Welcome to The Benefactor's Survey
For over 120 years the Fraser-Hickson Institute Library has served the citizens of Montreal. The endowment which has kept it open for so long is no longer sufficient. The Library will soon be forced to close at its present location and move to smaller premises. Its 11,000 members are about to lose a valuable resource. The Library's users include a cross-section of society: seniors, new immigrants, members of numerous cultural communities, countless children, and the disadvantaged of the immediate community.
The services provided by the Fraser-Hickson Library have saved the City of Montreal millions of dollars. Now, with the endowment at a critical level, the City has been asked to provide stable funding for the next five years. Their response is "NO". Short-term funding available from the Borough is not sufficient and the Borough will require that the Library hand over its property if it accepts Borough funding. The Borough seems to feel that the literacy and community services of so many people are less important than other matters.
After petitioning literally thousands of people on the streets, we the Friends of the Library encountered enormous support for the library. We realized that those numbers included many who might be able to help. Unsure of the long-term sustainability of this charitable institution,
potential large-scale donors could be reluctant to come forward.
The irony is that there may be many such potential donors with similar concerns. We reasoned: if they were aware of each other, and could anonymously (without a commitment) state the amount they might be willing to donate given similar pledges, we could assemble enough funds towards a self-sustaining endowment.
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