Founders’ Vision Lives On at Milan Gala

It wasn’t Milan, Italy, but the 2026 Olympics-themed Gala, at the Morris J. Lawrence Building in Ypsilanti brought attendees together in pursuit of a higher purpose.

During an evening of dining, dancing and philanthropy, Greater Milan Area Community Fund Chair David Snyder reflected on the endowment’s beginning on May 19, 2005, with just $100. The GMACF now oversees 30 funds and $5 million in assets.

“Every one of those funds is focused on making life in Milan the best possible experience,” Snyder said, “through funding community improvements, commitments to Milan kids, through … allowing people of this community the opportunity to pool their resources to address local needs.”

In the past year alone, they launched a skilled trades scholarship, began work on London Township’s first playground, supported stabilization of the Community House and hired the first Milan affiliate Maxine Tewsley. The GMACF also awarded $125,000 in micro-grants and scholarships in 2025, according to Valerie Orr, executive director of the Community Foundation of Monroe County, which administers the GMACF. 

The evening marked the first gala since the 2025 passing of founder Isabelle Schultz. Fellow founders Don Harkness and Millard Phillips both died in 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic.

In their honor, the board pledged $10,000 annually for three years to each of the three funds the founders established, supporting the Milan library, the greater Milan community, and Milan students. Many attendees Saturday night also pledged additional donations to support those funds.

Snyder recognized family members of each of the founders who were in attendance, while also honoring the leaders who have continued their legacy.

Harkness, a quiet businessman who co-founded the Milan-Chamber, had great empathy from a childhood experience with polio, and served as the first secretary for the GMACF, Snyder said. He created the Donald E. Harkness Endowment Fund, to benefit his community.

Phillips, the town jeweler and Milan’s last village president and first mayor in the 1960s, served on the library board for 16 years and created the Millard and Marie Phillips Fund to benefit the public library.

Schultz, a journalist, and GMACF’s first president, founded Milan Children’s Preschool and created the Duane and Isabelle Schultz Milan Area Schools Alumni Scholarship Fund.

Snyder said the event was the best attended since COVID, with 267 tickets sold.