Re: Looking for Peter Arthur Katz born 1943
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In reply to:
Looking for Peter Arthur Katz born 1943
Sean Hennessy 7/07/03
this may be the peter you are looking for, i was looking for information about the foundation and saw your inquiry.
Twenty-six years ago Peter Katz relocated his family business from New York to Newnan. Two years ago the family relocated its charitable foundation to Atlanta.
With a gift of $100,000 to Camp Twin Lakes, the Abraham J. and Phyllis Katz Foundation has begun what it expects to be the start of a large campaign of local giving.
The foundation has assets of $13 million, but Peter Katz, a trustee whose parents gave their name to the foundation when they created it in 1994, said he expects that number to more than quadruple soon, once the estate of his late father, Abraham, passes through probate.
It will become one of the area's largest family foundations once it receives that infusion. By comparison, The Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation had assets of $23.9 million as of Dec. 31, although it operates differently from many foundations, which give out a small percentage of their assets each year. The Blank foundation approved $23.3 million in new grants last year.
In 2005, the last year for which documents are available, the Katz foundation paid out $369,753 in gifts.
Peter Katz wants to increase the foundation's profile locally.
"We want to give more to local charities and get the word out as to who we are," Katz said. "I want other people to solicit for donations, not that we'll approve them all, but for people to know there's a resource out there for the possibility of some kind of grant."
When Peter Katz's parents started the foundation its mission was to serve music and medical research.
Now Katz is expanding that to "all good works."
The foundation has large-scale projects like a cord blood center in Cleveland to which it has pledged $6 million over three years. Listening to 790 The Zone's first "radiothon" for Camp Twin Lakes last year, Katz was moved to start donating in a new direction.
In deciding where to donate, Katz, 64, said he read reports about various illnesses and the research being done to try to cure them.
"Then you've got the other side: unfortunate kids who haven't been able to get help with their diseases that they've acquired."
Katz is president of Kason Industries Inc., which manufactures refrigeration equipment for commercial uses. Katz said almost 30 years ago the family business, founded in 1926, conducted a national search to find a relocation site, as "some of our costs of running the business in New York were getting out of hand."
They chose a site in Shenandoah, near Newnan, because of its proximity to the Atlanta airport, as company executives often travel for business.
The foundation moved here in October 2005. About a year later, Katz's father, Abraham, passed away. The estate is in probate and while Peter Katz, the estate's executor, said no one is contesting it, he said he expects it to take a year to 18 months before it is freed because of its size and the amount of paperwork involved.
Katz said with the foundation's assets set to expand to such a degree, he and the other trustee, his brother Alex, are considering whether to hire someone to run it. Since the creation of the foundation, the Katz family has volunteered its time.
Katz said it makes donations only to projects that have no administrative costs. He said the foundation does not make general donations without knowing what the money is going for, nor does it give to projects such as general building funds. Instead, it does things like buy instruments for struggling musicians or pays their salaries for a concert. His mother was a concert pianist.
"We want to get the next classical artists discovered," he said. "We're not interested in building a wing of a building or having a plaque in the men's room."
As an avid sports fan, Katz said he followed 790's first radiothon last year.
Steak Shapiro, a 790 sportscaster, said the station had done charity work before, but "we hadn't wrapped our arms around anything as a company." He would see Doug Hertz, founder of United Distributors Inc., one of the station's largest clients, at Georgia Tech basketball games and Hertz suggested the station get involved in Camp Twin Lakes, of which Hertz is chairman.
The first radiothon raised $130,000. This year, Katz decided to do more than listen and his gift pushed 790's total to $309,000.
"We've had a lot of great days in the history of the company," Shapiro said. "But that was a great day."
Katz visited the Camp for the first time early in July. He said he plans to continue to give and to be active with the camp.
"We are interested in getting a seat on the board and actively participating," Katz said of his interests. "The local [charities] are the ones we want to be active in. We don't want to control them, but we want to do more than send a check."
Reach Manasso at [email protected].