Peter Kiewit Foundation looks to end half century run with splash of donations
The Peter Kiewit Foundation for decades has stood out as one of the region's largest philanthropists, offering up nearly $1 billion in grants for projects and causes in Omaha and beyond.
But now the longtime Omaha institution is preparing to make one final big splash.
Leaders of the foundation, first established in 1980 by the estate of Omaha construction magnate Peter Kiewit, have decided to spend down its nearly $500 million in assets by 2030.
They say the move is consistent with the intentions of Kiewit, who believed there would be a time for the foundation to complete its work and make way for the next generation of givers.
While the foundation has typically distributed roughly between $25 million and $50 million in annual grants, exhausting the assets over the next five years and sunsetting its operations will allow it to make some major final investments in the community.
"I don't think Mr. Kiewit would have ever imagined that the $150 million he left in 1979 would have grown to a foundation that will have lasted 50 years, and will have returned his wealth to the citizens of Nebraska and western Iowa at over a billion dollars," said Wendy Boyer, the executive director of the foundation.
Just what the final big investments will be has yet to be determined. But they are likely to include further enhancing Omaha's urban core and downtown — a priority of Peter Kiewit in his life and one foundation leaders over time have devoted more than $225 million to support.
"There are some big opportunities in front of us in Omaha," Boyer said. "If we can do things now that set Omaha up for the next 25 years instead of just sprinkling things over time, we think it can be more impactful."
But the Kiewit Foundation also has provided regular grants to help sustain the operations of some four dozen partner organizations and charities — and those donations within five years will cease. Included are a number of Omaha youth, arts and social services charities.
One of the reasons the foundation's leaders began letting those organizations know about their plans this week is so they will have time to plan, prepare and adapt. Boyer said the foundation is also willing to work with them to help build their future financial capacity.
"The real work has always been, and will continue to be, in the hands of the communities and organizations we've supported over the years and the next generation of philanthropic leaders," the foundation said this week in a letter to its partners.
Indeed, when it comes to the next generation of Omaha philanthropy, there are numerous other Omaha foundations that have risen up in the decades since the Kiewit Foundation first emerged as the region's biggest.
Many of them have been playing growing roles in the community, and some are now larger than the Kiewit Foundation. Those players include the Omaha Community Foundation; Susie Buffett's Sherwood Foundation; the family foundations of the late Walter Scott, another former Kiewit construction leader; the foundation of Valmont founder Robert Daugherty; Heritage Omaha; and many others. There's also an untold number of other family foundations in their infancy.
"There's no shortage of philanthropic leaders in this community," said Donna Kush, president and CEO of the Omaha Community Foundation. "It may look different in the future, but there are across every corner of this community individuals and families who are having philanthropic discussions — for now and into the future decades."
Boyer agreed the city's philanthropic future is bright — which can partly be traced back to Peter Kiewit.
"I do think part of Mr. Kiewit's legacy was to set the model for other leaders to give back to their community," Boyer said.
Business success created county's biggest estate
The story of the Kiewit Foundation begins with Peter Kiewit, who, from a home base in Omaha, built Kiewit into a construction powerhouse.
In 1931, Peter Kiewit took over the construction company that had been founded by his father, reconstituted it, and grew it into one of America's largest engineering firms. It became the nation's largest interstate highway builder and took on complex engineering jobs all over the world.
Upon Kiewit's death in November 1979, his will established that most of the assets from his estate — believed at the time to be the biggest ever in Douglas County — would go into a new educational and charitable foundation. The estate was estimated to be worth $150 million by the time all assets were liquidated.
The foundation launched in 1980 and made its first grants that year. It became the state's largest private foundation, the first Nebraska foundation with a statewide focus, and the first with paid staff. With current assets of roughly $480 million, it remains among the largest.
Kiewit wanted the new foundation geographically focused on Nebraska, Omaha and parts of western Iowa.
"He really wanted it to be a thank you to the hard-working Nebraskans and western Iowans who helped make his company a success," Boyer said.
At the time of Kiewit's death, he was active civically in the effort to revitalize downtown Omaha. Omaha had seen its downtown retail and business district wither as the city sprawled to the suburbs. The idea was to remake downtown as a destination, first with the development of Gene Leahy Mall.
The Kiewit Foundation contributed almost $1 million to extend the mall and followed up with almost $18 million as the city's once-industrial riverfront was redeveloped into Heartland of America Park and Lewis & Clark Landing.
The foundation has contributed to nearly every major downtown development since, including the city's arena and convention center, the new College World Series ballpark, the Bob Kerrey Pedestrian Bridge, the Holland Performing Arts Center, Steelhouse Omaha, the Luminarium science museum and the recent addition to Joslyn Art Museum.
As with most of its giving, the foundation provided only part of the funding in partnership with other foundations and donors. One exception to that was the "string of pearls" dome streetlights along Abbott Drive, a $9 million initiative of the foundation in 1998 intended to enhance the view from the airport into downtown Omaha.
