Posted November 13, 20196:30 pm
The George Gund Foundation honors retiring president with Geoffrey Gund Fund for Children and Families at The Legal Aid Society of Cleveland
Cleveland, OH - After 25 years as president of the Board of Trustees of The George Gund Foundation, Geoffrey Gund will retire following the board meeting on Thursday, November 14. The Foundation’s board awarded $2 million to The Legal Aid Society of Cleveland to launch the Geoffrey Gund Fund for Families and Children in his honor. Gund worked at The Legal Aid Society of Cleveland in the late 1960s.
“We often talk about the importance of the ‘Legal Aid story’ our past clients, staff, interns and board members have,” said Colleen Cotter, Legal Aid’s executive director. “The best Legal Aid narratives are those like Mr. Gund’s: where one sees a wrong or injustice, they act on it – not just for the moment they are at Legal Aid, but for a lifetime. This generous gift in honor of Mr. Gund is special because it will extend the reach of justice to so many families and children in our community for years to come. With this gift, Legal Aid can build more partnerships, remove barriers to opportunity and continue to be a catalyst for community change.”
“It has been a special joy to be involved with The George Gund Foundation,” Gund said. “During my tenure I have seen the Foundation’s grantmaking expand from $3.5 million annually, in 1976, to more than $25 million annually today, and from a staff of two to our current staff of twelve. Our localized funding, our collaborative work with other foundations, and our ability to leverage our knowledge of the community and the organizations within it, allows us to have a depth of impact that would not exist without concentrated grant making within a geographical area.”
Gund served as a trustee of the Foundation for 43 years. During his 25 years as president, the Foundation made more than $584 million in grants, mostly in Cleveland, for programs in the arts, community and economic development, education, the environment and human services. The largest single grant was for $10 million to Say Yes to Education Cleveland, which is particularly dear to Geoffrey Gund’s heart. He spent most of his career as a high school teacher in New York City and has a deep commitment to education.
Geoffrey Gund’s father, George Gund II, started the Foundation in 1952. One of six children, Geoffrey Gund grew up in Cleveland but has lived for many years in New York City where he taught history, economics and law at Dalton School until his retirement in 2013. He is a graduate of Harvard College and Yale Law School.
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For additional information, contact:
David Abbott - The George Gund Foundation
216-241-3114
Melanie Shakarian, Esq. - The Legal Aid Society of Cleveland
216-861-5217
Learn more about The Campaign for Legal Aid at www.ExtendJustice.org