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Seal of Accountability

Sample Program Evaluation

Example of a Moderately-Complex Evaluation

This is a report of how CCCC did an evaluation of a program that was a moderately complex review. The full evaluation of the Community Trust Fund, including segregated and pooled funds, took place from September 2007 to May 2008. The issues of concern that caused us to select this program over other programs were:

  • the program operated largely on a manual basis
  • the number of transactions per year had taken a sharp increase in the last two years, straining our ability to operate the program, and it appeared the transactions would continue at or above the current levels
  • notwithstanding its value to our members, we had questions about whether it was still a necessary program for CCCC to run, given the birth of so many community and denominational foundations in recent years, some specialized fundraising organizations that could process gifts of securities and the number of charities that now have brokerage accounts
  • we had some questions about the pooled investment aspect of the trust fund, and finally
  • we operated the trust fund on the basis of voluntary donations to cover the transaction costs, and wondered if the program was paying for itself.

The initial meeting to define the program evaluation was attended by all staff members who either work directly in the program or have responsibility for it. The CEO participated as well. A report had been prepared for this meeting that broke the trust fund into two components (segregated and pooled funds) and showed for each component (as well as the total):

  • the number of hours of staff time to run the program (and the associated dollar cost),
  • the number of donors,
  • the number of receipts issued (which is the number of transactions),
  • the number of beneficiary charities,
  • the average hours per cheque issued,
  • total donations,
  • average donation,
  • total dollars donated to CCCC to operate the program, and
  • the average size of the donation to CCCC.

An abbreviated logic model was developed at this initial meeting which listed two purposes for having the program. The purposes were the reasons why we thought the program was necessary. The purposes were then analyzed to see what assumptions we were making to justify those purposes, and then we came up with what things CCCC could do, given those assumptions. For example, the first purpose was “to facilitate donations of marketable securities to Christian charities.” One of the assumptions we made to justify this purpose is that “charities are not set up with brokerage accounts and legal authority.” Two activities were identified for how CCCC could address this problem:

  1. we could educate charities on how to get the legal authority and set up brokerage accounts, and
  2. we could provide the service for them.

In this way, we explored the options that are available to our members and came to a good understanding of how the Community Trust Fund program fit with our members’ needs and our own mandate.

A listing of the advantages and disadvantages of donor-advised funds helped frame some of the issues related to the program. We then listed the questions we wanted the program evaluation to answer, grouped them into categories, and then assigned teams to research each category. The four categories were: 1) competitive analysis, 2) risk analysis, 3) program effectiveness, and 4) program efficiency.

The competitive analysis revealed that, while there are competitive options available to our members for receiving marketable securities, the combination of choices available through our program made a valuable contribution to the other trust funds that are available, particularly in terms of flexibility and cost. We also realized that the “one-stop shopping” aspect had appeal for some of our members. We realized that there were plenty of good options available to our members for the secondary purpose of the Community Trust Fund, which was to provide charities with surplus funds a pooled investment opportunity.

The risk analysis identified a number of risks, including:

  1. issues related to the death or incapacity of a donor before the pooled funds are distributed, and dealing with disgruntled family members after the donor dies,
  2. issues related to our disbursement quota obligation,
  3. liability of the trustees,
  4. gift valuation,
  5. non-publically traded securities, and
  6. 10-year gifts.

The effectiveness analysis built on the initial report given to the evaluation committee as described above; number and size of transactions, number of beneficiaries overall and number of beneficiaries that are members of CCCC. The analysis confirmed that there was a steady increase in the use of our trust fund, that people not associated with CCCC were finding it by apparently searching for trust funds online, that the bulk of the donations went to members of CCCC, and that more and more people were not making any donation to CCCC to cover our costs. The average donation to CCCC was 1.1% of the donation to the trust fund, but as the activity grew, the average donation was becoming less and less. A competitive analysis showed that CCCC was the least expensive option available, but it led us to question whether the trust fund was a good use of our limited resources. A new pricing policy was suggested and a comparison was made for the last year of activity showing the revenue generated by voluntary donations compared to what we would have received with a fee schedule based on a percentage of the donation and the number of cheques that would be written. A new pricing policy was developed that included a price benefit if a CCCC member charity was one of the beneficiaries of the donor’s gift.

The efficiency study looked at such issues as procedures and valuation. It documented ideas for automation, showed sample journal entries and gave detailed procedural instructions. Each transaction within the past year was listed in a table that showed the type of fund, whether or not the documentation was in order and if there was a sunset clause, the gift to CCCC to cover the transaction cost and the amount that a proposed fee schedule would have earned. The efficiency analysis also considered communication with the donors (of donor-advised funds) and compared our proposed fee schedule with 13 other foundations, to ensure we were both reasonable and also of high value to our members.

As a result of the program review, CCCC discontinued the non-donor advised fund immediately (this was the secondary purpose of the trust fund) because of risk, complexity, and the ready availability of well-priced options to our members. A fee schedule was introduced with an appropriate phase-in period. Based on processing problems (caused by donors or their brokers), all forms associated with the trust fund were redeveloped to address these problems. The web page for the trust fund was redesigned and a significant automation program was implemented, which is still on-going.

 

Use of the Community Trust continues to grow, CCCC is recovering the cost of operating it, and the number of processing problems has dramatically dropped.

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- Billy Graham