Letcher Family Fund

“Luckily, we have had few major problems in our lives, and we feel it’s important to help those less fortunate,” say Stephen and Bettina Letcher about what motivated them to establish the Letcher Family Fund.

Steve, a graduate of Trinity College and Brown University, is a retired physics professor at the University of Rhode Island (URI), while Tina, who earned a B.A. at Mount Holyoke College and a Ph.D. at URI, is a poet, former editor of the Northeast Journal, and long-time writing and ESL instructor at the Rhode Island Maximum Security Prison and at URI.

The Letchers originally established a donor-advised fund with the Foundation in 2008 to support their many interests, but over time, made the decision to create a designated fund to provide long-term assistance to specific organizations meaningful to them. South Kingstown Land Trust, the Jonnycake Center for Hope, and the Kingston Congregational Church are a few of the community groups that receive assistance. Scholarships for young people studying science at South Kingstown High School and those already at URI are supported by the Letcher Family Fund, as well as Beautiful Day, a Providence-based nonprofit whose mission it is to assist refugees in adjusting to life in America by offering paid, on-the-job training and education.

Rather than working with each organization individually, Steve and Tina appreciate the ability to have their grants made through the Foundation, “a ‘one-stop shop’ and a reliable organization that can do it all.” Steve, a founding board member of the Kingston Chamber

Music Festival, learned of the benefits of working with the Foundation as the Festival’s treasurer. The Letchers are also members of The 1916 Society, a group of generous Rhode Islanders who have included the Rhode Island Foundation in their estate plan.

Steve and Tina conclude, “It’s good to be in a community where people can help each other.”