Q & A
CHRISTOPHER SIMONEAU
CHIEF DEVELOPMENT, MARKETING AND COMMUNICATIONS OFFICER,
LEE HEALTH FOUNDATION
Valued at $3.5 billion, Lee Health is among the largest economic drivers in Southwest Florida.
The private nonprofit health system staffs around 17,000 across its five hospitals, eight outpatient centers and various institutes, urgent care locations and wellness centers. It supports one of every 10 jobs in Lee County and represents two-thirds of the county’s total health care employment.
Lee Health relies on philanthropic support to keep its operations going and growing.
Christopher Simoneau is the chief development, marketing and communications officer for Lee Health Foundation, the health system’s fundraising arm that has raised more than half a billion dollars over three decades. He spoke with FLORIDA TREND about its fundraising trends, tactics for drumming up money, and goals for the future of Lee Health. This report has been edited for length and clarity.
FLORIDA TREND: Walk me through Lee Health Foundation’s fundraising over the years.
A: Lee Health Foundation was founded in 1995 to secure philanthropic support for the Lee Memorial Health System, which was a public entity at the time. It started off relatively slow. It really ramped up in the 2000s to prepare to build a new children’s hospital, which was about a $250-million effort. To make that feasible, the health system needed philanthropy to contribute about $100 million. We launched a fundraising campaign, secured a $20-million gift from Tom Golisano (the founder of Paychex), and ended up raising about $103 million. That campaign ended in 2017 with the opening of a brand new hospital (the Golisano Children’s Hospital in Fort Myers). Since then, we’ve raised money for both the children’s hospital and the support of children across the region. We’ve also done a lot of fundraising to build the Lee Health Cancer Institute, Heart Institute, Musculoskeletal Institute, and smaller programs around things like Parkinson’s disease and ALS.
FT: Last year, the Foundation raised $27 million, correct?
A: Yes. And this fiscal year, we’ll have raised $35 million. Over the last four or five years, we’ve really started to pick up speed. I think we average now between $25 million and $35 million in fundraising each year.
FT: Who are some of your biggest supporters?
A: The great thing about our program is we have donors from across the spectrum. For instance, Tom Golisano’s giving is over $30 million. We have people like Dick Schultz, the founder of Best Buy who lives in Naples and has been passionate about children’s services and cancer care. We have incredible support from organizations like the Southwest Florida Children’s Charities, which runs the Southwest Florida Wine and Food Fest. They’ve given us more than $27 million over the last 15 years. The Naples Wine Festival, which is one of the largest in the country, has given us about $6.5 million. We’ve been blessed to receive from local corporations like Arthrex, Chico’s and Hertz, who give because their employees live here and want great health care. That’s a good recruiting tool. We receive from small organizations, classrooms and schools who collect change or do toy drives. So, we run the gamut. You name it, we’ve received it.
FT: Do you have any advice for how to rally fundraising support?
A: First, be really good at what you do. People want to invest in a winner — and Lee Health is a winner. We win national awards on a regular basis. People look at that and know if anything happens to them or their family, Lee Health is a great place to go. The second thing is having big dreams. Lee Health has big dreams. Creating a children’s hospital out of scratch is a big dream. Building the Lee Health Heart Institute, competing with national players, is a big dream. We have a lot of big ideas about where we can take health care and how we can improve it. And then the third thing, I would say, is inspire people to get involved. Create events, do good marketing, tell good stories, and people will get engaged.
FT: What challenges is Lee Health Foundation facing?
A: We’re continually watching federal and state politics. The Big, Beautiful Bill, for instance, has some significant changes to Medicaid. Is that going to change the needs of our population served? Lee Health is a safety-net hospital, which means we take care of everyone regardless of their ability to pay. Seventy percent of our patients are supported by the government through either Medicare, Medicaid or Medicare Advantage. Anything that happens from a policy perspective has some significant effects on our business, including revenues.
FT: Going forward, what are your goals for fundraising?
A: Lee Health Fort Myers, which will probably open early 2028, is project No. 1. It is an $810-million campus that will have a hospital, ambulatory surgery center, medical office building, orthopedics institute and day care center. It may have a hotel or housing in the future, where people could stay after their procedures. That is a major project for us. We are also looking at spending around $1.8 billion in capital investments over the next five years alone, including expanding our heart, cancer and orthopedics institutes in Cape Coral. Last year, we converted from a public entity to a private not-for-profit, which enables us to go outside of Lee County. Geographic expansion is going to be our primary view.