel-Captiva Conservation Foundation is dedicated to the conservation of coastal habitats and aquatic resources on Sanibel and Captiva and in the surrounding watershed through environmental education, land acquisition, landscaping for wildlife, marine research, natural resource policy, sea turtle conservation and wildlife habitat management.

Tax-deductible contributions to the campaign can be made online at www.sccf.org or by calling Erick Lindblad at 427-2329 or Cheryl Giattini at 395-2768.