Kathy Cole founded West Wind Consulting Strategies in Fund Raising LLC in July of 2002 following a nineteen-year career in fundraising and institutional advancement. She worked with a wide range of clients in higher education, health, the arts, social services, and animal welfare and successfully guided her clients through major campaigns, including several “first-ever” capital campaigns, the creation of brand new fundraising programs, and the strategic restructuring of underperforming programs.
She was an active member of the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP) for over twenty years, having served as a member of the Board of Directors in both the Finger Lakes and Central New York chapters. She achieved and had maintained Certified Fund Raising Executive (CFRE) status through AFP since 1994. Kathy was awarded the Outstanding Professional Achievement Award by AFP in 2013.
Kathy’s approach to her work helped clients create an inclusive, high-energy fundraising program that was both robust and sustainable. Our firm continues to be referred by many of the clients she worked with years ago. Her caring, strategy, and commitment to her clients was a hallmark of her work and established our firm’s reputation. Our list of clients gives you some sense of the people, organizations, and volunteers whose lives were touched by her work over the years.
Kathy passed away following a cancer diagnosis in 2019, but her teaching, values, and work live on through the firm today, and through all those she worked with over the last 18 years.