17 November, 2025 2 2 Comments

Lessons Learned…So Far

November 17, 2025 By 2 Comments

So far…

Over the past few weeks, we’ve had a chance to sit down with several of the wonderful organizations we support at the Carl Angus DeSantis Foundation.

It’s been a lot of running around, a lot of deep conversations, a lot of learning and a lot of anxiety as well. These are not easy times.

But meeting with the exceptional leaders running local nonprofits and foundations gives me hope. It’s the best part of a great job.

After a career spent in business, a season in politics and journalism—all wondrous in their own ways—I have to say that this work is the most fulfilling. Every day your heart breaks when you see the need and every day your heart gets filled when you see how local heroes are making a real and lasting difference.

We are preparing for our annual meeting in January and that requires us to reflect on the lessons we’ve learned since 2021 when our founder, Carl DeSantis, asked me and a colleague to help him create a charitable foundation that would help people in Palm Beach and Broward counties.

We started from scratch.

While I’ve been on numerous nonprofit boards over the years and have been involved in our community since 1987, learning about philanthropy and the nuts and bolts of foundations was a mountain to climb. Philanthropy is both an art and a science. It asks us to look at data and outcomes but also requires us to examine things you can’t measure—heart, passion, and a feel for people and what it takes to build and sustain community.

We do this work together—with teammates, partners, advisors and a legion of people who are in our ear vying for finite resources.
When I tell people what I’m doing these days, I often hear “wow, it must be fun to give away money.”

It is.

But it’s hard work too. And we don’t just give money away. We do our homework. We dig deeply into organizations and treat our grants as investments. We want a return—not a monetary one– but results. If you say you are going to help people, we want to see and verify that you are.

Unfortunately, there are times when you must say no. Saying no is never easy because just about every cause is a good one. But we’ve learned to stay focused on our four pillars: health and nutrition, leadership and entrepreneurship, civic innovation and faith-based giving. We’ve been entrusted to honor our founder’s intent. Carl’s wishes guide everything we do.

This is a unique time for our Foundation because right now several key staff and board members knew (and loved) our founder.

Because our Foundation is designed to be “perpetual” that won’t always be the case. There will come a time when the folks running this foundation will have had no personal connection to our founder.

That’s sobering.

It also makes us focus on creating a ‘foundation for the Foundation’ that will imbed Carl’s spirit into this work that will last beyond our tenure as stewards of his generosity.

So, when we meet with the EJS Project, Bound for College, The George Snow Scholarship Fund, the Alzheimer’s Drug Discovery Foundation, FLIPANY, 1909, 4Kids of South Florida and Boca Helping Hands among others, I try and imagine my friend Carl in the room sitting alongside me. We lost Mr. D in 2023 and there’s not a day that I don’t think about him. My job, and frankly my heart requires that I do so.

For years, I had the blessing of wandering into his office, pulling up a chair and talking with Mr. DeSantis about life, business and a whole range of topics because he had an active and restless mind. We laughed. A lot. For some strange reason, we had a bond that I can’t put into words. I wasn’t alone. Carl had that connection with so many, but I count myself exceptionally blessed to represent his generosity until someday someone else will step in and carry it forward.

When we started this work almost 5 years ago, my colleague Maritza and I searched high and low for advice, knowledge and inspiration. We spoke to foundation leaders, nonprofit executives, attorneys and bankers from sea to shining sea. Everyone was so generous with their time and their experience. They gave us their playbooks, the lessons they learned, and their best practices. From that source material, we created a stew that is uniquely ours always measured against what we thought Carl would want or believe in.

Thanks to Karen Granger of 4 Kids, we met with Stephan Tchividjian, co-founder and CEO of the National Christian Foundation of South Florida, to give us advice on our faith-based pillar. Stephan is the grandson of Billy Graham. Like his grandfather he’s charismatic, smart and a deep thinker.

I’m a Jewish kid from New York. We come from different worlds. But in many ways, I found a kindred spirit. Since that meeting, Stephan checks in with us regularly always asking what’s giving us joy and what’s draining us. It’s nice of him. How often do we slow down enough to check in with others? And bother to listen.

