Please note: As part of #GivingTuesday, the Northwest Minnesota Foundation is posting a few articles that already appeared in print, in various issues of our Resource newsletter. The following article ran in our October 2021 issue, which can be seen in its entirety here: https://issuu.com/nmfcommunications/docs/october_2021_resource_final
‘We’re from here so that’s where we want to help’
Dick Hebert moves family foundation to NMF to further local impact
As the oldest of seven kids in a farming family outside Argyle, Richard “Dick” Hebert didn’t grow up with excesses. Still, he was raised by parents in a community that shared a giving spirit.
“Some people give time; some people give money. It’s just giving in different ways,” said Dick, reflecting back on rural life in the years following the Depression. “If you gave your neighbor a cup of sugar, that was a big deal because you didn’t have a cup of sugar to give in the first place. If you gave the shirt off your back, that was a big deal.”
Decades later, Dick’s giving has evolved into impactful philanthropy locally and in the region. In 1987, he co-founded D&D Commodities Ltd., which packages caged and outdoor pet food. The success of his business, which Dick sold this past summer, enabled the funding of several university scholarship endowments as well as the establishment of a family foundation in 2011 at a North Dakota-based bank.
In recent years, as his estate-planning continued, Dick began to wonder how that bank was going to ensure his goals and priorities for the foundation would be followed.
“They’re not the bank they were 30 years ago; they’re a $3 billion or $4 billion bank, not the $100 million bank like they used to be, and the people I know, they’re all getting to be old like me so they’re not going to be around,” said Dick, who wondered whether future hires would be able to fulfill his wishes if they hadn’t ever met or conversed with him.
This year, Dick and his wife, Audrey, made the decision to move the Dick Hebert Family Foundation to the Northwest Minnesota Foundation. He was not unfamiliar with NMF: D&D obtained a $100,000 loan from NMF in the late 1980s, paid it back, and then obtained a $200,000 loan a few years later when the business was poised to expand. Because of these business deals, Dick received NMF’s Resource newsletter regularly over the years and took an increasing interest in stories highlighting donors who made lasting impacts through giving in their communities.
“The Northwest Minnesota Foundation is committed to this 12-county region that I’m interested in – specifically maybe two or three of those counties – and that is why I’m moving everything here,” Dick said. “I was never interested in giving money to anywhere else, and we’re still kind of like that. … It’s all local. We’re from here so that’s where we want to help. It’s not that we don’t care about other places, but we’ve lived here all our lives. We’re fourth-generation farmers.”
The farming days are long past – Dick’s father sold what remained of their land in 1987 – but agriculture is the foundation upon which Dick’s success was built.
Dawn Ganje, Director for Community Philanthropy, said the residents of Marshall and Kittson counties have long been strong supporters of community philanthropy and the Heberts’s gifts will further that local impact in long-lasting, meaningful ways.
“The legacy the Heberts are leaving, through their gifting, and for their grandchildren, it’s very inspiring,” said Dawn, who has been working with Dick and Audrey toward accomplishing this step the last two years. “Their gifts will provide lasting support for future generations yet to come in our local communities.”
For years, Dick and his late wife, Carole, donated to various causes and efforts anonymously until they were encouraged by their advisers to be more open and public about their support.
“My accountant said, ‘You have to open up now because you’re giving more, and people need to know that. Your donations will encourage other people to donate,’” Dick recalled.
Audrey shared a story illustrating this. Not only does the couple make large-scale contributions to a variety of educational and community efforts, but they also embrace smaller actions that can make a personal impact, such as leaving generous tips at restaurants and anonymously paying for veterans’ meals. A veteran friend had joined them for lunch one afternoon when they did the latter and he was struck by their generosity. Later, he called them and proclaimed, “I pulled a Dick and Audrey!” He had encountered a veteran friend and took him for a ride and bought him lunch.
“Just doing something, and letting someone see it can spark that interest. All of a sudden, it snowballs,” Audrey said. “It doesn’t have to be huge, it can just be a random act of kindness.”
