San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Charities find new ways to raise funds
The Great Gateway Gathering fundraiser for Gateway Public Schools was long planned and scheduled to go last weekend. A week before the event, word came that it was likely that all public events would be canceled in San Francisco. Quickly, the team made a decision to adapt the format.
“The idea of a live stream was plan F — then everything was canceled, and we said, ‘What would it take to do that?’ ” said Chanda Lockhart, the director of development and outreach for Gateway Schools. In one week, the event had to transform into a streaming fundraiser akin to a telethon on YouTube Live. This included figuring out the tech demands of a live stream, notifying guests of the change and turning a multipurpose space in the school into a broadcast set with recycled decorations and tablecloths tacked to the walls.For five hours, Lockhart and the school’s executive director, Sharon Olken, hosted the stream.
With other anticipated hits ahead in the school’s fundraising, Lockhart said that canceling the Gathering wasn’t an option. In past years, the event has made about $60,000: This year it raised $76,000 — through a combination of ticket sales and donations, likely owing to the YouTube stream’s wider reach beyond the immediate community.
“I’m not much of a public feelings person, but I cried on air when we exceeded our goal,” Lockhart said. “It was an intense feeling of community spirit.”
The Smuin Ballet gala also had to make a quick pivot because of COVID19. Originally scheduled for the San Francisco Design Center Galleria last Sunday. the company canceled and decided to offer ticket holders refunds or the option to donate their ticket cost for a full tax deduction. The vast majority of guests donated their tickets.
“The overwhelming response was, ‘We are here to support you,’ ” said Smuin development director Deb Glazer. Although Glazer believes the event took a fund
“The overwhelming response was, ‘We are here to support you.’ ”
Deb Glazer, Smuin Ballet development director
raising hit because of COVID19, Smuin was able to move the gala’s auction and fundaneed campaign to the company’s website.
The event is the company’s only fundraiser of the year. Although it has no plans to reschedule the 2020 gala, one of the upsides was that its venue payments will transfer to next year’s event. While donations are still coming in for this year’s gala, Glazer said that with the uncertainty in the stock market and a base audience of many retired people, the time doesn’t yet feel right to plan another event.
“It’s great that we didn’t lose any money with the Galleria, but I’m hesitant to plan anything else right now,” she said. “We don’t know if this (shelter in place) will last a few weeks or a few months.”
For many groups, including schools, arts organizations and other nonprofits, major fundraising events are essential for meeting operating costs, funding special projects and even continuing to exist. The shelterinplace order hit during a period in the spring season when several events were scheduled to take place, some that take more than a year to plan. In the past two weeks, several events transitioned from live to online formats, or got creative in other ways.
The San Francisco Ballet had to postpone its March 18 Ballet Auxiliary fashion show. The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco moved its first “On the Edge” gala from March 27 to sometime this fall. For the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, a total cancellation or postponement of a gala planned for
March 10 wasn’t an option: Instead, the museum shifted to a YouTube stream hosted by Executive Director Larry Rinder and gala chair Carla Crane. “In 24 hours we went from a physical event at the Hibernia in San Francisco to an online event from the BAMPFA Osher Theater,” said special events director Masha Berek. “We put a digital platform in place for both the onsite auction and campaign drive.We had no time to rehearse.”
The Presidio Dance Theatre also had to cancel its event scheduled for March 26. Instead it will roll out an online fundraising campaign to help meet its financial needs. The COVID19 shutdown comes at a perilous time for the 25yearold organization, which has had to move twice in the past few two years and now will lose revenue from a canceled spring season and the possible loss of summer camp programs.
“Everyone went into survival mode after shelter in place,” said Executive Director Sherene Melania. “We waited to announce the online campaign to give people time to prepare. Hopefully people are more settled now, and it will be a better time to reach out.”
In the sudden need to be nimble, some are seeing possibilities for innovation. After the postponement of the San Francisco Ballet’s fashion show, Danielle St. GermainGordon, the ballet’s chief devel
opment officer, saw an opportunity for another online fashionrelated event. This fall, St. GermainGordon is hoping to start a designer clothing drive among Ballet Auxiliary members and company patrons and consign the pieces with an online reseller. She said the ballet is also open to the possibility of streaming the fashion show, depending on the status of the pandemic.
Berek said COVID19 may continue to spur thinking about opportunities to reinvent the traditional event model.
“The gala is a strange format in a way. Lately there’s been a lot of fatigue surrounding it,” she said. “But it’s part of a stream of general support we can’t lose.”
Having to rearrange the BAMPFA event was scary, she said, but being able to pull it off brings hope for adapting in the future.