Philanthropist MacKenzie Scott donates $10 million to Georgia community lender

Philanthropist MacKenzie Scott is at it again.

The author and ex-wife of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, who was instrumental in the retail giant’s early years, has given $10 million to Access to Capital for Entrepreneurs, a nonprofit Community Development Financial Institution based in Georgia.

It is the largest donation ACE has ever received, and the second time Scott has given to the organization. In 2020, she gave the CDFI $5 million. The news was first reported by the Atlanta Business Chronicle .

In both cases, the gifts came completely out of the blue, Grace Covington Fricks, president and CEO of ACE told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. When she first saw an email this summer from Scott and her team, Fricks deleted it, assuming it was spam or phishing.

But when she received a follow-up a few days later, she realized it wasn’t a hoax, but still didn’t expect a donation.

“I thought, you know, she’s probably calling because they’re going to be doing a blog or a story on the impact of MacKenzie Scott’s previous awards, and she either wants to talk to me or wants to talk to one of our clients who benefited,” Fricks said.

But instead, when Scott’s representative told Fricks at the beginning of August she wanted to give ACE $10 million, the leader was shocked. The gift comes as Fricks, who has led ACE for 24 years, plans to retire at the end of the year. Martina Edwards, the group’s current chief of strategic partnerships, will take the helm in January 2025.

Credit: Handout

Fricks is excited to be able to pass off the organization in a strong position because of Scott’s gift. Edwards and the team will be able to think beyond the pressures of making payroll and other logistics, Fricks said, “they’re going to be able to dream a little.”

ACE, like other CDFIs, is focused primarily on community development. It relies on federal, state and private funding to redistribute to the community it serves.

Since 2000, the organization has provided more than $200 million in loans to entrepreneurs building a business in Georgia, with a focus on women, people of color and low-to-moderate income people. The nonprofit also provides business advising services.

ACE’s board will evaluate how to best use the $10 million at the organization’s planned retreat in October. Scott’s $5 million gift helped grow the organization, hire additional staff and make the nonprofit’s financial position stronger, which in turn makes banks and foundations more likely to lend to ACE, Fricks said.

Scott’s donations are large, unrestricted and often unexpected.

In 2019, the year Scott finalized her divorce from Bezos, she signed on to the Giving Pledge, promising to give away the majority of her wealth either during her lifetime or in her will, writing at the time she would “keep at it until the safe is empty.”

“We are attempting to give away a fortune that was enabled by systems in need of change,” Scott wrote in a 2021 essay . “My team’s efforts are governed by a humbling belief that it would be better if disproportionate wealth were not concentrated in a small number of hands, and that the solutions are best designed and implemented by others.”

She has given away more than $17.3 billion of her personal wealth to more than 2,000 nonprofits, with at least $246 million donated to Georgia-based organizations, according to Yield Giving , a database of her donations.

Past beneficiaries include Morehouse and Spelman colleges, Clark Atlanta University and Atlanta Habitat for Humanity. Earlier this year, two Atlanta area nonprofits that serve Hispanic and refugee residents received $2 million each from Scott.

Fricks noted the donations to ACE came without having a relationship with Scott, which is uncommon and highlights the strength of her organization’s work.

“In the world of nonprofits and fundraising, one of the things that you’re taught and that you learn is that relationships are so important,” she said. “This particular money from MacKenzie Scott is coming … without any personal relationship. So, what that means is that it is truly, 100% based on the work of the entire organization, including our clients.”

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