FJC’s Chief Executive Officer Sam Marks made the list of “Notable Leaders in Philanthropy 2025” by Crain’s New York Business.

Crain’s notes that it is a “… small wonder that New York today is home to so many philanthropic endeavors and nonprofit organizations. It’s our privilege to honor 62 individuals who are core to these efforts. In their various roles — executives and board members, directors and founders — the people presented in our 2025 list of Notable Leaders in Philanthropy are toiling for the public good, alleviating youth homelessness, servicing families battling illness, supporting the arts and more.”

Crain’s highlighted FJC’s innovative philanthropy including including efforts related to homelessness, adolescent mental health, affordable housing and economic justice. Notable successes include creating financial tools providing credit lines to arts and LGBTQ youth organizations, and launching an equity-like capital initiative benefiting affordable housing nonprofits. The piece also celebrated Marks’ board service to community development nonprofits like Fifth Avenue Committee and the Center for New York City Neighborhoods.

Read the full profile at Crain’s New York Business.

Marks responded, “It’s great for FJC to receive this recognition, which really reflects the amazing work of our staff, board, and all the partners and donors that fuel our work with their philanthropic giving.” 

Please join FJC in celebrating the work of Sam and the team for this recognition!

The recent wildfires in Los Angeles have been fueled by a confluence of factors, including record-breaking heat waves, prolonged drought conditions, and strong Santa Ana winds. Climate change has exacerbated these conditions, creating a perfect storm for the rapid spread of fire across vulnerable landscapes and communities. As flames consume homes, displace families, and devastate wildlife habitats, the urgency for support and intervention has never been greater.

While first responders work tirelessly to contain the fires and provide immediate relief, there are significant gaps that philanthropy can help address. Recovery is about more than extinguishing flames—it’s about helping displaced families rebuild their lives and livelihoods, restoring damaged ecosystems, and supporting frontline responders who are often overwhelmed by the sheer scale of these disasters.

Below is a small sample of non-profit 501(c)(3) organizations that are active in the Los Angeles area. This list is far from exhaustive, but these have been vetted by FJC and peer organizations with local expertise.  

To find one of the grantees below in the FJC donor portal, go to the Make a Grant page, select “Click here to search for a Grantee” and enter the EIN number of the organization.  Please note also our suggested language for the Grant Purpose field, which will help direct FJC’s grants to specific programs related to the wildfires.

California Community Foundation  (Grant Purpose: “California Wildfire Recovery Fund”)

EIN: 95-3510055 

Since 1915, the California Community Foundation (CCF) has been shaping and strengthening Los Angeles communities.  The California Community Foundation’s Wildfire Recovery Fund supports both mid-term to long-term recovery efforts for those affected by California wildfires. Since the Wildfire Recovery Fund opened in 2003, we have granted more than $32 million to support relief and recovery efforts in the aftermath of these devastating wildfires.

World Central Kitchen (Grant Purpose: “To support WCK’s Southern California relief team”)

EIN: 27-3521132 

World Central Kitchen provides meals in response to humanitarian, climate, and community crises. World Central Kitchen’s Relief Team is in Southern California to support first responders and families impacted by wildfires in the Los Angeles area. Their teams and partners have mobilized across the region to provide nourishing meals to people in need.

Los Angeles Regional Food Bank. (Grant Purpose: “Disaster Relief Fund”)

EIN: 95-3135649 

The Los Angeles Regional Food Bank and their partner agencies provide food assistance to people throughout LA County in normal times and times of crisis through a network of local food pantries and agency partners.

805 Undocufund (Grant Purpose: “Disaster Relief Fund”)

EIN: 86-2230353

When disaster hits, 805 Undocufund mobilizes resources, providing short-term financial relief to undocumented residents, and advocates for long-term systems change to ensure they are effectively included in disaster planning, preparedness, response and recovery. Donations to the Disaster Relief Fund provide urgent financial assistance to vulnerable families impacted by disasters, covering essential needs such as rent, utilities, food, and medical expenses. This fund is especially vital for undocumented and migrant communities who often lack access to traditional support.