Anyway, Stephan told us at one of our get-togethers that Carl’s work would continue, and that in many ways his most important work was ahead of him. I think of that beautiful idea all the time. That belief resonates and, in many ways, defines my understanding of legacy.

As I prepare for the annual meeting of our Foundation, I’ll be reflecting on how philanthropy should be trying to address the root causes of societal challenges. But I’ll also be thinking about community, legacy, grace, and empathy.

We read an awful lot about Artificial Intelligence. I am fascinated by its potential and its pitfalls too. Still, I can’t help but believe that community, legacy, love, grace, art and  philanthropy remain a distinctly human endeavor.

(Note) In the coming weeks, I hope to share more about root causes, legacy and community. I hope you’ll join me.  Please share your thoughts on lessons you’ve learned along the way. Thanks for listening.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

11 July, 2022 2 2 Comments

New Vistas…

July 11, 2022 By 2 Comments

Greetings from Portland, Maine.

Almost exactly two years ago, Covid almost took me out.
Laying in an ICU bed struggling for every breath,
I began to think about my bucket list.
I don’t know if you have a list but I suspect that you do. Most people I know have a wish list for their lives and as you get older you begin to think about a concept called QTR: or quality time remaining. How do you want to spend the time you might have remaining, knowing of course, that nothing is guaranteed?
After all, I never dreamt my life might end as a result of a virus discovered in a Wuhan, China wet market.
So as I lay there wondering if I’d ever go home, I began to think.
What did I want to do with my quality time remaining if I was granted a Covid reprieve?
My list was relatively short and I think fairly modest: an escape place in Maine and another golden retriever.
Oh, there’s many other things I aspire to do in business and life and I’m out there trying, but time in New England away from the Florida heat and humidity and falling for another golden were at the top of my list.
And thanks to my wife Diane, both have happened.
I’m very grateful. Especially for Diane and for Gracie, our beautiful golden and our new townhouse tucked in the woods in the West End of Portland.
So,  I urge you, my friends, to find your bliss and go for it, if it all possible.
Because life is fragile and time is finite and self care is important.
This blog consistently extols the importance of community and giving back and that’s something I try to do and enjoy doing.
But in order to give, we have to have gas in our tanks and sometimes we need to replenish.
For me, stepping away for a few weeks is a start. The change of scenery has been good so far.
You see new things, breathe different air and you feel your perspective change.
Of course, I miss my friends and my favorite haunts but I’m going to lobby my friends to visit and missing those favorite places only makes me appreciate them even more.
So I encourage you to think about your QTR and to try to make the best of your days.
Today, more than ever, it’s easy to stay connected to home, work, loved ones etc. But it’s also important to refuel, renew and restore.
I wish you all three and abundant health as well.
25 July, 2016 3 3 Comments

What We Often Don’t See Is What Matters

July 25, 2016 By 3 Comments

the-iceberg-of-successI saw a great graphic the other day. (Look above).

