Southern Oregon
Donor Legacy: Preserving a Sense of Place
Place matters to Drs. Jennifer Wise and John Seidner. When it came time to trade their longtime medical practices in New Hampshire for new opportunities, Klamath Falls made the perfect fit.
“We looked for a place on the map that had the most green on it: Forest Service land, state-protected land, nature preserves,” John says. “What really drove us was a community that had a good community hospital system.”
Drs. John Seidner and Jennifer Wise
Since their 2019 move, the couple has worked as physicians at Sky Lakes Medical Center—Jennifer in internal medicine and John in emergency medicine. It’s work they do in a spirit of service: the same spirit that inspired them to dedicate their estate to make public lands, nature and history accessible to others.
“It is important to both of us that we feel we leave the world a better place than when we came into it,” John says. “We enjoy the outdoors and nature and wildlife, and we want others to be able to have that enjoyment in perpetuity.”
“The impact we can all make is felt greater if it is local. We’ve always lived in small communities, so we hold dear the impact we can make to a small sphere around us.”
Dr. Jennifer Wise
John and Jennifer began planning for testamentary giving in New Hampshire. Having no heirs, they decided in Oregon to split their estate between OCF and the New Hampshire Charitable Foundation. Today, they are reassured by having a charitable plan in place with two community foundations they trust.
“You might liken it to organ donation,” says John. “You check the box on your driver’s license, and then you trust that the systems set up are going to give to those most appropriate and in need.”