The Los Angeles Fire Department Foundation

EIN: 27-2007326

The Los Angeles Fire Department (LAFD) Foundation provides vital equipment and funds critical programs to help the LAFD save lives and protect communities. As the Fire Department’s official non-profit arm, the LAFD Foundation focuses its fundraising efforts on projects that: improve firefighter health, safety and wellness; affect firefighters’ ability to perform their life-saving duty; and expand the resources relied upon to protect lives, homes and the environment.

Public Counsel (Grant Purpose: “Fire Relief and Recovery Services”) 

EIN: 23-7105149 

Public Counsel is a nonprofit public interest law firm dedicated to advancing civil rights and racial and economic justice.  The organization is helping individuals, families, small businesses, and communities impacted or displaced by the fires, in partnership with FEMA and the County of Los Angeles Recovery Centers. 

Baby2Baby

EIN: 46-4503539 

Baby2Baby is a nonprofit that provides children living in poverty across the country with diapers, clothing and all the basic necessities. Baby2Baby has already distributed over 5 million emergency supplies for the most vulnerable children and families who have lost everything in the fires, including diapers, food, formula, water, clothing, blankets and hygiene products. The organization partners with 470 partners in LA County spanning schools, homeless shelters and resource centers.

Jewish Free Loan Association. (Grant Purpose: “Wildfire Relief”)

EIN: 95-1691014

In response to the devastating impact of the wildfires, Jewish Free Loan Association (JFLA) is offering a limited number of zero-interest, zero-fee loans to affected people of all faiths and backgrounds: individuals, non-profits, and small businesses.  Loans are available to cover temporary housing, transportation, and essentials like food, clothing, medicine, bedding, towels.

A recent article in Chronicle of Philanthropy titled “Where Did The Funding Go?” provides a sobering assessment of the nonprofit sector, and highlights FJC’s recent loan to HERE Arts Center as a “creative solution.”

The article by Jim Rendon, published November 20, 2024, notes that organizations across the country are facing dire financial straits that have led to hiring freezes, program cuts, layoffs, and in some cases, closures.  He cites the challenges nonprofits have faced coming out of the Covid-19 pandemic, reduced financial support, and rising costs associated with the recent inflationary economy. 

Finding a bright spot in an otherwise bleak financial picture for nonprofits, the article cites a loan from a new DAF account at FJC, capitalized by donors Jennifer Suh Whitfield, HERE Arts Center’s Board Chair, and her husband Benjamin.

An excerpt is included below, and the full article can be found here.

The past few years have been challenging for HERE Arts Center in New York City. The organization, founded 30 years ago, runs a performance space, but audiences haven’t returned to pre-pandemic levels. The group had been running a deficit for years and was eating into its assets to continue operating. In June, the center’s founding director retired, and it brought on four co-directors.

Donors stepped up and provided additional, often unrestricted funding during the pandemic, but now that the emergency is over, many funders have moved on, says Lauren Miller, one of the center’s new co-directors. Some grant makers changed priorities and dollars have been scarce, she says. Like many new CEOs who have started in the past few years, Miller has found that some donors won’t support an organization in the first years after a leadership change.

“Just when we need new solutions and we need people to think differently and give differently, we’re seeing philanthropy retrench back to the pre-Covid status quo,” she says.

Miller and her co-directors have cut costs. Instead of large, costly productions, the organization is focusing on more one-person shows. It has just nine staff members, down from a peak of 20. The organization is trying to expand its base of donors. The center’s goal is to find a larger number of donors who make modest gifts, rather than depend on a handful of large donors who can give a lot, but who will have a big impact on the group’s finances if their giving changes. Miller wants to partner with other arts groups to seek funding together — many of them have similar missions and even work with the same artists, so why should they compete for money?

