Documents show Gannett Foundation's new gifts, but controversial executive donor Dubow missing

The Gannett Foundation's newest annual report shows it gave nearly $300,000 to charities hand-picked by top current and former Gannett executives -- once again, including many grants to non-profits far from where the company does business.

But the 15 executives who earmarked gifts in 2008 -- the latest year available -- are also noteworthy for someone whose name doesn't appear on the list: Chairman and CEO Craig Dubow.

Controversially in past years, Dubow (left) directed at least $40,000 to a college scholarship fund honoring himself and his wife, a fund that's virtually off-limits to Gannett employees and their children. Under pressure, Dubow conceded last year that the money had gone to the Craig A. and Denise W. Dubow Scholarship Fund at Western Carolina University in Cullowhee, N.C.

Dubow's name does not appear in the foundation's just-released 2008 annual report to the Internal Revenue Service. I received a copy of the report yesterday after requesting one from the foundation under federal open-records regulations; it was filed with the IRS late last year. The report for 2009 likely won't be filed for many months to come.

The grants in 2008 and prior years were made by Gannett's charitable arm under a special benefit program available only to current and former members of the Gannett Management Committee, a group comprising GCI's highest-paid executives responsible for overall company operations.

The donations are entirely legal, as they seem to have all gone to non-profit groups. But they've also been controversial because so many went to charities far from Gannett communities, and were made when the same executives were demanding belt-tightening across Gannett, including thousands of layoffs and cuts in retirement benefits.

A lead architect of those layoffs, Chief Financial Officer Gracia Martore, is one of the 15 current and former executives who earmarked a combined $288,000 in 2008, according to the IRS document. Each executive could direct up to $20,000. Martore piped $15,000 to her alma mater, Wellesley College near Boston; Gannett owns no newspapers or TV stations near there. That grant brought to $75,000 the total donations she has sent to Wellesley since 2004, public IRS documents show. (Noteworthy grants in 2007.)

The grants are different from the better-known GannettMatch program, where the foundation matches dollar-for-dollar employee donations of $50 to a maximum $10,000 per year to non-profits. Under the executive grant-making program, the executives are not required to give any money of their own. Moreover, as in the case of the Dubow scholarship fund, the gifts don't always publicly credit the foundation or the Gannett company. The foundation's assets comprise investments derived from the occasional sale of Gannett newspapers.

To be sure, the executive-led grants didn't all go far afield. For example, U.S. newspaper division president Bob Dickey directed $10,000 to the Angel View Crippled Children's Foundation. That charity is in Desert Hot Springs, Calif., about 11 miles from Palm Springs, where Gannett owns The Desert Sun newspaper. Dickey became eligible for the benefit for the first time in 2008, when he was promoted to the Gannett Management Committee.

Earlier: As layoffs near, charity that doesn't begin at home

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