SEJ Weighs Five-Year Goal:
$3 Million Endowment Campaign

The Society of Environmental Journalists (SEJ) is embarking on one of the largest and most ambitious-and also potentially one of the most important-efforts in its 13-year history: raise and endowment of at least $3 million over the next five years and do so in a way that preserves its journalistic integrity and independence.

SEJ's Board of Directors in April took the first step in this direction in passing a resolution (an 11-2 vote) supporting "a major individual gifts endowment campaign" to support core programs and operations. With a goal of raising at least 25 percent, $750,000 from members, founding and former board members and "other journalism leaders," the group is preparing to break new ground primarily in actively seeking large financial gifts from individuals "who support SEJ's mission to improve the quality, accuracy, and visibility of environmental journalism."

Those individuals could well be corporate chieftains, activist group leaders, government officials, academics, and others, "without regard to their opinions or positions with respect to environmental issues." But the resolution passed by the board stipulates that the names of donors will be made public and it emphasizes a no-strings approach with "no conditions or restrictions, expressed or implied, on any donations."

In a mid-May "Dear Members" letter, SEJ President Dan Fagin, of Newsday, and freelancer and SEJ Treasurer Peter Thomson, said the board's decision to pursue the endowment will not be made final until after a second board vote, which could come as early as this September.

The organization for the past several months has been exploring options to build a more secure long-term financial basis. While it has been quite successful since it was established in attracting grants from foundations and from some universities, experts in the charitable giving community often emphasize that foundation grants in the long run (usually three years or so) are aimed at "weaning" grantees as a way of encouraging them to assure their own financial stability. SEJ has developed an enviable record of foundation fundraising from some of the largest and most respected foundations in the environmental giving community, but the organization's leaders recognize that the universe of foundation givers is finite, and that it is not too early to be preparing for leaner years of foundation grants.

"A large endowment would by no means support all of SEJ's operations, or relieve us of the need for traditional fundraising," Fagin and Thomson wrote in their May 12 letter to SEJ members. "But it would help relieve some of the increasing pressures of fundraising, buffer us against economic difficuilties, and ensure that even if foundation fundraising were to dry up entirely, SEJ would always be able to maintain its core operations." Fagin and Thomson said the current SEJ dues structure covers about 10 percent of the group's annual expenses.

In considering its strategy on an endowment campaign, current SEJ board members over recent months have conducted a series of informal telephone interviews and conversations with members and with "several dozen journalism leaders, many of whom are also SEJ members." The SEJ members-only listserv in recent weeks has lit-up with an energized, and occasionally energizing, discussion of the pros and cons, plusses and pitfalls, of building an endowment. Debate to some extent has focused on whether the effort involves unacceptable risks to perceived and real editorial independence; whether "individuals" from corporate or environmentalist perspectives really can be trusted to have SEJ's environmental journalism vision at heart; and whether alternative funding strategies, including higher per-member dues or sales of certain services, might be an alternative. Those discussions and debates have brought out the high level of commitment of many members to the overall SEJ mission, and also, not surprisingly, a few ideas that would be perhaps more likely to cost SEJ money over the long term than to make much.

The resolution passed by the board in April includes "an absolute ban on restricted and anonymous gifts" and seeks to avoid "any possibility of outside influence, real or perceived," on the organization or its members. As emphasized by Fagin and Thomson in their letter to members, it promises a campaign "open to all, and accountable to all of our members," with individual donors of $5,000 or more expected to sign an agreement to the "no conditions" principles.

Fagin and Thomson in their letter characterize SEJ's fundraising standards as "among the strictest in the community of journalism organizations. We continue to believe that they are in SEJ's best interests, and we intend to continue to abide by them."

Editor's Note: Several writers and contributors to Environment Writer, including the principal editor, are SEJ members in various membership categories, and at least one, the writer of this piece, participated in the winter telephone surveys on whether and how best to structure the SEJ endowment initiative.