The center’s board chair came up with an innovative solution to help it address the financial shortfall. She created a donor-advised fund to give HERE Arts Center a loan. It was money that Miller says the chair was planning to give to charity, perhaps over several years. By structuring the support as a low-interest loan, the group got the money it needed up front. The center is paying back only interest on the loan to start, so the payments are low now while the group needs to conserve funds. The money that the group pays on the loan goes back into the DAF so it can be used for other charitable purposes later.

“By creating these very favorable conditions that can move the money quickly to where we needed it, it protected the organization. It was a real lifesaver,” Miller says. “We could start the next fiscal year fresh without having to make dramatic cuts to our staff or to our programs.”

The DAF was created, and the loan is being serviced by FJC – A Foundation of Philanthropic Funds. The group works with donors to help nonprofits fill funding gaps that government, banks, and other donors and grant makers won’t. A commercial lender never would have made the loan to HERE Arts Center, says Sam Marks, FJC’s CEO.

“You really needed a lender that was looking at it not just from a perspective of credit risk, but from a perspective of really understanding the fundamental business and committed to the mission — a real friendly, mission-based lender,” says Marks.

This creative approach has made Miller optimistic that the center can thrive in the coming years — and also that philanthropy, at least in some places, is starting to become more agile and listen to the needs of nonprofits.

“Those of us who are doing things differently and who are trying to innovate and create more interconnection, partnering with our peers instead of competing with them, and bringing new programs in and widening the aperture of what’s possible for our service, we’re being forced to take calculated risks to survive the present circumstances,” she says. “I think we need philanthropy to be as entrepreneurial and risk taking and innovative if they want to see us succeed in those risks.”

Visit Chronicle of Philanthropy at https://www.philanthropy.com/

Join us in celebrating our CEO Sam Marks for being included in a special issue of Foundation Review featuring the most well-received articles in the journal’s 15-year history.

The Foundation Review, published by the Dorothy A. Johnson Center for Philanthropy, has served as a platform for authors to share expertise and insights and contribute to the collective knowledge base in philanthropy since its launch in 2009. To date, articles have been downloaded nearly 600,000 times by readers from more than 14,000 institutions around the world. Authors representing more than 450 universities, foundations, nonprofit organizations, consulting and research firms, and public organizations and institutions have contributed to the journal.

As part of its 15-year anniversary, Foundation Review has published a special issue — free for all to download and explore — presenting the most well-received articles in the journal’s history, each with author commentary in newly written prologues.

Sam’s 2022 article, Donor-Advised Funds and Impact Investing: A Practitioner’s View, argues that any discussion of foundations embracing impact investing must include some discussion of one of the largest — and growing — sources of philanthropic capital: donor-advised funds. This article takes a practitioner’s view on the issue, reflecting on lessons learned by a sponsor of donor-advised funds that has long accommodated the impact investing interests of its donors.

In addition to writing new prologues, authors were invited to submit an introductory video reflecting on the impact of their articles.  View Sam’s video here.  A transcript is below.

Sam Marks here. I’m the Chief Executive Officer of FJC, a foundation of philanthropic funds. I’m in my fifth year here. We are primarily a sponsor of donor-advised funds. We also fiscally sponsor about 160 organizations and act as a financial intermediary, helping imaginative donors make impact investments with capital in their DAF accounts. I’ve been a nonprofit guy—sometimes a grant seeker, sometimes a grant maker—working at the intersection of the nonprofit sector and finance.

In my 30-year career, I’ve worked in youth development, affordable housing development, and impact investing at a CDFI before coming to FJC. I’d say it’s about one-third career in philanthropy, two-thirds as a practitioner. I was really honored to have my abstract accepted by The Foundation Review. Having the article peer-reviewed and published is very validating; it really underscores that we’re on to something.

