Helping your clients meet their financial and charitable goals is an opportunity and a privilege. Research shows that people who retain professional advisors often are eager to learn about philanthropy and count on their advisors to know about planned giving.

The Norfolk Foundation is a resource for you and your clients. Attorneys, accountants, financial planners, insurance agents and other professional advisors are The Norfolk Foundation’s valued partners in charitable giving. We are proud of our Foundation’s long reputation for integrity and service to donors.

The Foundation can help you stay current on charitable giving options. Our staff is available to meet with you or your client and to provide any assistance needed. For example, we can calculate the numbers for returns on a charitable trust. We also are available to talk with your firm, professional organization or other groups about charitable giving. Recent presentations focused on charitable giving options, community needs, grantmaking impact, planned giving and charitable giving benefits.

As a professional advisor, you can sign up for the Planned Giving Design Center, a free online resource center. Registered users can choose to receive e-mail alerts and analysis regarding legislative developments, court decisions and Internal Revenue Service regulations affecting charitable giving. The national Planned Giving Design Center complements services offered by the Foundation’s staff.

If you need additional information on charitable giving, please contact Nan Edgerton vice president of development.

Donor Highlight

In the late 1920s William A. Charters, co-founder of Investment Corp. of Norfolk, made home buying a reality for southeastern Virginia residents by providing some of Virginia’s first home mortgages. His wife Jane spent her career working at area naval bases. Both the Charters gave quietly to their community during their lifetimes. William Charters died in 1982. His wife lived until 2004. Before her death she created the William A. and Jane M. Charters Fund, a field of interest fund at The Norfolk Foundation. The fund’s more than $6 million in assets provides an estimated $250,000 a year for grants for area nonprofits providing basic human needs such as food, clothing, shelter and medical care.

Jane Charters “was a giving person,” says attorney and neighbor Peter G. Decker Jr. “Her husband also was a charitable guy.”