If you know me, you know that I have a weird obsession with bathrooms.  It goes back a long time and definitely has some strange psychologic underpinnings that I’m sure Dr. Freud would have fun discussing.  I don’t fight it – I just roll with it.

Several years ago, I had a discussion with Heidi Roizen about her failed attempt to get her name on a bathroom at Stanford during their fundraising drive for a new building on campus.  The rejection came with the admonishment that it wasn’t an appropriate thing to do.  I laughed and told Heidi – "no problem – I’m sure I can get one at MIT in no time – they are more flexible in their thinking about what is appropriate."  Boy was I wrong – I’ve written about the story before on this blog if you are interested.   The bottom line is the request apparently went around the system before being crushed by the bureaucracy somewhere at MIT.  Their loss.

No such challenge at CU Boulder.  I wrote about the immediate response of ATLAS’s director John Bennett to my Stanford / MIT bathroom story.  Following is the result a few months later.

That’s me standing in the doorway of the second floor men’s room at ATLAS next to my plaque which says "“The Best Ideas Often Come At Inconvenient Times – Don’t Ever Close Your Mind To Them.”

John – nicely done.  The Boulder Daily Camera interviewed me yesterday and wrote a fun story about it, including the punch line from John that ATLAS has seven other bathrooms that have the potential to be named. 

MIT – that could have been your money! 

Amy and I are proud to announce that we’ve completed the fundraising for Boulder Building New Orleans.  Our goal was to raise $50,000 to fund a high quality / low cost house in New Orleans for someone displaced by Hurricane Katrina.  Due to the generosity of many of our friends in Boulder (and several from outside Boulder), we’ve accomplished this goal.  The Community Foundation Serving Boulder County was instrumental in helping us manage this effort.  Thanks to everyone involved!  Following is the press release that the Community Foundation issued last month.

Boulder Building New Orleans

Local giving builds a home for a New Orleans family

BOULDER COUNTY (November 12, 2007) – A little over a year ago Amy Batchelor and Brad Feld had a discussion about how they could directly contribute to rebuilding New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.  They had made financial contributions and underwritten several trips of students to the city, but Batchelor and Feld were looking for something tangible to do. A close friend and nationally known architect, Coleman Coker, told the couple of a project he was working on with his Tulane architect students building contemporary, sustainable, affordable housing in New Orleans.

“Coleman connected us with the folks at the Neighborhood Housing Services of New Orleans (NHS), a New Orleans based non-profit that helps first time home buyers,” said Feld. “After a little study, we determined that Coleman and his students could provide a high quality house for a family for a $100,000. As a result, we put together a program, in conjunction with The Community Foundation, that we call Boulder Building New Orleans (BBNO). Our goal was to raise half of the purchase price through donations and then have the family take out a mortgage for the other half. With the contributions of others in the Boulder area, we have raised our $50,000 goal.  Amy and I are covering all administrative costs of the program so 100% of the donations are going toward the house.”

Architects are currently finishing construction drawings of the “Boulder House” and are on schedule to break ground the first of the year. NHS is providing the line of credit to finance the construction.

Coleman’s students at Tulane University and NHS are building multiple houses with the help of donors like those here in the Boulder area.

“We hope the BBNO house will inspire other cities to build a house just like ours. Just think of what New Orleans would look like if every city builds just one house,” said Feld.

Donations to the Boulder Building New Orleans Fund through The Community Foundation are 100% tax deductible.

The Community Foundation exists to improve the quality of life in Boulder County, now and forever, and to build a culture of giving. The Foundation connects the resources of local donors with non-profit organizations to facilitate philanthropy in meaningful and useful ways, for good and forever. www.commfound.org

I’d like to welcome and thank my friends at Gold Systems for joining The Entrepreneurs Foundation of Colorado.

Terry Gold – the co-founder of Gold Systems – was one of the first entrepreneurs that I met in early 1996 shortly after Amy and I moved to Boulder.  At the time Gold Systems was about 15 people.  Terry, his partner Jim, and I went for plenty of long walks in 1996 and 1997 as they tried to navigate the waters of growing a young business.  As I got to know Terry better, he came to epitomize the ideal of a thoughtful and generous entrepreneur and person.

Through Mobius, I invested in Gold Systems in 2000.  Terry and his team grew quickly after the investment but then had to struggle with the telecommunications downturn in 2002.  Due to Terry and his team’s perseverance, they survived and have gone on to build a solid member of the Boulder tech community.

I’m proud of what Terry and the team at Gold Systems have accomplished.  I’m very pleased that have chosen to become a member of the Entrepreneurs Foundation of Colorado.  Thanks Gold Systems.

A little over a year ago Amy and I had a discussion about how we could directly contribute to rebuilding New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.  We have made financial contributions and underwritten several trips of students to the city, but we were looking for something tangible to do.

A close friend and nationally known architect – Coleman Coker of buildingstudio – told us of a project he was working on with his colleague Jonathan Tate to build high quality, low cost housing in New Orleans.  He connected us with the folks at the Neighborhood Housing Services of New Orleans a New Orleans based non-profit that helps first time home buyers.

After a little study, we determined that for $50,000 we could provide a high quality house for a family based on Coleman’s design (approximately 900 sq. ft.)

As a result, we’ve put together a program in conjunction with the Community Foundation Serving Boulder Country that we call Boulder Building New Orleans.