FJC has been working at the intersection of donor-advised funds and impact investing for nearly 30 years, and when I started as CEO in 2019, it was clear there were cool things happening here, but it was a bit of a best-kept secret. It was time to export our practices and inspire others to invest the funds in their DAF accounts in ways that support nonprofits. A lot of it has been about trying to change attitudes and values, letting people know what’s possible, and shifting minds. That means providing thought leadership. Most foundation investment committees have conservative approaches to investing; they invest for market returns, grow their endowment, and give more money away the next year. But what if funds at foundations could be invested to advance mission work and help nonprofits advance their missions?

It’s been really exciting to see that there’s an audience out there that wants to dig into this, do some deep dives, and look at case studies. I really appreciate The Foundation Review. There’s a tendency for foundations to think transactionally, but for us to step back, think big picture, and see patterns is really important. It’s still early days for our article—it’s only been available for several months—so the causal relationships of change in the world may be beyond the powers of some of the folks on this call who are experts on that. But I can say we’ve had a lot of inbound interest about building on some of the case studies we wrote about in the piece.

We had a foundation come to us with a million dollars and open a donor-advised fund to capitalize a low-interest revolving loan fund for one of their favorite youth-serving organizations in New York City. A corporate foundation is preparing to make a million-dollar loan to FJC so we can on-lend it to a series of affordable housing developers, who would then match funds with some donor capital. A couple of our nonprofit borrowers, who’ve borrowed from FJC at a market rate of interest, are interested in working with us to create a pooled fund that would serve their whole sector of legal defender organizations at a below-market rate of interest. We are seeing these green shoots of practitioners and people thinking about this stuff.

I do worry sometimes that we’re preaching to the choir to some degree, because the folks I’d really like to be reading this article are investment committees of foundations and people who work on Wall Street—those who have access to way more resources and might think more creatively about them if they knew what was possible. One of the interesting lanes I’m trying to open is around working with nonprofit boards that may have some resources around the table and some financial sophistication. Instead of centering on donor preference for how philanthropic resources can be put to work, we should center on what nonprofits need, their gaps in their business models, and how they could benefit from building up their balance sheets—not just having grants that help them operate in the black for the year, but investments that build up the financial capacity of the organizations.

These are the kinds of conversations I’m hoping this article can help advance.

We invite you to explore the whole special issue of Foundation Review.

“These articles continue to resonate today because of their provocative, relevant insights that foster discussions and influence philanthropic practices,” said Dr. Hanh Cao Yu,  Editor-in-Chief of Special Issues. “Each of them provokes opportunities to continue addressing the issues facing philanthropy today.”

We invite you to read this blog post by FJC CEO Sam Marks about the existential threats facing nonprofits as a result of delayed government payments – and the role philanthropy can play in helping nonprofits manage through these challenges. The blog post was published in Alliance’s online magazine, and is excerpted here.

Imagine being charged with critical life-changing responsibilities while being starved by the same public actors to whom you are accountable. This is the crazy-making situation nonprofits are finding themselves in, whether they are housing the unhoused, providing safe spaces for women fleeing intimate partner violence, or providing childcare, many of society’s most critical services rely on timely, predictable funding from government agencies. The problem is that payments for contracted services have become anything but reliable for too many organisations.

For too long, nonprofits’ business needs have been woefully misunderstood and undervalued, and the bill is now coming due.

Not-for-profit operations face the same financial challenges as their for-profit counterparts — managing cash flow, planning payroll, and navigating financing relationships. However, the segment of the nonprofit sector that carries out necessary services funded by the public sector faces unique challenges.

Public contracts come with immense upfront costs of delivering services, and oft-delayed payments are gumming up the underlying financial machinery for many service providers. As my friend John MacIntosh wrote in City & State last year, ‘Nonprofit vendors regularly complain that the procurement system is complex, antiquated and creates lengthy payment delays that are costly, sometimes even fatal, to organizations waiting for their money.’