The picture depicts success as an iceberg with only the good stuff visible on the surface.
But just below is what it took to achieve success. The trials, tribulations, setbacks, false starts, hard work, good habits and more that few see. But it’s the struggle that is essential for achieving success.
While the graphic is probably aimed at individuals, I think it also holds true for cities and other things we strive to build.
There are so many things that don’t appear on the surface. So many hurdles that few get to see.
And so it has been with Delray Beach and Boca Raton.
First Boca.
I moved here in 1987 and I remember the old mall on US 1. It wasn’t a very nice mall, but it had a bookstore and so I went there often.
I worked for a newspaper at the time headquartered on East Rogers Circle and it was a fairly desolate place back then. There were few places to eat, we had to drive to Tom Sawyer’s or into Delray where there was a restaurant sort of underground at Linton Towers. We sometimes went to Rosie’s Raw Bar, Dirty Moe’s  or to a barbecue joint on Linton and Congress.
Boca was always pretty with beautiful parks. But there was really no downtown. The best restaurant may have been La Vielle Maison. West Boca began to boom and often we would venture to Wilt’s or Pete Rose’s Ballpark Cafe and yes we saw Wilt a few times and Pete a whole lot. He did his radio show from the cafe which was attached to a Holiday Inn on west Glades.
Boca was a pretty nice place back then but at the risk of offending some folks, I like it now too.
Although I knew many of the city folks and elected officials through the years I wasn’t privy to the struggles they most surely dealt with.
I was too absorbed with Delray’s journey first as a reporter and later as an elected official.
And dear reader, there were some titanic struggles and make or break decisions to make.
When I think of the 80s, the first thought that comes to mind is crime. The town felt dangerous.
I remember walking into the old Phoenix at Atlantic and A1A as a naive 22 year old new to town hoping to shoot some pool and grab a beer. I actually wondered whether I would make it out intact.
Then there was the time I was assigned a “man on the street” interview and when I stopped a guy on Atlantic Avenue he turned around and ripped the sleeve of my shirt clean off. We both stood there shocked. It was a perfect tear, not sure how he did it and I guess he surprised too, because he ran off. I can’t remember whether he answered my question. Probably not.
I went to police briefings and neighborhood crime watch meetings and heard a litany of horror stories.
Back then, there was a major drug dealer in town named Deniz Fernandez. His network of dealers were brazen and actually hung a pig’s head off a street sign as a warning to cops. When he finally went down as a result of a task force consisting of Delray police and federal agents, the scope of his astonishing empire was revealed: 10 homes, acres and acres of property, a few businesses and duffel bags full of drugs were seized.

 Fernandez owned a place locals called “The Hole,“ a notorious crack house on Southwest Ninth Avenue in Delray Beach.

During the summer of 1987, the group`s business reaped an estimated $50,000 a day in gross profits by selling individual doses of crack cocaine for $10 a rock, according to federal agents and police  who worked on the investigation.

Check out that number, $50,000 a day in $10 increments.

When undercover Delray officers closed in on him on a dirt road wear of town, he brandished a blue steel revolver and pointed it at them before ditching the weapon. Germantown Road, steps from a popular Ford dealership, was Fernandez’ turf and drivers were brazenly hailed to pull over and buy crack rocks. When  officers showed up the dealers dispersed in seconds disappearing into the darkness. Our city was literally an open air drug market.

Once a month, the Sheriff’s fugitive task force came to town and teamed up with our officers to round up literally scores of felons who failed to show up in court or were on the run.
We rode with Charlie Comfort of PBSO, Lt. Jeff Rancour and the late Johnny Pun in an effort to find as many of the  worst offenders before word spread on the street that the warrant task force was out and about.
Augmenting those efforts, was the legendary or infamous–depending on what side of the law you were on–tact team also known as the jump out crew. They were tasked with fighting and disturbing street level drug sales which was rampant in parts of Delray. This is where I first met a young Jeff Goldman, now our chief and really amazing officers such as Mike Swigert, Don West, Eddie Robinson, Chuck Jeroloman, Toby Rubin and John Battiloro.
Mad Dads was active back then. They were citizens determined to reclaim their streets from drug dealers.
I saw K-9 officers like Skip Brown and Geoff Williams deploy their dogs in pursuit of dangerous criminals and a slew of incredible detectives solving one horrific crime after another. Legends like Bob Brand, Robert Stevens, Tom Whatley, Craig Hartmann, Dwayne Fernandes, Casey Thume, Brian Bollan were only a few of the people who labored long hours below the success iceberg.
John Evans, Terrance Scott, Robyn Smith, Tom Judge, Shirley Palmer, Randy Wilson, Marc Woods and Jeff Miller were road patrol cops who made a big difference. Vinny Mintus was a fixture in Pineapple Grove which was far from gentrified in those days. Very far. Tom Quinlan and Glenn Rashkind kept our beach safe and everybody knew their names.  There were more. So many more.
While police and fire lived most dangerously, in every department at City Hall there were people toiling below the success iceberg struggling with financial issues, code enforcement challenges and even zoning problems–all trying to find a formula to  unlock success. They found it. And that should give us comfort as we read about today’s challenges, which include a crushing heroin epidemic.
Our community has risen to challenges before, they will again.
Meanwhile, I appreciate the present because I saw the hungry years. And that’s what gives me and others civic pride.
21 September, 2015 1 Comment

