With a Legacy of Community-Led Systems Change, Program VP Karla Miller Is Retiring

Karla retires in spring 2025 after 23 years at the Foundation.

Program Vice President Karla Miller first walked through the door to the Foundation as a community liaison for its Connections program in 2002. Over the ensuing 22 years, she moved through multiple funding approaches and positions, advancing to program director and most recently to vice president. She has announced her intention to retire this coming spring.

We’ll miss her! But we’re also very grateful that she’s shared with us her leadership, her insights, and her deep commitment to community and to systems change.

President and CEO Kevin Walker says, “I am delighted for Karla that she is ready to write the next chapter of her life’s adventure story! I find it hard to imagine the Foundation without Karla, who brings so much experience, skill, and heart to our work together. Karla has done as much as anyone to shape what we do and how we do it, particularly during her decade-plus as the leader of our Program team.”

Community-led systems change is a throughline.

Coming to the Foundation from a background with a community action agency and as managing director for one of the country’s first community development financial institutions (CDFIs), Karla was familiar with the importance of building networks and spreading innovative ideas that allow communities to determine their own futures and thrive on their own terms. But it wasn’t until working for the Foundation that she recognized these concepts to be systems-change work.

She saw the fuller possibilities across our region for communities to change the systems that impact their daily lives instead of enduring change imposed from without. She made it her goal to try and open doors for changemakers so systems would give local communities what they need.

How these concepts show up in our current funding approach and have become embedded within the mindset of the Foundation will continue long after Karla retires. She says this gives her hope as she steps away.

“The approach will continue to evolve as the Foundation listens to and learns from its grantees. I’m encouraged by the Foundation’s dedication to look to grantee partners and communities to say, ‘Here’s what we need, and here’s how we need it.’”

Engaging with diverse communities has been a key part of Karla’s personal and professional journey.

Karla had plenty of experience with rural communities before joining the Foundation, and also had worked with some of our other priority communities: Native Americans, communities of color, immigrants, and refugees.

“The vast array of cultures I’ve had the opportunity to learn about and learn from while working for the Foundation is remarkable” says Karla. “I can’t imagine my life without those relationships.”

When asked who her most memorable grantees are, Karla chuckles and is quick to note, “That’s like asking who your favorite child is. Each of the grantees through the years has different meaning to me, and I have a unique connection with each of them. I am truly grateful for every grantee and what they are contributing to our world!”

Making “Connections” with community members.

The first program Karla was deeply involved with was our Connections program. She and her team searched for replicable models for community-based poverty-reduction efforts within our region. The Great Strides Awards were a key aspect of the program, recognizing communities that had taken important steps to reduce poverty long term. Because community members helped shape the awards, Karla began visiting and talking with community members within every state in the Foundation’s region.

She says, “What a unique experience to walk the same ground as the organizations we were funding, to listen to them firsthand. The opportunity was an important step in helping to shape me into who I am and how I approach funding today.”

Program-Related Investments stand the test of time and are a source of pride for Karla.

Since 2004, we’ve provided impact investments to nonprofits and companies that make change aligned with our mission, which complement our grantmaking to support prosperity in the communities we serve. Program-related investments (PRIs), one form of impact investing, prioritize social impact without expecting market-rate financial returns. Our original commitment to PRIs was $10 million. We’ve currently allocated $13 million to them. By 2030, we’ll increase that to $25 million.

Karla started making PRIs more than 20 years ago. She cites their ongoing impact within our priority communities, noting, “PRIs continue to have a strong impact today. They’re an amazing way for the Foundation to support organizations.”

Motivated by the potential of philanthropy.

The Foundation’s region is always changing, and we strive to change with it. One thing is constant, however: amazing people and communities.

“I have such fond memories of so many people and places—from my coworkers at the Foundation to my nonprofit colleagues to the grantees we support,” says Karla. “I will miss that the most. It’s what’s kept me grounded, what’s kept me steadfast through challenging times. There is so much potential to how funding can be shaped if we continue to listen to each other and to our grantees and keep learning and growing along with them.”

What’s next.

Karla will continue to lead her team until she retires in spring 2025. We’ll soon be launching a search for a new program VP (more is forthcoming later this month), and Karla looks forward to helping with the transition.

The Foundation’s funding approach, approved in late 2021, will not be changing. Current and prospective grantee partners can be confident that we are staying the course on our funding for racial, social, and economic justice and to pursuing it by listening to and learning from the communities we serve, as Karla and the Program team have been doing for these past two years.

“The Foundation is deeply committed to its grantees,” says Kevin. “Our funding approach, our impact investing strategy, and our mission itself have Karla’s fingerprints all over them, and the Foundation will continue to evolve in the direction she’s helped determine, long past the spring of 2025.”

Once Karla is retired, she plans to check off the things on her “deferred” list—riding a riverboat on the Mississippi, taking the Borealis train to Chicago, focusing on her artistic endeavors (her funky fiber hats are in high demand!), spending more time with her family, and more.

Join us! We plan to celebrate Karla with style.

In 2025, we’ll have a memorable shindig, and possibly other celebrations outside of St. Paul, to toast Karla and all she’s contributed to the Foundation and to our grantees. Stay tuned and sign up for our emails so you’ll be in the know on the details!