CFO assumes grantmaking for Musgrave Foundation

SBJ file photo

Jerry Redfern managed the Musgrave Foundation until his death this year.

Community Foundation of the Ozarks Inc. is assuming the grantmaking responsibilities of the Musgrave Foundation after the death this summer of its longtime manager.

CFO Chief Operating Officer Louise Knauer said the organization would operate the foundation's grantmaking as an "externally managed fund." U.S. Bank Wealth Management will continue to run investment activities for the foundation and transfer funds to CFO, she said.

The grantmaking change follows the death of foundation manager Jerry Redfern. The 84-year-old Neale & Newman LLP attorney died June 3 of cancer, according to past Springfield Business Journal reporting.

“Jerry Redfern will certainly be missed as he managed the Musgrave Foundation’s grantmaking process since 2003,” said Becky Bonner, wealth management adviser for the Musgrave Foundation, in a news release. “It was an easy decision, however, to select the Community Foundation of the Ozarks as the successor foundation manager with their strong history in the community."

The foundation was created in 1983 by Jeannette Musgrave, and it since has awarded more than $15 million to nonprofits focused on initiatives impacting children and senior services; health care and education; poverty, hunger and homelessness; and arts and community betterment, according to its website. Her husband, Edward Musgrave, was a dentist and inherited funds from his family's oil leases; the sum passed to his wife when he died in 1970.

Musgrave Foundation grantmaking through CFO is slated to start early next month, according to the release.

Knauer said the externally managed fund format is similar to CFO's grantmaking for the Louis L. and Julia Dorothy Coover Charitable Foundation. Commerce Trust Co. manages the Coover Charitable Foundation’s investment activity.