CTI Clinical Trial and Consulting Services (CTI), a global, privately held, full-service contract research organization has joined in a new partnership with Horizon Community Funds of Northern Kentucky, a Covington-based community foundation serving Northern Kentucky.
The two organizations will collaborate on the “CTI Cares Employee Fund,” a donor advised fund that will help support and enrich CTI’s charitable contribution program.
“Our team members have been heavily involved in philanthropy since CTI was founded more than 20 years ago,” comments Derek Vanover, Corporate Counsel at CTI and chair of the company’s “CTI Cares About Our Communities” committee. “The donor advised fund is the next step in that commitment to our communities and a way we can multiply the impact of our teams’ generosity.”
CTI has an employee-driven, monthly charitable spotlight program through which team members can raise awareness and financial contributions for causes they personally feel passionate about. Moving forward, the company will utilize the donor advised fund to streamline this process. Horizon Community Funds will perform the necessary due diligence with nominated charities in addition to managing and investing the money collected in the fund.
“As we have continued to grow, both locally and globally, we have identified a need for a more robust charitable giving vehicle,” remarks Brian Lawrence, Vice President of Finance at CTI. “After researching several options, we concluded utilizing a donor advised fund was the best choice, allowing our charitable programs to grow while maintaining our employees’ focus on moving medicine forward.”
A donor advised fund is a simple, flexible, and tax efficient vehicle for individuals or companies to give to their charities of choice. By partnering with Horizon Community Funds, companies are able to receive a tax deduction for their gifts when made, but they can recommend grants at any time, either immediately or in the future. These types of funds are less expensive than establishing a corporate foundation, as well as easier to administer and more flexible.
“A donor advised fund is a way for individuals and organizations to centralize their giving strategies and essentially outsource the financial portion of those efforts to a team of experts,” explains Nancy Grayson, President of Horizon Community Funds. “We’ve partnered with CTI in the past on other community initiatives, and we are excited to work with them to support their philanthropic work in our community and abroad.”