September Song

September 21, 2015 By 1 Comment

cancer

“Oh, it’s a long, long while from May to December
But the days grow short when you reach September
When the autumn weather turns the leaves to flame
One hasn’t got time for the waiting game

Oh, the days dwindle down to a precious few
September, November
And these few precious days I’ll spend with you
These precious days I’ll spend with you

September Song

My ex sister in law died last week. She was 51.

About three weeks ago my friend’s wife passed. She was 47.

Both brave women had cancer. The same disease that took my mother 17 years ago at the age of 59.

My “second dad”, my best friend’s father lost his battle with mesothelioma, a rare form of cancer caused by exposure to asbestos. Last week marked the 10th anniversary of his passing.

To say I hate cancer is an understatement. I also fear it, support charities that fight it and pray every day for a cure.

I also pray for families struggling with the disease.

We get caught up in the little stuff. We all do.

We shouldn’t.

Cancer is awful, but it will focus you in a hurry; make you concentrate on the things that really matter. Like love. Like friendship. Like family.

The week before last wasn’t an easy one. On Sunday, on my way to a Rosh Hashanah dinner, I learned that my credit card was compromised. Again. A day later while driving on US 1 in Boca I was struck by a driver who just slammed into me near Spanish River Boulevard. He sped off. Nice.

But when you get a call that a loved one has passed at such a young age it floors you. And just like that the little things seem trifling.

You get another credit card. You fix the scrapes on your car door. These are little things.

My former sister in law, a beloved aunt to my children and a friend of mine and just about everyone she ever met, had passed at age 51 after a brave bout with cancer. There are no words.

We are fortunate in Boca and Delray to live in a community with strong hospitals and cancer support services.

All of our hospitals, Delray, Boca, Bethesda and West Boca, provide oncology services. FAU and several local bio tech institutes are engaged in meaningful research related to cancer.

These efforts and other charitable endeavors deserve our attention and support.

Progress is being made in the fight to find a cure, but we are still losing far too many people to this awful disease. Way, way too many.

 

17 December, 2014 1 Comment

Water Cooler Wednesday: Perspective

December 17, 2014 By 1 Comment

perspective

Just this week…

One of my favorite people lost her dad to cancer and one of my childhood friends called to tell me his dad was just diagnosed.

In Pakistan, the Taliban butchered 141 people, mostly children at a school. In Yemen, 26 children were killed by terrorists—it barely made the news.

In Newtown, Connecticut, parents marked the second anniversary of the Newtown Massacre and face another holiday season without their children.

In suburban Philadelphia, an Iraq War Veteran killed six family members before taking his own life. It is said that the soldier suffered from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.

I don’t list these items to depress you, but merely to ask that we exercise some perspective as we navigate the daily inconveniences of our lives.

Last I looked, the sun was shining, gas prices are low, we are using dollars not rubles and the temperature is just delightful.

Downtown Delray Beach is abuzz with activity and people seem happy as they stroll Atlantic Avenue and snap family pictures in front of holiday displays.

We visited Mizner Park this week and it was packed with shoppers and diners. I saw a lot of smiles, despite the long lines at the valet. If waiting for a valet is your biggest concern, you have it pretty good.

Life is fragile.

Tomorrow is not guaranteed.

Clichés, but true nonetheless.

Your world can be rocked by one phone call or simply by being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Here are some of the greats on perspective:

“We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses.”

― Abraham Lincoln

“Some people see the glass half full. Others see it half empty.

I see a glass that’s twice as big as it needs to be.”

― George Carlin

“The optimist sees the donut, the pessimist sees the hole.”

― Oscar Wilde