The fundamental problem for nonprofits is that without reliable access to capital and credit, something as basic as delayed contract payments can pose an existential risk. To be clear, committed officials at every level of government are delivering important reforms to the public contracting process. Bureaucratic reform, however, is slow. In the meantime, foundations, which provide grants and help nonprofits build capacity in myriad ways, can and must develop creative new ways to support nonprofits and rally the support of committed philanthropists.

Increasingly imaginative philanthropists and foundations are developing creative solutions to help nonprofits navigate unreliable cash flow, providing a model for others to follow.

Please read the full blog post at Alliance Magazine, which includes examples of recent solutions FJC has executed, including a bridge loan to Brooklyn Defender Services, and low-interest revolving loans for Brighter Tomorrows and an LGBTQ youth-serving organization.

NYN Media’s Phenix Kim recently interviewed Sam Marks, CEO of FJC, about uses of Donor Advised Funds that center the unique business development needs of nonprofit organizations.  An excerpt is below:

Phenix Kim, NYN Media: One of the things you stressed was a shift in mindset regarding philanthropy, from something reactive to something more long-term, strategically. Would you mind elaborating on this?  

Sam Marks, FJC: A lot of nonprofits and nonprofit board members come to me for advice about fundraising. Many of them are encouraging their board members to go out and fundraise for the organization, [such as] end of the year campaigns or Giving Tuesday. And I think nonprofits often can get donations from the social circles [of board members] who will give to a nonprofit because they want to support their friend. I think the bigger challenge for nonprofits is to find the ways to engage potential funders in ways that hook them into an organization for the long-term, and get a donor to really fall in love with the organization and its mission and its impact. And that can sometimes take a long time. But those [donors] that do really fall for an organization and get to know the leadership, can be some of the most valuable long-term stakeholders for an organization and pull others into the nonprofit’s orbit. Particularly for the nonprofits that rely a lot on city funding, those payments are delayed and the city’s facing budget cuts. And it’s important for them to have other sources of funding that are more flexible and longer term to help them invest in the organization’s long-term sustainability infrastructure.

The profile notes that FJC continues to grow in philanthropic accounts and assets, even as its donors have increased their distributions of grants to nonprofits.  The interview also mentions examples of innovative uses of funds in DAFs, including donors using funds in their accounts to capitalize low-interest revolving lines of credit. Read the whole interview here.

Earlier in November, FJC’s CEO Sam Marks was a guest on Get Connected with Nina Del Rio, New York City’s 106.7 Lite FM’s weekly talk show featuring NYC’s influencers, experts, and vibrant non-profits.

Del Rio interviewed Marks about his background and the world of Donor Advised Funds, as well as the creative ways that FJC puts philanthropic resources to work. 

He spoke about FJC’s Agency Loan Fund, an impact investment vehicle that allows donors to invest some or all of their accounts in a pool of loans to nonprofits, so that funds are actively supporting nonprofits even before they are disbursed as grants. He cited capital grants and contract receivables as payments FJC’s loans typically bridge. “We do a lot financial intermediation, during these timing gaps for nonprofits,” said Marks.

He also spoke about innovative transactions with nonprofits like The Fortune Society and the Tenement Museum. 

From the interview:

People typically think, my philanthropy is to make grants to help an organization hit their goals to operate in the black for the year. But you could also use philanthropic dollars to help organizations be more entrepreneurial and take on more exciting projects that will help them grow and expand their services.

The nonprofits we work with understand the challenges that their businesses face, whether it’s cash flow issues because of late payments or a dearth of capital to take on new, exciting projects.  The nonprofits really know where their gaps are.  The challenge for us is finding donors with the imagination to put their philanthropic dollars to work to fill those gaps. If we could get more of our donors to think about, while the dollars are with us, how they could be invested for the benefit of nonprofits, we could really help nonprofits worry less about where their next dollars are coming from. We could go to the heart of what makes these nonprofit businesses challenging.

You can listen to the whole interview at this link.

A reflection by our outgoing Chief Legal Officer, Mark Cohen.

