Giving a gift in memory or in honor of a special individual in one's life carries so many emotions and feelings along with it. As I met in the home of one of our donors, Carol Franco, I was privileged to hear some of those stories. Making a gift to the Lansing Community Library Endowment Fund in memory of her husband, Angelo "Ang" Franco, connected honoring and supporting the current volunteer work of their daughter, Emily, with their own love of books and libraries. "Look around, there are a ton of books", Carol said, "We are bookworms." "You can enter all kinds of worlds and just grow." We talked of travel, birds, books, and times past. As they raised their family, it was Angelo who took the children to the library. Books and travel were always a part of their family's lives. "When you are young, you begin a love affair with books, and it carries you through your whole life."

Thank you to the Franco Family and to the many other generous donors who support and strengthen our community resources through gifts made to the Community Foundation.

In this episode of Making Change, Brian Byrnes discusses his views on social change and and his criticism of the sector on the eve of his transition out of traditional philanthropy as the president of the Santa Fe Community Foundation to become a full-time zen practitioner.

While philanthropy is valuable for many reasons, there are deep, fundamental flaws in the way it is practiced, says Mr. Byrnes, including an environment of competition instead of collaboration, and the plutocracy of philanthropy.

Community foundations should lead the change in how philanthropy is practiced, says Mr. Byrnes, by promoting a culture of reflection at the executive and board levels, and experimenting with ways of democratizing philanthropy.