To date, we have raised a little over $40,000.  Amy and I are covering all administrative costs of the program so 100% of the donations are going toward the house.  On the second anniversary of the land fall of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, Amy and I thought we’d put together a final push to get the $50,000 raised for this project.

If you are inclined, please consider making a donation to Boulder Building New Orleans.  You don’t need to be from Boulder to do this – you’ll be part of helping our extended community provide a new house for a family in New Orleans.  Any amount helps – electronic donations can be made in amounts as little as $10.  While it might not seem like a lot, it’ll be life changing for the folks that end up living in the house.

Blue Mountain Arts has been a fixture in the Boulder community for the past 35 years.  It was started by the parents of my friend Jared Polis (Susan Polis Schutz and Stephen Schutz) who are all dynamite people.

For Blue Mountain Arts’ 35^th anniversary, they’ve given a wonderful gift to Boulder.  Rather than having a big party and spending a bunch of money, they’ve given each of their 100 employees a share of $200,000 to donate to their favorite charities.

Jared and I have been involved in a number of philanthropic efforts in the Boulder community, including activity around The Community Foundation Serving Boulder County, Social Venture Partners, and most recently the Entrepreneurs Foundation of Colorado.  I’m really proud of the Schutz’s and all the folks at Blue Mountain Arts for actively engaging in local philanthropy in such an impactful and visible way.

Amy just blogged about her trip last week to New Orleans.  Neither of us had been there since Hurricane Katrina.  She went as an attendee at a conference organized by the Women Donors Network called Revitalizing Democracy: What We Can Learn from Katrina. 

We were together in Boulder over the weekend and had plenty of time to talk about her experience during the few days she was in New Orleans.  Her post summarizes her thoughts well and end with some concrete suggestions about what she (we) are going to do.

Bill Erickson sent me a link to a TUAW article on Introducing Nike + Group Goals.  Nike has a super cool Nike + iPod Sport Kit (which I’ve bought and have sitting on my desk – I guess I need to get my act together and actually try it).  Now – they are donating $1 to a cause for every mile that you run and record on their website.  The Lance Armstrong Foundation is up first – Nike is donating up to $50,000 for 50,000 miles contributed (he’s got $24,469.28 contributed at this point.)  The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society are in the mix as is a showdown between the Northside and Southside of Chicago.  Awesomely cool stuff.

Amy and I have been supporters of KidsTek for the past several years, even since we were introduced to it by Pat Maley when he was the CEO of Dante Group (Mobius was an investor / I was on the board.)  Amy and I are big supporters of education – especially in Colorado – and when Pat described the KidsTek mission to me, it was a no-brainer.

KidsTek works closely with Colorado youth (ages K-12) service providers in underserved communities to provide the keys to successful technology education, including:

• Technical Resources: The development and ongoing maintenance and supervision of technology centers.
• Curriculum: A project-based educational model for KidsTek Partners to utilize and build upon.
• Supervision: A Technology Program Coordinator to establish, monitor & assess KidsTek Programs and train instructors.
• Mentoring: Engaging volunteers from the technology community in a meaningful partnership
• Assessment: Ongoing outcomes-based measurement to assess the long-term impact on kids.

On October 12th, from 6:30pm to 10pm at The Denver Aquarium, KidsTek will be having their 6th Annual Tech Leader’s Dinner.  In addition to being a super fun event with plenty of unique stuff (for example, CEOs of the companies that are the table hosts actually serve dinner and compete for the “best waiter award), KidsTek will be honoring Amy and I with this years “Phil Award” which is given to leaders in the technology industry who have made a difference through philanthropy.

Come join us, have some fun, and help support a great organization.

I’ve strongly encouraged my portfolio companies to incorporate “philanthropic activities” into their businesses early in their life.  I don’t advocate any particular focus – I simply encourage founders and leadership teams to think about what they can do to make a difference. 

Historically, most large public companies have some amount of philanthropic focus, but this is often missing early in the life a company.  I’m proud of a number of my portfolio companies that have incorporate philanthropic programs into their businesses early, including Rally Software’s 1% Fund, StillSecure’s 1% of Revenues to Lance Armstrong Foundation, and NewsGator’s 3% of Revenues to Hurricane Katrina Relief Efforts.

Last week Return Path announced that they have developed a broad philanthropic partnership with the Accelerated Cure Project for Multiple Sclerosis.  The relationship originated when a former Return Path employee was diagnosed with MS.  I knew that Art Mellor – a long time colleague from Boston who is a successful entrepreneur – also had MS and had started the Accelerated Cure Project with a goal of curing MS by determining its causes.  I connected the various folks up, including Matt Blumberg, the CEO of Return Path.

I watched from the sidelines as the relationship between the two organizations developed.  This is one of my greatest pleasures in business – making the initial connection and watching capable, motivated, and competent people figure out how to work together.  In this case, it has worked splendidly for all parties as Return Path is demonstrating that it can do good by doing well.

Some day MS will be cured – there’s no doubt in my mind that the work Art and his crew are doing will contribute significantly to this.  The folks at Return Path should be proud today about their contribution to this cause.

My friends Ben Neumann and Chris Ueland have a clever idea for helping out Hurricane Katrina victims called MillionDollarHelpPage.  They’ve taken the idea that Alex Tew came up for MillionDollarHomePage and repurposed it to be a Katrina fundraiser with the goal of raising $1 million.