Jewish megawealthy give little to Jewish causes

NEW YORK — This is what we know so far about the Jewish giving of the Jews who have accepted the Giving Pledge, according to searches of their foundations’ 990 tax forms and media reports:

Michael Bloomberg

Already one of the world’s most generous givers, the mayor of New York City has been ramping up his charity in recent years.

His foundation does not yet have 990 forms that show where his money is going, but according to a New York magazine profile he is a major donor to New York’s Jewish Museum.

“Being charitable is an important part of Jewish identity,” Joan Rosenbaum, director of the Jewish Museum, told the magazine. “And Michael has been an extraordinarily generous supporter of the museum since 1988.”

Eli and Edythe Broad

The Broads, who have made their biggest splashes of late in education and by practically single-handedly building the art scene in Los Angeles, give relatively little to Jewish causes.

The foundation gives away from $60 million to $400 million in a year, but only about $1 million goes to overtly Jewish causes. Still, its 990 tax forms show a bevy of four- and five-figure gifts to Jewish causes, including the American Jewish Committee, the American Friends of the Israeli Philharmonic, the ADL and B’nai B’rith. Read the related IJN editorial

In 2006, the largest Jewish gift was a $100,000 grant to Friends of Israel Arts. The same year, the Broads gave more to the United Way than to the UJA-Federation of New York.

In 2002, the foundation gave away about $2 million of the $360 million it pledged to Jewish causes, but Broad had this to say about his Jewish giving: “If I had only a little to give away, my emphasis would be on Jewish and Israeli causes,” he told the L.A. Jewish Journal.

“Once you get beyond several hundred thousand dollars, you become a better and more respected citizen if you also give to the Music Center and universities. If I would donate only a million dollars, I would split it between Jewish and general community projects.”

Barry Diller and Diane Von Furstenberg

The DDVF foundation does not yet have any 990 forms available, but the foundation’s website does list a number of Jewish organizations among its grantees: Temple Sholom in New Milford, Conn., the Henry Street Settlement on the Lower East Side of New York, American Friends of the College of Judea, the ADL and the US Holocaust Memorial Museum.

Larry Ellison

In 2007, the founder of Oracle gave $500,000 to fortify Sderot while on a mission to Israel organized by the Israeli Foreign Ministry.
Joan and Irwin Jacobs

Qualcomm founder Irwin Jacobs is one of San Diego’s most generous men. Aside from propping up the San Diego Symphony with a more than $100 million gift last decade, the Jacobses have decided to give away most of their money through a donor-advised fund at the Jewish Community Foundation of San Diego. Last year, according to the Chronicle of Philanthropy, they gave the fund $24 million.

George Kaiser

The Tulsa billionaire, the son of refugees from Nazi Germany and worth about $9 billion right now, is one of the pillars of the Oklahoma Jewish community along with Lynn Schusterman.

Kaiser, who gives millions to Tulsa causes — about $100 million in 2007 — also gives to Jewish causes. Among his 2007 gifts were five-figure amounts to B’nai B’rith, Congregation B’nai Emunah, the Illinois Holocaust Museum and the Jewish Federation Foundation, according to his foundation’s 990 form for 2008.

Lorry Lokey

Lokey says he wants to die broke or close to it. Among his largest gifts was a $33 million pledge to the American Technion Society.

He also has given heavily to the Leo Baeck School in Haifa, one of Israel’s two Reform Jewish schools. He also has given to Ben-Gurion University.

Lokey told JTA last week in an interview that while he has already pledged away most of his $700 million fortune, he expects to make another few hundred million dollars before he dies, and the next $60 million or so would go to Israeli education.

Bernie and Millie Marcus

Bernie Marcus, the co-founder of Home Depot, spent some $200 million in building the Aquarium in Atlanta, where he is based.

The aquarium and Marcus hosted an evening event at the annual conference of the Jewish Funders Network back in 2008, and the Marcus foundation also has a branch dedicated to Jewish giving.

The foundation’s 990 tax form for 2008 shows only two gifts to Jewish causes — $4 million to the Jewish Federation of Atlanta and $250,000 to the Institute for Jewish and Community Research in San Francisco.

Bernard and Barbro Osher

The Oshers have two foundations, the Bernard Osher Foundation, which gave away more than $100 million to general causes in 2007 — many of them $1 million-plus gifts to universities — and the Bernard Osher Jewish Philanthropies Foundation, which is run by the Jewish Federation of San Francisco.

The latter gave away $4 million in 2007 to an array of groups ranging from the Jewish Music Festival in San Francisco to the Osher JCC in Marin County.

The largest gift that year was a $2 million capital grant paid in shares of Wachovia to Congregation Beth Sholom in San Francisco.

David M. Rubenstein

The billionaire behind the Carlyle group is perhaps best known for his recent mammoth gifts to the Lincoln Center in New York Cit, but he has given to Jewish causes as well. In 2008, for instance, he pledged $500,000 to help establish a $1.5 million professorship in Jewish studies at the University of North Carolina.

In talking about his philanthropy, he has a knack for bringing up his Jewish identity.

Herb and Marion Sandler

The Sandlers, the philanthropists behind ProPublica, have liberal views on Israel.

A look at the 990 tax form shows that their foundation “made grants in support of the charitable, educational, scientific or religious purposes of the Jewish Community Federation of San Francisco, Marin, the Peninsula and Sonoma Counties.”

The foundation gave away $94.5 million in 2007, with $65,000 going to the New Israel Fund and $1.3 million to the Jewish Community Federation of San Francisco.

Jeff Skoll

Those looking for overtly Jewish causes in the philanthropic portfolio of this Jewish-born Canadian eBay executive are going to be disappointed.

There’s nothing in the $28 million in giving listed in his 990 tax form that suggests any overtly Jewish giving.

Skoll has given hundreds of thousands of dollars to organizations such as Common Ground that are working toward better understanding and peace in the Middle East.

Shelby White

Although we are not sure if White is Jewish, her late husband Leon Levy was, and the foundation of which she is the trustee has given seriously to Jewish causes. Most recently the foundation, which is heavily into archaeology, history and the arts, gave $860,000 to the Center for Jewish History for an archival project.

According to its latest 990 form, in 2007 the foundation gave $90,000 to Harvard’s Ashkelon archaeological dig, $220,000 to the Center for Jewish History, $1.3 million to the Harvard Semitic Museum and $3.5 million to the Israel Antiquities Authority.

Sanford and Joan Weill

Sanford Weill, the Citibank mogul, is most philanthropically famous for his $250 million gift to the Weill Cornell Medical Center.

He was honored with the Center for Jewish History’s Emma Lazarus Award during the mid-1990s, which means he likely has given there, but according to a CJH source it has not been for quite some time.