WHAT WE DO
Are you passionate about making a difference in the Waikato? Do you want to be certain your giving will be effective?
Perhaps you want to create a legacy that perpetually supports the causes close to your heart? Maybe you’re in a position to give back to the community that has given you so much?
Through ‘Generosity that Delivers’, Momentum Waikato is helping to build ‘A Better Waikato for Everyone, Forever’.
As an independent Community Foundation, we provide people from all walks of life with giving solutions, through a trusted model that adds value now and forever.
To help nurture and build the strength and capacity of Waikato’s communities, we connect generous donors with proven charities and projects across the wider Waikato - from Pokeno to the Coromandel in the north, to Te Kuiti and Tokoroa in the south.
We convene and celebrate the everyday philanthropists who grow the Waikato’s social investment and fuel its transformational projects, for the benefit of the generations to come.
Since 2013, we’ve attracted and gathered over $100 million in donations, gifts and funding, which has fuelled more than 30 place and purpose-based endowment funds and some of the region’s most transformational projects.
As a community leadership organisation, we are nimble and flexible and able to bridge the gaps between central and local governments, the market and community groups.
If you are considering leaving a bequest in your Will, or are a lawyer or an accountant who advises on Wills, see us to find out how we can ensure a gift of a lifetime will give back to a donor’s community forever.
If you’re involved with a charitable trust, know that we can invest a trust’s capital to provide it with a growing and diversified income stream, and can take on its charitable purpose, allowing its trustees to focus on seeking support, or to wind up the entity knowing its mission will continue and its funds are in safe hands.
Everyone who contributes to Momentum Waikato experiences the joy of giving, with the ability to choose to give now or into the future, and then follow the path of generous giving to its ultimate impact.
Talk to us if you want to know more!
What is a community foundation?
When we say Momentum Waikato is a community foundation that manages an endowment fund, what do we mean?
Community foundations are independent for-purpose place-based trusts that enable generous people, from all walks of life and of any income, to grow their charitable donations and continue their giving forever. They have been popping up around the world for over 100 years, including in most regions of Aotearoa New Zealand over the last twenty years.
Each foundation like Momentum Waikato is building and activating its own professionally invested endowment fund, largely from two sources.
One is generous individuals donating now and/or pledging to leave a gift in their Will (a bequest) to create a ‘named fund’ within the Momentum endowment fund. What we call ‘smart giving’.
The investment income from that fund (which is explained below) is then annually granted to charities and projects according to the donor’s wishes, sometimes informed by our advice on how best to target their social and environmental priorities.
The other is the transfer of an existing trust’s capital to create their own ‘community group fund’ within the Momentum endowment fund, so they can either diversify their income or also transfer their charitable mission and therefore retire their own operations while their original goals continue to be met.
Some of our named and community group funds welcome donations and bequests from the public, and therefore have their own online donation pages on the Momentum Waikato website.
Community Foundations are always initiated and driven by local people, they are not ‘branch offices’. They are focused on a place and its people, connecting local everyday philanthropy with their community’s needs and opportunities.
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What guides us?
Momentum Waikato has a rigorous governance process leading its strategic direction and fund growth, all underpinned by a smart, purpose-driven approach to high-impact community investment.
The Board of the Momentum Waikato Community Foundation is made up of trustees from the community and business, all recruited and appointed by a Board Appointments Panel made up of appointees of key local entities.
Momentum Waikato’s second five-year strategic plan, for the 2020-2025 financial years, is focussed on delivery and sustainability.
The key objective, as ever, is to continue to nurture a culture of generosity across the region and grow endowment funds to support 'A Better Waikato for Everyone, Forever'. We're proud to have invested over $100 million to date in transformational projects and philanthropic investment funds.
Investment information
Momentum Waikato has the added complement of independent investment fund portfolio managers Craigs Investment Partners and JBWere providing strategic investment fund management, to ensure solid growth returns for future distribution throughout the community. An investment committee oversees the recommendations of these expert portfolio managers.
Professional investment advice should be taken before making an investment. This graph provides a guide, however growth depends on fund performance and changing market rates.
Our Statement of Investment Policy and Objectives outlines our commitment to prudent stewardship of donor funds, focused on maximising fund distribution over the long term.
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