At the end of this year, I will retire from my role as FJC’s Chief Legal Officer, a position that has been the defining role of my 47-year legal career.  I am well aware it’s no longer quite in fashion to spend one’s career at one company or organization.  Young people in particular move around a lot.  I may have stayed in one place, but because the job has been so interesting, varied, and challenging, I’ve never stood still.

I never expected to be the chief lawyer of a nonprofit, much less a foundation of donor advised funds.  In 1977, shortly after I graduated from law school and had spent a year in a judicial clerkship, I landed a somewhat conventional corporate legal job at a company providing back-office services to Wall Street securities firms and government agencies. By 1984, that company started to have problems and eventually folded, and by happenstance I mentioned my plan to start looking for a new job with an old law school friend whose family became one of the founding donors that started FJC.  Those founders offered me a job as an attorney in their commercial business in 1985.  After FJC was formed in 1995, they began to invite me to FJC Board Meetings on a purely volunteer basis, where I dutifully took minutes and prepared resolutions.  As my role with FJC evolved and deepened, one of the Board Members, a lawyer, noticed how much work I was doing and said, “You know, we should probably put Mark on the payroll, so the organization’s books reflect his time and effort.”  And so in 2000, my formal role with FJC began.

From these modest and rather accidental beginnings, I could not have imagined how creative and all-encompassing my work with FJC would become, enough to fill a career. 

From its early days, FJC was focused on innovative uses of philanthropic dollars, particularly investing donor funds in loans to nonprofits.  Early on we provided bridge loans to nonprofits that were building group homes for adults with development disabilities.  Following the expose by Geraldo Rivera about the notorious Willowbrook facility on Staten Island, New York State began shutting down large warehouse institutions with the intention of opening up smaller and more humane group homes that were better integrated into their communities.  The challenge for our nonprofit partners was that capital funding from the state agency was only available on a reimbursement basis.  The nonprofits essentially had to spend the money before they had it.  These were some of the first bridge loans we made from our Agency Loan Fund, and we were able to facilitate dozens of new group homes.

I remember when FJC started the Agency Loan Fund, we required our donors to invest 10% of their account holdings in the loan pool. After all, we had no track record, and we weren’t sure they would invest their funds willingly.  But after we began to have solid performance on our loan portfolio and the benefits to the nonprofit community became evident, it became a popular and unique offering, something that set us apart from some of the “plain vanilla” although sometimes larger DAF sponsors. I believed that those other DAF sponsors were more often interested in keeping their clients’ money captive than in benefiting the nonprofit community, which was one of FJC’s major reasons for existence. 

In many respects working on the loan program was like working for a bank lending department.  I had never done that.  I began to feel like I was in a batter’s box with a pitching machine.  The balls kept coming.  We made loans to nonprofit theaters, museums, social service agencies, charter schools, and a lot of public television and radio stations. At last count, we have made over 350 loans  of more than $370,000,000 to a wide variety of nonprofit organizations in furtherance of their missions. Donors began coming to us with their own ideas about nonprofits they wanted to finance with their DAF accounts, whether it was for bail funds, clean energy, or—just recently—refinancing the bonds used to finance the Lower East Side Tenement Museum. When some donors wanted us to make loans to organizations that couldn’t meet our credit standards, we came up with the customized loan program to allow donors to recommend the terms of the loans and treat them as investments in their DAFs. 

Our fiscal sponsorship program has also really been a model of innovation. I can’t count the number of organizations that we fostered that went on to become nonprofits in their own right. Hopefully that spirit of innovation and expectation of trying to help the nonprofit community will continue.

Working in the nonprofit sector, I’ve always been somewhat amazed and enamored of the fact that there are so many people who are truly devoted to enriching the lives of the underprivileged and underserved.  Most people I work with have worked so hard and so long.  Like me, many have been in their positions for decades.  I’m fairly certain they could have made a lot more money in the private sector, but they are truly committed to their organizations and the communities they serve.  Because of that, it’s always been a pleasure to see if we could help them along with their missions.

