PORT ANGELES — The 2014 Sonny Sixkiller Husky Celebrity Golf Classic, staged July 24-25 by the Olympic Medical Center Foundation, has improved its fundraising performance since its first two years, especially since its second year, 2012, when the event netted little more than $4,000 and cost more than $84,000 to put on.
This year’s event included a dinner, fundraising auctions at Vern Burton Community Center and a golf tournament at Cedars at Dungeness Golf Course.
It’s named for and hosted by the former University of Washington football star Sonny Sixkiller, who invites former Husky stars to participate in the event.
This year, Husky legends such as Marques Tuiasosopo and Steve Emtman, along with legendary college football announcer Brent Musburger, played golf with event participants who are wined and dined.
“Because of our sponsors, 100 percent of all money raised at the event will go to the hospital,” Karen Rogers, OMC foundation board president, said in a statement following the golf tournament.
Sponsors pay for event expenses, and in return get their names publicized, and the remaining money is used by the foundation for operations of OMC programs and equipment, she said last week in an email.
The foundation’s policy is that “all donations will be paid to or for the benefit of the hospital,” she said.
Donations are “paid to the foundation by businesses and individuals to be used for the charitable purpose which may include overhead,” Rogers said.
Overhead includes salaries, other day-to-day expenses of the foundation, and program services, OMC foundation board treasurer Duane Wolfe said Friday.
He said donations made at specific fundraising events for designated purposes — such as “fund-a-need” — go to those specific purposes.
All net proceeds after event expenses, including donations above the fair-market value of purchases, such as trees at the Festival of Trees, also fund OMC programs and equipment, Wolfe said.
This year, the tournament attracted $86,000 in sponsorships as part of the $117,000 that was raised, foundation Executive Director Bruce Skinner said.
The sponsorships more than covered $73,000 in expenses, including administrative costs, Skinner said.
The $13,000 left over from sponsorships is part of the $44,000 in net proceeds that will help pay for OMC programs and equipment, he said.
Tournament proceeds also included a live auction that generated $18,000, a silent auction that generated $7,000, and $6,000 in miscellaneous events such as a raffle and golf-course contest that focus on such skills as putting, hitting the ball closest to the pin, and the longest drives.
Skinner said the $117,000 generated was not all cash — it included $20,000 in “trade-outs” offered by the Jamestown S’Klallam tribe that are counted as expenditures that covered such items as food, beverages, and the tournament program at no cost.
Expenses included $15,000 in “giveaways” — pullovers and golf shirts — to 180 players, and a dinner sponsored by the Jamestown S’Klallam tribe that cost about $10,000, Skinner said.
Records were set in this year’s Sixkiller events for corporate sponsorship, attendance and funds for OMC.
In 2011, its first year, after expenses, the tournament netted $7,786 for OMC, not including administrative costs such as personnel.
In 2012, the tournament raised $89,326 and cost $84,850 to put on, netting $4,476 for OMC.
Skinner admits the tournament performed dismally in 2012, when the dinner cost $20,100 and gifts such as sweater-vests for participants and sponsors cost $18,484.
Skinner said the 2013 Sixkiller tournament landed more on the plus side, generating $124,353 in income and $88,436 in expenditures.
Total sponsorship was $63,750 in 2012 and $82,961 in 2013.
Live auction proceeds also increased from $11,850 to $20,000.
“As we projected, this event has turned into a great fundraiser for us, after investing in it the first two years,” Skinner said in an email.
“We expect it to continue to grow financially in the years ahead.”
Some foundation members defend the earlier tournament take as growing pains.
“We wouldn’t have even gotten that [$7,786] to the good that first year if we didn’t hold the event and bring it in and get it started,” said Jim Jones, Clallam County’s administrator and a member of the OMC foundation board executive committee.
Several of the 10 donors who have taken issue with foundation expenditures said they were concerned with the foundation’s salaries and benefits.
According to the foundation’s Form 990s, filed annually with the IRS, salaries and benefits nearly doubled from $153,288 in 2007 to $284,080 in 2012.
Skinner said the hike was caused mainly by an increase in financial work required to operate the foundation’s now defunct gift annuity program.
A bookkeeping position also has been eliminated.
Sara Maloney, one of the dissatisfied donors and also the foundation’s former associate executive director, points to Form 990s that show net overall foundation losses of $797,224 from 2008 through 2012, including $197,756 in 2012.
But foundation board treasurer Duane Wolfe said donations are counted as expenses because the foundation is writing a check to the hospital.
So it’s not as though something has actually been purchased as an expense in the conventional sense, he said.
Skinner said the foundation has “never lost money any single year.”
He said the nonprofit often shows losses in one year because donations received by the foundation may not be given to the hospital until the next year.
“We haven’t lost money if you don’t consider donations to the hospital.”
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Senior Staff Writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5060, or at pgottlieb@peninsuladailynews.com.
