Giving it away: Haim Saban joins Eli Broad in making large donations.

It must be great to be like Eli.

Eli Broad, that is -- multi-billionaire, arts patron and the richest man in Los Angeles, who has long been the top dog in the local philanthropic community.

And now the point is being pressed just a bit further. In just the last month, he has made pledges of $100 million and $60 million for a Massachusetts biomedical research institute and a new building at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. That's on top of the $20 million donation for an arts center at UCLA.

It's a role that hasn't gone unnoticed -- by non-profits or by his peers.

Over the course of the last year, three other local billionaires have made multimillion dollar contributions to non-profit organizations.

Why the rush to fund now?

One reason appears to be the stepped-up efforts of non-profits that have targeted the super-wealthy as smaller individual and corporate donors retrenched during the recession.

But another is that billionaires can simply afford to give away vast sums -- and aren't past a little one-upmanship.

"These people by their nature are competitive," Len Brisco, a private wealth advisor at Merrill Lynch's private wealth center in L.A. "If one donates $100 million, there's a competitive spirit that might incense others to donate, too.

"At the billion-dollar level you don't need the money anymore," he said. "But the competitive spirit is still in you. And the status you achieve as a result of a major donation is an important motivator."

The latest example came on June 23, when media mogul Haim Saban announced his largest-ever donation, a commitment of $100 million to various health and education entities, including Childrens Hospital Los Angeles.

In pledging the money, Saban publicly called on wealthier members of the entertainment industry to be less stingy when it came to spreading their wealth. He did not name names, but over the years Hollywood moguls have been called to task for not giving more.

"This is a call to action," he told the Los Angeles Times. "You have some people here who are multi-billionaires who can make a difference in this community and they don't.

Stepping up

Besides Saban, whose net worth is estimated by the Business Journal at $1.6 billion, MiniMed founder Alfred Mann last year committed $530 million of his $1.1 billion net worth to several charities -- including biomedical research institutes at the University of California Los Angeles and the University of Southern California.

DreamWorks SKG co-founder David Geffen, whose net worth is estimated at $3.4 billion, made his largest donation to date with a $200 million gift to UCLA School of Medicine.

Broad, former chairman of both KB Home and SunAmerica, lauded those efforts, saying that donations from other billionaires are long overdue in L.A.

"People are beginning to realize they have to be leaders," he said. "In making these gifts, all three of them and myself are stepping forward to others."

But don't discount the ego boost that comes with a nine-digit contribution, said David Gold, founder of 99 Cents Only Stores Inc., whose own net worth has been estimated by the Business Journal at $950 million.

"The best donors give anonymously," Gold said. "It's an ego thing, not to give anonymously."

One factor that doesn't appear at play is taxes.

"I'm not even sure it's as much tax motivated anymore as much as these individuals really want to save programs and organizations from being extinct," said Carol Savoie, director of private client advisory services at Deloitte & Touche.

The recent spate of mega-donations comes at a time when non-profit development officers are hounding billionaires with sales pitches about their own economic duress, said Andy Katzenstein, a partner at law firm KMZ Rosenman who represents several of L.A.'s billionaires in their charitable giving.

But non-profit groups say it's more than a pitch. Peter Manzo, executive director at the Center for Non-Profit Management in L.A., said the city's wealthier contributors, who typically give in the hundreds of thousands, held back their donations in the past year as their stock portfolios hit the skids. Meanwhile, he added, government money and corporate donors have dried up.

Increased reliance

Savoie, who sits on a number of non-profit boards, said the super wealthy are under pressure to support certain programs and services at large organizations.

She said the need is exacerbated because several non-profits added programs and services during the dot-com boom, relying on the contributions of a steady stream of newly rich entrepreneurs.

Most of the funding drop off, Savoie said, came from the charitable trusts that pledged anywhere from hundreds of thousands of dollars to $10 million or $20 million.

"They've got to rely on these larger donors because they're not getting it en masse like they used to," Savoie said. "Now, they've really got to push larger donors to make a commitment now."

The big question is who goes first?

"Eli Broad has established himself as the lead man in charity in this community," Katzenstein said. "There are others who aspire to that mantle."

Broad, 70, said he hopes the gifts keep on coming and noted that Saban, who did not return calls seeking comment, is setting an example by letting others know about his gift.

And even Broad acknowledges it's been great to be "the good guy."

"Maybe other people say, 'Gee, I want to do some of those things because I like the recognition Eli Broad has gotten,'" Broad said.