After so many years at FJC it’s hard to imagine being out of the day-to-day decision-making of the organization.  It’s a tough personal choice to retire, but my wife and I want to devote more time to our grandchildren, and we want to travel more. But I’d love to stay involved.  Otherwise, I’ll miss the thought-provoking part of the job I love the most: trying to come up with new solutions to new problems, to help nonprofit practitioners get the work done.  That has always been a great pleasure, and the highlight of my career.

We invite you to read this guest essay by CEO Sam Marks published in Inside Philanthropy.  The article suggests that “this is a time to experiment with deploying philanthropic dollars more strategically to help nonprofits address those issues more effectively and spend more effort on mission-critical work.”

The essay recommends that donors look beyond grantmaking for their philanthropy and consider other approaches to using philanthropic capital.  Examples cited include the revolving predevelopment fund FJC arranged for the Fortune Society, and the refinancing of the Tenement Museum’s mortgage through a DAF investment.

From the essay:

The conversation between philanthropy and nonprofits very often begins and ends with grantmaking, and there is no question that grants are a key component of nonprofit business models. But the nonprofit sector could surely benefit if this conversation were more expansive — on both sides. Nonprofit practitioners could be more explicit with their philanthropic partners about their cash flow challenges that distract senior management from a full focus on their missions, or the capital resources they need to grow and be truly transformative. Donors could consider more inventive and mission-focused uses of the philanthropic dollars that are currently invested in the private sector, whether in foundation endowments or in DAF accounts. These approaches depend on donors and nonprofits engaging more deeply and finding a common cause.

Simply put, there’s an opportunity to grow beyond the conventional relationships between donors and nonprofits by elevating creative, entrepreneurial thinking. Sponsors of DAFs, in particular, can play a role in helping small donors align their funds and execute some of the more inventive uses of their philanthropic dollars, such as loans, recoverable grants or impact investments. DAF sponsors have always offered donors operational scale and efficiency; why not also offer technical and legal assistance to facilitate these more complex transactions? Or to pull together multiple donors that want to work collectively to create a solution?

This vision for DAFs is not just about more effective donations; it’s about building a more robust philanthropic ecosystem where the interests of donors, nonprofits and beneficiaries converge.

Read the full essay here.

We invite you to read this op-ed by FJC CEO Sam Marks in City Limits, an investigative journalism nonprofit that identifies urban problems, examines their causes, explores solutions, and equips communities to take action.

Read the entire op-ed, which is excerpted here:

We often hear that solving New York City’s myriad challenges—from an affordable housing crisis to growing a more equitable economy that works for all New Yorkers—will require an all-hands-on-deck approach. Usually, leaders use the “all hands” phrase to signal the need for cooperation between the public, nonprofit, and private sectors.

It can be challenging at times to bring these parties together, but the charitable sector, when it’s working at its best, can act as a catalyst to invent new solutions. With its creativity, flexibility, and mission-driven focus, philanthropy can be a linchpin, capable of bringing together the public sector’s authority and agenda-setting power and the private sector’s financial resources and dynamism.

The piece continues with a description of the Boss Up program, administered by FJC through a Scholarship & Award Account, and funded by the Ron and Kerry Moelis Family Foundation.

The initiative was inspired by research from Center for an Urban Future, and partners included the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA), NYC Department of Small Business Services, the BOC Network, and the Brooklyn Public Library.

The program supports entrepreneurs living in NYCHA housing expand their businesses, providing $20,000 grants and business development courses to the  winners of a “Shark Tank”-style competition.

As Marks wrote in the piece, “The Boss Up program is an example of philanthropy at its best and it should prompt all of us to think differently about how we work. If we can form more connections between imaginative donors, entrepreneurial nonprofits, and the public sector there is no limit to the new, creative solutions we can develop to improve people’s lives.”

This fall FJC is working with the Moelis Foundation and the NYC Department of Veterans’ Services to replicate the program with veteran entrepreneurs.