Bill Beisswanger (‘96)
In recent years, I’ve written to you about the importance and the necessity of substantial alumni financial support for ATΩ Delta in the coming years. Among many other smaller projects the past few years, your donations covered the $34,000 cost of the long-needed replacement of the metal roof at 125 Chancellor in Fall 2010, and we hope we are continuing to earn credibility and trust as good stewards of the funds you all so generously contribute to ATΩ Delta. As you will read in Matt Terry’s article in this newsletter, we continue to have critical financial needs in the near- and medium-term, most notably the complete replacement of the floors in the first-floor common rooms. Beyond the needed repairs and improvements that the Board of Trustees has identified, as many of the more successful fraternities at UVa have done, we need to begin building a substantial nest egg, well into the six figures, so we will have the resources in the future to a) potentially rebuild and expand 125 Chancellor Street, particularly to make the first floor more appropriate for fraternity events, and b) potentially fund the purchase of a better chapter house, should one become available. The transaction a few years ago in which Delta Upsilon sold their Rugby Road house back to Beta Theta Pi and built a brand new chapter house at 135 Madison Lane after buying and demolishing an old apartment building on that site (not to mention the substantial financial investment Beta made in then completely gutting the old DU house and rebuilding it from the inside) is an example of the type of effort I would like us to have the resources to fund in the future.
As I wrote last year, we are well aware that alums always want to know things like how big the Chapter is and how this year’s rush went, because they rightly want to know if they’ll be backing a winning horse with their financial support. We have hammered that message home to the Actives year after year, and continue to, and I’m happy to sound like a broken record and say once again that they continued to hold up their end of the bargain this past year – Delta is now 45 strong after initiating 16 new members this spring. And it’s quality, in addition to quantity – as Worthy Master Kevin Vincenti (‘14) lays out elsewhere in this newsletter, the Actives have been very busy improving how Delta operates and how it recruits new members, the Chapter now has a successful philanthropy which started last year called Taus For Paws, and Delta Brothers are very active in other groups on Grounds, among them The Cavalier Daily, Jefferson Society, UVa Rugby Team, and Glee Club. I hope you will take all of their efforts into consideration when planning your giving to our capital efforts going forward.
Annual Giving
We are nearing the May 31, 2013 end of our fifth Annual Giving campaign with Alumni Hall, and it’s been another great year — one that will hopefully have an even better finish once you all read about the many positive things that have been going on at ATΩ Delta in the past year! Through April 15 (and in two fewer months than normal due to the late start to the 2012-2013 giving year), we have raised $9,000 from 41 different donors (see list on page 7), compared with $11,100 from 58 donors through May 30, 2012, $15,000 from 55 donors through May 3, 2011, $8,730 from 51 donors through May 3, 2010, and $8,600 from 54 donors through April 15, 2009 (the cut-off date for the newsletter those four years – the full annual amounts ended up being $15,100 in 2012-2013, $16,100 in 2010-2011, $12,800 in 2009-2010, and $10,920 in 2008-2009). Effectively all of these donations have come via the “Donate Online” link at our Web site, atodelta.com. As a reminder, the Web site allows us to accept credit card donations and enables you to set up recurring donations (i.e. automatically charge your credit card $25 each month), and all donations you make through this channel count toward your overall giving to U.Va.
During the past year, we spent a total of $13,000 out of the ATΩ Capital Fund on 1) replacement of the water supply and sewer lines from the meter into the house, 2) substantial repairs to the front porch and its columns, and 3) our share of the costs to replace the foyer floor from the joists up after it collapsed in May 2012. After all of that, as well as paying 75% of our 2012-13 annual fee to Alumni Hall for their communications and fundraising assistance, we have a current balance of $11,150. This, along with any future donations, will be used this summer for some of the projects Matt laid out in his article.
Capital Campaign
I can’t say much definitively at this stage, but we appear to have solved the “personnel constraints” regarding a potential Capital Campaign that I’ve made reference to in past years, and there is some early activity and ambitious plans on the Capital Campaign front. So stay tuned!
As I look back on another year, I come to a similar conclusion as in past years: we’ve come a long way since I moved back to Charlottesville in 2000 as far as getting organized financially and starting to address our significant capital needs, but there is still a ton of work in front of us to secure ATΩ’s place at the University for decades to come. Why do I personally want ATΩ to be around 30 or 50 years from now? Sure, we all want a place to come back to and meet up with old friends at reunions. But that’s not enough — for me, I want U.Va. men for decades to come to have the opportunity to find a place that will embrace them when they arrive on Grounds, the way the fraternity did for me when I arrived as a second-year transfer student. From the time I joined through today, ATΩ Delta has always been unique in its openness — it’s what you bring to the house during rush that matters, not where you went to school, who your parents are, or anything like that. I believe that is what ATΩ Delta stands for, and I want to see that live on at The University.
As always, look for more from us in the coming year, and check in on atodelta.com every so often for updates on the Chapter. We’re very close to the end of our Annual Giving year, so if you haven’t already (or if you have and want to do more!), please consider making a contribution to our Annual Giving campaign before May 31, either with a credit card at atodelta.com (Annual Giving link on the left), or by sending a check payable to “ATΩ Capital Fund” to:
Alpha Tau Omega
University of Virginia
P.O. Box 400314
Charlottesville, VA 22904
I can be reached anytime at bbeiss@gmail.com or at 434-975-4385 if you have any questions. As always, thanks for your support of our efforts!