“My husband felt very strongly about the value of community foundations. And he saw the foundation as the best vehicle to continue to support our passion within the larger context of this community.”
For Beau Rezendes, a constant passion is how we care for our aging population. Specifically, Beau’s longtime support and advocacy of hospice care remains central to her giving focus.
“My late husband, Dennis, worked with the Community Foundation to set up a Donor-Advised Fund in my name,” she recalls. “I was involved in the beginnings of hospice across the country and here, what is now called TRU Hospice Services. It’s an important part of my life, and my purpose. And once a year, through the Donor-Advised Fund, I make a donation to the hospice program of TRU Community Care.”
Why establish a fund at the Community Foundation? “My husband felt very strongly about the value of community foundations,” Beau says. “And he saw the foundation as the best vehicle to continue to support our passion within the larger context of this community. I guess you could say he had a bias toward community foundations and what they stand for. He also liked the idea of the fund being managed by an unbiased third party.”
When ground-up hospice programs were being formed across the country, Beau was at the forefront, gathering what information she could about other hospice programs. “To learn more, I went to a conference in New Haven, where I met my husband, my soulmate. We were both very much involved in hospice care from the beginning – Dennis was really the founder of the national hospice movement, and its first administrator.”
Indeed, for his pioneering efforts in the hospice movement, Dennis – who passed away in 2015 – received recognition from former presidents Carter and Reagan, former speaker Tip O’Neill, former senators Ted Kennedy and Bob Dole, and others.
“Dennis was also very interested in doing something here, locally, to ensure that people would always be provided hospice care – regardless of their ability to pay,” adds Beau. “That’s why he started the fund.”
She describes her own motivation to give as “reinforcing what can be done to make a difference.”
“There are other things I’m passionate about, too,” she concludes, noting additional involvements with Frasier Meadows, The Conversation Project, and the Highland City Club. “I always try to look at things from the standpoint of ‘what can I do?’ and ‘what can we do?’ to make this a better world.”
