At a city committee meeting this week, Kathleen Woit of the Madison Community Foundation mentioned the difficulty of making plans not knowing if or how much people will leave in their wills. She said estate planners and lawyers routinely tell the foundation it can expect to get money, but not how much or from whom.
Committee member Jim Garner asked whether the foundation ever calls prospective donors to delicately ask about legacy donations. Replied Woit, "The joke is that when someone tells you you're in their will, they will [live to] be 125 years old."
Garner's comeback: "You're in my will."
