Group Helps Lead Way in Latino Philanthropy

The 5-year-old fund represents the successful coming together of the county's Latino business and political leadership to promote philanthropy within and for their community.

But most significantly, Destino--a modest fund in the big picture of mainstream philanthropy--offers a model for establishing Latino-oriented funds.

Indeed, United Way-style Latino funds are few nationwide .

Destino, the United Latino Fund in Los Angeles and the Hispanic Community Foundation in San Francisco are the only three in California that raise money to aid nonprofit organizations that perform general social work in Latino communities.

According to philanthropy experts, the three join just four other such Latino funds nationwide--compared, for example, to hundreds of women's and thousands of Jewish funds.

Meanwhile, Destino's successful endowment is leading the way in the Latino funds' attempts to convert themselves into permanent organizations from ones that raise money and immediately dish it out.

In California, the Hispanic Community Foundation has an endowment of $200,000, while the United Latino Fund aims to establish one.

"It is not a stretch [to say] that [Destino] has developed something like a model of what might happen in other communities," says Henry Ramos, principal in New York-based Mauer Kunst Consulting, who has studied the emerging Latino funds and has urged their nurturing by mainstream philanthropic institutions.

Some founders of Destino, sitting around a table in the offices of the Ventura County Community Foundation--which helped create and administers the fund--are particularly proud of the endowment.

"Money begets money," says Hank Lacayo, 70, a former national figure in the union movement who retired to Ventura County. "Imagine what we could do with $1 million?"

Reaching the $400,000 goal a year early has given Destino loftier goals. That amount will guarantee that the fund grants at least $20,000 a year.

So what ingredients made Destino successful?

It started with the Ventura County Community Foundation, where Danny Villanueva--a nationally prominent Latino businessman as head of Bastion Capital and former professional football player--was on the board.