Donation tops $60M

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This article was published 13/12/2001 (8934 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The city’s Moffat family will hand the Winnipeg Foundation at least $60 million today — the largest-ever gift to a community foundation in Canada.

Yesterday, the Winnipeg Foundation would say only that the donation from the former broadcasting magnate is larger than the previous record gift to any community foundation — $40 million. However, sources told the Free Press the amount is somewhere between $60 million and $100 million.

Randy Moffat, 58, declined to comment on the family’s generosity, saying he would wait until today’s announcement.

The Moffats had a profitable year, cashing in for more than $700 million when their family-owned company was sold to Shaw Communications. Moffat Communications owned Videon cable, CKY and WTN.

The Winnipeg Foundation, celebrating its 80th birthday this year, gives away the interest from its endowment nest egg. It supports a wide range of interests, including Winnipeg Harvest, health and social services groups, arts, culture, education and environmental organizations.

As of September, it had given away more than $100 million in total grants, including more than 300 grants this year worth $8.3 million.

When media baron Izzy Asper donated $10 million to the foundation last year, its chairwoman, Helen Hayles, said it would increase the amount they could give by $500,000 a year. Using those figures, a $60-million gift should boost the annual giving by $3 million — a windfall for local groups.

Until today, the largest donation to a community foundation was the $40 million Joyce Young gave to the Hamilton Community Foundation last year. She loaned money to her nephew for a high-tech start-up company, receiving shares in return. When it went public, she immediately passed along her newfound fortune to help others.

Jim Carr, president of the Business Council of Manitoba, of which Randy Moffat is a member, said Moffat is a generous man.

“He has always shown, through major contributions, for example, to the United Way, the spirit of giving back to our community, which has given his family opportunity,” Carr said. “It’s another example of why Manitoba is such a special place, because we have a core of philanthropists who reinvest in the community, which sets us apart from any other I know.”

Last year, Moffat Communications donated $500,000 to a United Way project aimed at getting high school students to develop projects that will improve their communities.

There is a rich history of giving in this province, both from the average person and the wealthy. For the second year in a row, Manitobans have given more to charity than anyone else in the country, averaging $240 each.

Asper has been handing out his money for years now, including a recent $5-million gift to the St. Boniface Cardiac and Vascular Project, $10 million to the Asper School of Business at the University of Manitoba, $20 million to the Jewish and Winnipeg foundations, $2 million to the Asper Jewish Community Campus, $700,000 to the Manitoba Theatre for Young People and $500,000 to build the Lyric Theatre in Assiniboine Park.

John Buhler, who heads Buhler Industries, gave $3.5 million to the Foundations for Health Research at the Health Sciences Centre. David Graves, who runs Centara Corp., a venture capital fund, created a $1-million chair in telecommunications research at the University of Manitoba and is the principal sponsor of the New Music Festival. The Richardson family has been generous for generations, notably with the arts community.

The Moffat empire began in 1945 when Lloyd Moffat started one radio station in Winnipeg and built a network across Western Canada. He then expanded into television.

When his father died and he took over the company, Randy Moffat was 21. He oversaw the expansion into cable TV and the company’s purchase of a piece of the former Winnipeg Jets hockey club.

Until the company was sold to Shaw a year ago, Moffat-owned Videon supplied cable TV service to Winnipeggers on the west side of the Red River. Shaw serviced the city east of the Red.

Moffat said for years he wouldn’t sell, but relented last December when the offer hit $35 a share for his 52 per cent stake in the company.

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kim.guttormson@freepress.mb.ca