Sitting Down with David Colligan, former at large Trustee of the Ralph C. Wilson Jr. Foundation

The Ralph C. Wilson Foundation was created after the death of former Buffalo Bills owner Ralph C. Wilson Jr. The Foundation was given $1.2 billion to spend over the course of 20-years. The money that funds the Foundation comes from the sale of the Buffalo Bills to the Pegula family. The 20-year limit on spending the money was to ensure that those who knew Ralph Wilson Jr., the four lifetime trustees, could spend the money within their lifetimes.

 I recently sat down with David Colligan who was a former at large trustee for the Ralph C. Wilson, Jr. Foundation. One of the questions that I asked David was how he would describe the Foundation to someone who had never heard of it before. He told me that the tag line of the foundation was to improve the quality of life for people in Buffalo and Detroit. David explained that the foundation has eight pillars, including youth sports, green design, entrepreneurship, economic development, and more.

As part of our discussion, David explained that the Ralph Wilson Foundation is a spenddown foundation.   The Foundation had 1.2 billion dollars to spend between Western New York and Michigan by a predetermined date. When the Foundation first started, it was one of the first of this type of foundation. Today, there are more spenddown foundations in existence. Currently, Gayle Benson, owner of the New Orleans Saints, is considering a similar donation following her death. Her intended beneficiaries would be local charities in New Orleans.

David originally got involved with the Ralph C. Wilson, Jr. Foundation when he reached out to the Detroit ownership group 15 years after his time with Business Backs the Bills.  He was a member of Business Backs the Bills which was working on a project to help renew the lease in 1998 for then-Rich Stadium. This would eventually become Old Highmark Stadium as we know it today.

After Ralph C. Wilson, Jr. died, David became a foundation trustee generating a host of responsibilities that has shifted as time passed. He was required to attend eight meetings a year, in addition to other duties, but when he first became trustee, he was much more involved in the day-to-day operations of the Foundation.

I asked David what he was most proud of from his time as trustee. He told me that three things stood out above the rest. The first is the parks and trail systems. There are around five hundred miles of trails that the Foundation is helping to connect through Western New York and Southeast Michigan. The trails are connected to Ralph Wilson Centennial Parks in both Buffalo and Detroit, with the Buffalo park opening sometime in the next year. The second thing that David is most proud of from his time as trustee is the entrepreneurship effort. He was involved with entrepreneurship in Buffalo and got to see projects like Lauch New York grow to what they are today. The third thing that David is most proud of from his time as trustee was putting endowments in place for arts and culture. The Strong Museum of Play in Rochester was part of a project that was funded by the Foundation.  David explained that he is proud of the arts and culture protections and entrepreneurship because it links Buffalo’s past to its present.

For part of his career, David was both a Trustee of the Ralph C. Wilson, Jr. Foundation and a managing partner of a law firm. I asked how he balanced those two jobs. He said that it was manageable because he was able to do things in the course of a business day. I inquired if David learned any skills as a Foundation Trustee that he used in practice. He told me that he had a mentor at the Foundation, who taught him things that he integrated into his practice, but that he couldn’t point to just one thing that he had learned.

Looking to the future, I asked David if there was anything he hoped that the Foundation would accomplish before its end. He pointed out that there is a need for venture capitalist in Buffalo, and that he would like to see the Foundation help fill this gap. To end our discussion, I asked David if he had any advice for those who wanted to get involved with a foundation like the Ralph C. Wilson, Jr. Foundation. His advice was that people who get involved with foundations  should be passionate about the foundation’s mission.