The Westchester Community Foundation is a division of The New York Community Trust, one of the oldest and largest community foundations in the United States.

The New York Community Trust is the umbrella name for two organizations: The New York Community Trust, an unincorporated association of charitable trusts joined by the adoption of a common resolution and declaration of trusts (R&D), and its corporate affiliate, Community Funds, Inc., a New York State not-for-profit corporation.

Funds established as trusts are invested by institutional trustees selected by the donor from our list of those trustees who have adopted the R&D. The trustee has sole investment responsibility. Investment performance is monitored by Trust staff and reviewed by our Investment Committee.

Most of our trustee banks require at least $500,000 in order to establish a charitable trust. Many have minimums of $1 million or more.

Funds established in Community Funds, Inc. (including the Long Island Community Foundation and the Westchester Community Foundation) are invested in vehicles selected and reviewed by the Investment Committee of the New York Community Trust.

Funds established with our trustee banks are charged a trustee's fee by the bank, which is negotiated at the inception of the fund. Most of the banks charge on the basis of reasonable compensation as provided under New York State law. Each trust fund is treated as a separate account for fee purposes. The fee scales usually start above 1 percent of market value for the first $1 million, with the rate declining for larger funds. In addition, there is sometimes a flat administrative fee per account which ranges from $1,000 to $1,750. The median total fee is above 1 percent.

For funds established in Community Funds, Inc., fee levels are fairly moderate because all our investment advisory assets are pooled, with a median fee below 50 basis points. We are also very conscious of mutual fund expense ratios and have historically worked with fund families that have both low-cost operations and competitive investment performance.

We charge all funds, whether in The Trust or Community Funds, Inc., a modest annual administrative fee.  The fee for a donor advised fund is 2.50 percent of grants paid or .4 percent of assets (40 basis points) whichever is greater, the fee is .5 percent of assets (50 basis points) for all other (that is, non advised) funds.