Donor Spotlight: Mary Body & Al Raymond

At the heart of Bayview Manor Foundation are the people who believe in its mission. Meet Mary Body and Al Raymond, who share why they choose to support the Foundation and invest in the future of the community.

Mary’s thoughts: A common theme among poets and philosophers is to leave a place better than we found it. To honor the lives of friends who have died, I have chosen to make contributions to Bayview Manor Foundation in their memory, ensuring that in small, personal gifts to the Foundation, their lives leave a better life for their fellow residents. By making other gifts to the Foundation I am doing my part paying it forward for others to benefit from my resources. I chose the Foundation for these monetary gifts because I look to the Foundation as being careful, considerate stewards of the funds entrusted to their care.

Al’s thoughts: The main reason to support the Foundation is its primary mission of insuring no resident must be evicted because they run out of money before they run out of life. However, I believe this is necessary but not sufficient because Bayview is a small independent competing in an industry in which the trend is that profit-making conglomerates buy up the not-for-profits. This is an industry in which the major problem nationally is staffing the care-giving, maintenance, food-service, housekeeping, and management operations required to support a retirement community. Conglomerates have a huge advantage in the competition for human resources because of, for example, economies of scale. Bayview is constrained in the bidding because increase in wages must be funded by an increase in resident payments. Employees are attracted to Bayview when they could be making more money elsewhere because they view Bayview as a “good “ place to work (the difference in pay has been termed “psychological income”).

I believe the Foundation has an important role to play in this competition for recruiting and retention of employees because of its third mission; “Fund any other programs and services connected to Bayview, furthering its mission”.

This third mission of support recognizes that without Bayview, there is no need for the Foundation. It also recognizes that the Foundation can be a vital resource in Bayview’s competition to exist.