Published on CBC News
By Wallis Snowdon, November 14TH, 2024
A 101-year-old Edmonton widow is in a legal battle with the Rotary Foundation Canada over which charities should benefit from her late husband’s $40-million estate.
Mary McEachern says the foundation has repeatedly blocked her efforts to honour her husband’s final wishes and redistribute his estate to various charities, not the Rotary alone.
Steve McEachern accumulated his wealth in his role as an investment advisor with Investors Group, where he worked for 65 years. A lifelong philanthropist, he served with a number of community boards and charities, including Rotary.
When he wrote his will, he entrusted his entire fortune to the Rotary foundation, with the exception of a trust fund to cover his wife’s living expenses. However, Mary McEachern said her husband of 74 years had a change of heart before his death at the age of 98 on Sept. 10, 2020.
My husband wanted this money to go to many, many deserving charities. He advised me of how important it was to him for me to do everything within my power to ensure that his true charitable-giving wishes are carried out. But Rotary wants it all, and they’re doing every delay tactic they could have done in the past four years to keep it theirs.
Mary McEachern
A senior Rotary official says the foundation wants to settle the Court of King’s Bench dispute but a lack of financial transparency has delayed negotiations. The same official says the family’s decision to take the case public in a “well-orchestrated media campaign” has unfairly maligned the organization.
We need to do the due diligence to make an informed decision and we do not have the information we need to make that informed decision.
Dean Rohrs, Rotary Foundation