The Kiewit Foundation made its biggest contribution to downtown — and the largest donation in its history — when it provided $55 million as part of the roughly $350 revitalization of the city's downtown parks. Since the first of the parks reopened two years ago, the area now called The RiverFront has already attracted an estimated almost 5 million visitors.
"The strategy has really been about investing in quality of life amenities that will make Omaha and downtown Omaha a place where people will want to live and where jobs will want to move to," Boyer said. "We feel good that we have been a part of helping to catalyze some of that investment and resurgence downtown."
The University of Nebraska has also been a major beneficiary of the foundation and will likely be another focus of the planned spend down, Boyer said.
The foundation has provided over $135 million for capital projects at all four university campuses. The foundation most recently pledged $50 million toward the construction of the University of Nebraska Medical Center's new hospital — up from an original $30 million commitment.
That grant is part of $100 million in pending Kiewit grants that are not considered part of the future spend down.
The foundation has also provided more than $300 million for scholarships at both the university and community colleges in Nebraska and Iowa.
The foundation several years ago launched a new engineering scholarship program at the University of Nebraska with a special focus on recruiting young women into engineering fields. By the time the program is fully built out, it will be supporting 160 students annually.
Boyer said one of the priorities of the spend down will be finding a way to assure the $7.5 million in annual funding needed to continue that program, whether through endowment or some other mechanism.
NU President Jeffrey Gold said the Kiewit Foundation has been an "amazing" partner to the university. Knowing its leadership, he said, he has confidence the spend down will be completed thoughtfully.
"It allows them to focus on some really big ideas they have been involved with," he said.
Looking across the region outside Omaha, the foundation has provided $90 million for various community amenities, from libraries to parks and theaters.
The Kiewit Foundation also provided $4 million in seed money in 1982 to launch the Omaha Community Foundation, an organization that seeks to grow the city's philanthropic community and match donors to worthy causes. Today, Omaha has one of the largest community foundations in the country, especially remarkable for a city its size.
Omaha Mayor Jean Stothert said the Kiewit Foundation will always be known for its legacy of giving, especially for some of the biggest projects the city has seen.
"They certainly have met their vision," she said.
But what she most appreciates are the hundreds of smaller but critical grants they've given to organizations and causes like Habitat for Humanity, the Omaha bike share program, the Latino Center and Holy Name Housing.
"Not everything they do is big and splashy," she said. "It seems like it always goes to organizations helping people, and that's why they are so special."
Stothert said she does not fear for the future of such organizations with the Kiewit Foundation riding into the sunset. She's confident if there's a worthy need, others in Omaha's philanthropic sector will step up.
And she said there are indeed future big things in Omaha that the Kiewit spend down could support, including in the urban core.
"There's more in the works," she said. "Stay tuned."
Omaha attorney worked with Kiewit on trust
Boyer said spending down the assets is something the charity's five-member board of trustees had been considering for more than a decade. It now believes the time is right to make way for the next generation of philanthropy in the city, she said.
While there was no specific sunset date when the foundation was established, an Omaha attorney who helped legally set it up almost a half century ago says Peter Kiewit did discuss it.
John Boyer was a young attorney in 1975 who worked with Peter Kiewit, other Kiewit executives and a law partner to set up a legal trust that established the foundation upon Kiewit's death.
He said there are notes and minutes from that time in which Peter Kiewit talked about a time frame during which the foundation would function, whether future trustees decided that was 25 years, 50 years or longer.
"The 25 years was something they clearly discussed before he passed away," said John Boyer, who is not related to Wendy Boyer.
John Boyer thinks Kiewit's thoughts on that can also be seen in his strict rule at Kiewit that all employees retire when reaching age 65 — rooted in Kiewit's belief "they needed to make room for the next generation," he said.
"I think that was the root of his philosophy on why he would think sunset would be the wisest thing to do at some time in the future," he said. "And I think the action that they're taking now confirms what his intentions would be."
Experts on foundations and charitable giving say it is not uncommon for family foundations to decide to sunset, particularly with the passing of generations. The founder's family may no longer live in the city or be involved with the entity. Over time, that can risk the foundation drifting from what the founder originally intended for the funds.
In the case of the Kiewit Foundation, 2009 was the last time a member of the family served on the board, and no current board members knew Peter Kiewit personally.
Wendy Boyer said there are obvious tradeoffs between keeping a foundation going in perpetuity and the larger opportunities created by spending down the assets. But to the foundation's board, she said, it comes down to donor intent and returning Peter Kiewit's wealth to Nebraska.
"It's the right time," said Paul Ternes, a community investment officer with the foundation. "It's a chance for us to thoughtfully step aside and finish the race well and hand it over to the next generation of people, whatever that may look like."
John Boyer said spending down the foundation's significant assets over the next five years represents an "amazing" opportunity for Omaha.
If Peter Kiewit could see the foundation and its work today, Boyer said he thinks he would be surprised by the large scale of its work and its wide reach over a sustained period of time.
"I think he would be pleased with the results," he said.
, 402-444-1130, twitter.com/henrycordes
Reporter - Metro News
