After six decades of supporting nonprofits in the Bay Area and around the world, the Richard and Rhoda Goldman Fund is wrapping up its grant-making work with more than $4.45 million in new grants.
A few weeks after Richard Goldman died on Nov. 29, 2010, fund officials announced that the 60-year-old fund would cease operations at the end of 2012. Next year will be an administrative year, fund officials said, after which remaining assets will be divided among the family foundations of the three Goldman children. Rhoda Goldman died in 1996.
As part of its closure, the fund also approved $25 million in legacy grants to the S.F.-based Jewish Community Federation, Congregation Emanu-El in San Francisco and three other organizations that “have had long-standing relationships with the fund and represent issues of personal importance to the Goldman family,” according to a press release.
The three others receiving a legacy grant are the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy’s Lands End project, the Richard and Rhoda Goldman School of Public Policy at U.C. Berkeley and the Stern Grove Festival.
The newly approved grants include:
• $175,000 to S.F.-based UpStart Bay Area to provide support and raise visibility for Jewish social entrepreneurs.
• $125,000 in holiday grants to 25 San Francisco nonprofits that serve the homeless, immigrants, domestic abuse victims, at-risk youth and other vulnerable populations.
• $300,000 to Boston-based Corporate Accountability International to reduce the use of bottled water and strengthen municipal tap water systems.
• $160,000 to five Israeli nonprofits to support pluralism and freedom from religious coercion in Jerusalem.
• $400,000 to the Washington, D.C.–based National Abortion Federation to ensure safe access to reproductive health clinics.
Since its founding in 1951, the Richard and Rhoda Goldman Fund has distributed more than $700 million to 2,600 nonprofits in the Bay Area, Israel and elsewhere, officials noted. It has funded work in the areas of the environment, Jewish affairs, reproductive health and rights, arts and culture, education, child welfare and elderly care, among others.
“The Board is committed to making the transition as smooth as possible for everyone involved,” said Amy Lyons, executive director of the Richard and Rhoda Goldman Fund. “Our efforts so far, including the latest set of grants, give every indication that we’re well on track to do so.”
Meanwhile, fund officials are in the early stages of producing a commemorative book to document the philanthropic legacy of the fund and its founders, Richard and Rhoda Goldman. Also, the fund plans to archive its records and memorabilia with the Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life at U.C. Berkeley’s Bancroft Library.