Minnesota Public Radio receives $56 Million cash gift for classical music & technological support

[Mikey Radio]

Minnesota Public Radio receives $56M gift for classical music​

Minnesota Public Radio receives $56M gift for classical music

The donation is the largest in the organization’s 55-year history.

current.org

An anonymous donor has given a $56 million cash gift to Minnesota Public Radio to support its classical music service YourClassical.

The donor directed the funds to be “used exclusively to serve YourClassical audiences and provide technological support for new media transmission,” according to a Wednesday press release from American Public Media Group, MPR’s parent organization.

With the gift, MPR will establish a separate permanent endowment to ensure stewardship of the funds “to best serve the donor’s designated purpose,” according to the release. The donation is the largest in the organization’s 55-year history.

 

[TheBigA]

Interesting story. $56 million isn't as much money as it appears. The goal is to use it to make more. The article says it will use the money to set up an endowment. What that means is they will set up an investment fund that seeks to preserve the principle, and live off the interest or dividends. That is dependent on the economy. So when you have a big stock market crash, as we did last month, it effects the budget. That's the trade-off.

The other part of this story is memberships at classical public radio stations are down. People have many choices for music, and some use their money to subscribe to Sirius rather than support public radio. Some do neither and just freeload. But this donation ensures the format will continue regardless of what happens on the listenership side.

 

[Mikey Radio]

The other part of this story is memberships at classical public radio stations are down.

While I'm not sure if it's still causing an ongoing impact, I know my NPR station, and many other non-profits, started really feeling a financial pinch and a reduction in donations when Trump changed the tax code and the standard deduction was raised much higher than it had been previously. While many made donations to NPR and PBS stations and other non-profits to support them, others did it, or certainly gave more generously, with the plan to deduct those donations and enjoy the tax benefits. Once the standard deduction was raised by the former president, many of those donations went away or were greatly decreased. Congress has tried to help a bit by allowing people to report $300 in monetary donations per year (this doesn't include donations of goods or services, only $$), but folks who were driven primarily by the ability to get the tax deduction oftentimes gave more than that.