At the invitation of my friend Valerio Melandri, who heads the Masters
Program in Fundraising at the University of Bologna, I travelled this week to
the region of Emilia-Romagna and the
resort town of Castrocaro Terme, to
make a presentation at the 5th Annual Festival Del Fundraising, Italy’s one and only fundraising
conference.
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| The Grand Hotel in Castrocaro Terme |
Castrocaro is about 10km outside of a small city called Forli, which
has the distinction of being Benito Mussolini’s home town. Mussolini liked “taking
the waters” of Castrocaro’s Terme,
and he stayed at the elegant Grand Hotel, the site of the conference. It’s a beautiful Art Deco building straight
out of the early 1930’s. There are several rooms on the first floor which
contain stunning Deco furniture, and one of them was Mussolini’s office while
in residence. The main Padiglione (pavilion) was equally stunning and it was
interesting to see such a gem of an original building in full use today –
original door hardware and all.
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| The Padiglione at the Grand Hotel |
The conference this year attracted 600 participants from across Italy,
and I was one of the eleven “International” speakers. My friends Guy Mallabone (from Calgary), Laura
Fredricks (from New York City), Susan Storey (from Toronto) and Harvey McKinnon
(from Vancouver) were also there, and it was not long before all the
English-speaking speakers were regularly drinking and eating together.
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| Mr. Guy Mallabone |
I spent a great deal of time over the last two months preparing for the
conference, which was the only “work” I’ve done while on sabbatical. At times, it was hard to engage my brain, and
keep my attention focussed. However, I
think all the hard work paid off because my 75-minute presentation “Fundraising
for a Public Hospital” was (I think) well received. The participant’s evaluations will be the
real test though. The topic was of
interest to Valerio, in part, because as a rule, publically-funded hospitals in
Italy do not fundraise – imagine!
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| John Greenhoe (from Michigan) and Laura Fredricks |
The Festival is the most FUN fundraising conferences I’ve been to –
mostly because fun is built into the program and Italian’s certainly know how
to LIVE well. While the state of
fundraising in Italy is behind that of North America, the Festival plays a
vital role in building the capacity of professional fundraising, and the
profile of philanthropy in Italy. It was
an honour to return to Castrocaro again for the second time – to see old friends,
make new ones, and do my bit-part for hospital fundraising and Italian
philanthropy.
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| Grand Hotel, Castrocaro |
