by Stuart Comstock-Gay, President & CEO, Delaware Community Foundation

This is an unsettling time. Disorienting and confusing. And like all such times, it’s more important than ever that we work together. 

As I consider this moment, I am aware that this is the fourth major economic disruption in the past twenty-five years.  All have led to massive dislocation in the social sector – meaning that many nonprofits struggled to stay alive, meet payroll, and most important, continue to serve their clients.   

In 2000, the “tech bubble” burst, and the Nasdaq Index in October of 2000 fell 77% from its peak only six months earlier.  I vividly remember donors at the community foundation I then served talking about three things. First, that their assets had shrunk significantly. Second, they remained committed to continuing their support for the nonprofits they cared about. And third, in some cases, their priorities had shifted to core needs like food and shelter.  This left many organizations, such as those in the arts, struggling greatly.   

When that period ultimately passed, we reached a new equilibrium. That is, until 2008, when it seems the entire economy imploded on the backs of the housing crisis and subprime mortgages. Once again, now at another foundation, donors told me the same three things that I heard in 2000.  Organizations struggled. Some closed their doors, merged, and created new partnerships. As for formal philanthropy, endowments lost up to 20% of their buying power, but many still increased their payout. As we all know, we came out of that with a changed sector, but a still strong one. 

Twelve years later, COVID arrived. In that crisis, we saw an incredible expansion of giving – an outpouring of support for nonprofits as they continued to provide outstanding service in the midst of the pandemic. Philanthropy gave more than $20 billion during that crisis, more than double the amount given to the previous top 10 disasters combined. Importantly, it didn’t take long to also see that individuals and foundations weren’t alone. The U.S. government provided billions of dollars to help ensure that citizens continued to get the support they needed. 

Now we’re here again. Only, this time it’s different. We don’t know how bad this will get, how long it will go on, which threats to funding are real or not, or what the end looks like.  And while we in Delaware have great partners in our state and local governments, it’s clear that Federal support will be reduced for the foreseeable future.  

What funders and nonprofits of all sizes know is that philanthropy can never fill all the gaps. It is through combined corporate, foundation, and individual giving that we come out of this. 

What I know from the philanthropists that we work with is that they will continue to be generous.  It’s tougher for donors whose income is tied to the markets right now as the tariffs have run roughshod over those sources of income.  But they want to – and plan to – help. 

At the same time, as the need for financial support will be greater than ever, donors will have to make hard choices. For some, that means focusing more of their money on fewer organizations. For others it will mean shifting to what they view as particularly essential needs. And for most, they are looking for organizations with a plan for how they will thrive in the future.  

It’s not necessarily fair, but the whole sector needs to consider new partnerships and mergers. Funders need to be supportive of that.   

We’re going to do all we can to keep the social sector vibrant and to work with our funding partners to be as generous as possible. For all of us, it means re-visiting how we can best do our work. 

The future is not the past. What we start to rebuild now will not be the same thing that was in place last year or the year before. New models, new partnerships. And yes, that is disorienting.  But I also remain optimistic.  Because working together, and focusing on our communities, and how great communities thrive, is what will help us through this crisis – just as it has in the past. 

Sure, we don’t know how long this will last.  But we absolutely do know that collectively, we will take care of our communities, and each other.  It will be difficult, but it’s the solution we have, and we will get through this.