Testimonial List
Tom and Ann Smoot have been a part of the Southwest Florida Community Foundation since its inception back in the late 1970’s and are ardent and devoted supporters to this day.
Tom, one of the Community Foundation’s Founding Fathers, actually brought the concept of a community foundation to the area, and was instrumental in getting it developed. After that, he credits the Community Foundation’s other Founding Father, Johnny Sheppard, for making it grow. “A lot of people can come up with good ideas, but it takes one person to really get things going,” Tom says. “That person was Johnny Sheppard. He was the one who really got the Community Foundation to take off.” Ann was involved from the beginning as well. In fact, she served as the Community Foundation’s first Administrator. In those early days, Ann says, work was conducted out of the Smoot home. Later, the Community Foundation hired Anne Wilke as a part-time Administrator and eventually moved into its own office. Tom and Ann are especially proud of the quality of the Community Foundation’s Board of Trustees. Back when Tom was helping to write the organizational charter, he says that great importance was put into developing a Board that would be representative of the community that it serves, well-known in the community, and well-respected as financial stewards. Tom also includes staff in his praise: “All of the people that we’ve had to run this foundation have been just the right people at just the right time.” Ann adds, “Changing times have brought changing needs; nobody back then knew about AIDS or other things that were to come.” Yet, as times did change over the past 34 years, the Southwest Community Foundation has adapted, grown, sustained, reached out, and has become a leader in our communities, identifying changing community needs and providing support to meet those needs.
Local artist Barbara Yeomans came to Fort Myers from England in 1954, so she has seen our Southwest Florida communities growing and changing for quite some time.
That is part of the reason that she supports the Southwest Florida Community Foundation. Barbara understands that needs change as a community grows. She also recognizes that the nature of the Community Foundation is to help people to develop a plan for their giving that will continue on long after they are gone. Barbara says, “When I joined, I liked the fact that gifts were being made to help the local community— local dollars directly into the community.” In Barbara’s life, she has been a wife, a mother, a volunteer, and an artist. “Art is my fulfillment in life,” she explains. “It requires no one. It is what I know I was born to do.” Indeed, Barbara’s art is an extension of her way of giving. The thought that someone else can get such great enjoyment from a piece of her work is, in her words, humbling. “The real heroes to me are the regular people who give what they can. Everyone has something to give.”
As a local small business owner, Carol Conway understands the importance of giving back to the community that supports her business.
“We have benefited in our business from our philanthropy in the community,” Carol says, “just by getting to know many of the nonprofit agencies through our service to them.” Indeed, Carol’s business, Cape Coral-based CRS Technologies, takes care of the computer technology needs of many of the areas nonprofit organizations. Making those contacts helped Carol and her husband to develop their philanthropic goals. Carol was introduced to the Southwest Florida Community Foundation by former CEO Paul Flynn. She says, “When I was new in the area about fifteen years ago, I made friends who were really my role models and mentors, and they all seemed to have this one thing in common, and that was philanthropy.” Since then, Carol has been involved in several charitable causes. She loves animals and she cares deeply about services that empower people. When asked about what she likes the most about the Community Foundation, Carol offers an immediate answer: “I like the diversity and variety of the things that the Community Foundation chooses to fund. The Board is made up of some very practical people who understand how to get the job done.” Carol especially appreciates what she sees as an “empowerment theme” that is expressed in the work of the Community Foundation. “They take potential and realize it; they support things that are already good and make it even better,” she says. “The Southwest Florida Community Foundation understands what it takes to build a community.”
“To whom much is given, much is expected.” Nancy Near is very fond of this biblical quote.
Indeed, she credits it for being her motivation for giving. Nancy’s other major influence is her late husband, Jim, as he was extremely generous and supportive to anyone who asked for help. After Jim died, Nancy began her own journey as a community volunteer and supporter with the Guadelupe Center of Immokalee. “I was deeply impacted by the poverty of the Immokalee residents, the struggles they had in learning a new language, and the needs in that community,” she says. From this experience, Nancy became involved in other community organizations, like the Southwest Florida Community Foundation and the Lee Memorial Children’s Hospital just to name a few. Nancy and her sons also support higher education as a way to give back to the educational institutions that helped to shape their careers. Nancy was honored by Gulfshore Life magazine and the Southwest Florida Community Foundation at the September 2010 Philanthropists of the Year event, being named “Outstanding Volunteer of the Year” for 2010. The Community Foundation is fortunate to have philanthropists like Nancy in the Community Foundation family, who selflessly give back to the community from not only their treasure, but also their time.
If you are a snowbird, or have moved around from state to state, you will certainly be able to relate to Bob Shrader’s story.
A medaled veteran of the Korean War, Bob moved around quite a bit during his career as a project manager in the field of engineering. Working for such firms as GE, Grummond, NASA, and XEROX, Bob had to follow projects as they came up, and that meant being willing to move. The rewards were worth it, though, because Bob got to be involved with some big projects, including military aeronautics and NASA’s space program (the Apollo Program and even technology being used in the Hubble Space Telescope). Plus, he discovered Fort Myers where he eventually settled. Currently, Bob is involved with the Imagine Solutions Conference in Naples and recently finished his second term as GOP State Committeeman of the Lee County Republican Executive Committee. Bob’s patriotism and recognition that sometimes people just need a boost to get going drive his passion to give. Bob focuses his philanthropic goals on education and supporting young people who are going into college, particularly girls who pursue degrees in math and computer sciences. “I was the first in my family to go to college,” Bob says, and he appreciates what a college education will do in a young person’s life. Also important to Bob is that he knows that his gifts will be used locally, which is one of the big pluses of working with the Community Foundation— funds created here are used to support local causes and organizations. “This is my home,” Bob declares strongly, and the Southwest Florida Community Foundation is glad to have him in the family.
Brenda and Dewey Tate consider themselves to be “strategic philanthropists” and have a particular interest in funding women and family issues both domestically and throughout the world.
Dewey grew up in a small Alabama town. As a young child, Dewey’s mother encouraged him and his siblings to get a good education and work hard. Dewey broke the cycle of extreme poverty and began a successful engineering business. Brenda grew up in Atlanta and had a successful insurance firm. She became involved in nonprofit work and advocacy and was introduced to the concept of community foundations in Georgia. As Brenda puts it, “We had successful businesses and worked to raise our family. Now we are at a point in our lives where we have the means and the time to make an impact in those areas of interest that are important to us.” Brenda and Dewey fund and support a variety of nonprofits and Brenda is a founding member of the Women’s Legacy Fund of the Southwest Florida Community Foundation.
