Recently appointed Homer Foundation Executive Director Stacey Schultz began work Monday, July 15.

She is taking over for outgoing director, Mike Miller, who is retiring after five years with the organization. Miller will remain in the office for a bit longer to assist with the transition, providing training and helping Schultz become more familiar with the community.

Miller said the transition should go smoothly because Schultz already has five years of experience working as the executive director at community foundation in Marshfield, Wisconsin. There are differences in terms of funds, but “for the most part community foundations operate in very similar ways,” Schultz said.

One difference is that the Homer Foundation has a larger fund base than the Marshfield foundation and it’s a continually growing organization. Miller said when he started at the foundation the fund base was about $2.8 million and currently “we’re about $20,000 below $7 million,” he said.

In honor of the organization’s 30th anniversary in 2021, Tom Kizzia, former board member, wrote a series of pieces detailing the foundation’s history. These were published in the Homer News and are now available on the Homer Foundation website. It was the first community foundation in Alaska.

“I find it fascinating that Homer stepped up as the first community foundation before Anchorage, Juneau or Fairbanks and it really stood out to me when I decided to apply for the position,” Schultz said.

Though she comes to Homer from Wisconsin now, Schultz also worked as a recreational therapist for Challenge Alaska, a community integration program in Anchorage from 1997 until 2001. The organization provides adaptive recreation and community integration for people with disabilities.

“They’re very well-known for an adaptive ski program that they run in Girdwood for downhill skiing at Alyeska,” Schultz said.

They also used to coordinate a wheelchair handcycle race from Fairbanks to Anchorage but ceased that event due to hazards of racing on the road, Schultz said.

“I was focused on people with developmental disabilities and wanting to get them integrated into the community and doing recreation with everybody else,” Schultz said.

During her time in Anchorage, she would often bring clients to Homer for summer trips “because people were very generous here,” she said.

She moved back to Wisconsin with her family and started employment at the community foundation there. She said that what she liked about the transition from working in the nonprofit sector to the foundation “is that you get to work with all components of the community, not just your one little bubble.”

“It was a nice switch and I was really happy with my work there,” she said.

She noted the role of the Council on Foundations, a nationwide collaborative group that helps foundations sort through various questions and challenges they might have where they can find support or assistance from foundations in other parts of the country.

“It was there that I happened to see a post saying that Mike was leaving his position and I had always told my family that if I ever returned to Alaska I wanted to live in Homer,” she said. “For the opportunity to come back here and work for the kind of organization that I love, I, at least, had to try for it.”

“I really look forward to working here,” she said. “There’s a lot of momentum with the organization right now and I hope to continue, as far as building all those funds and getting the asset size up to the goal the foundation is aiming for.”

Schultz said that although the foundations purpose is for funding, one of her favorite parts of the career path is being able to hear donors’ stories and learn about what they want to support, where there hearts are in the process.

Miller agreed.

“If someone wants to put their life resources into helping kids dance and that’s where there heart is, it’s great to be able to facilitate that and have a donor walk out of the office feeling really good about what they’re supporting,” Miller said. “It’s an amazing feeling to help people achieve their dreams.”

Another example personal achievement that Schultz provided was the ability to do something like set up scholarships for a family member who has passed away; it helps support the legacy of memories.

“When we’re talking with donors, we really want that personal story, because we want to be able to share that story long after we’re gone and the fund donor, is gone. That’s really my favorite part of the work,” she said.

“My focus isn’t necessarily fundraising; it’s developing the relationships. Because when people trust you, then they’re going to want to trust the foundation to invest their money and then we’re going to get that money out in the community for the biggest needs, just to make the community stronger.”

Miller described the foundation as “a savings account for the community of Homer.”

“We’ve been here 34 years now and we’re just getting started. It’s not about 34 years. It’s about 134 years,” he said.

“I really think Stacey is the right person to take it the next the next stretch. She has a great heart for the community and she has great heart for foundations.”