More than a century after a railroad baron’s daughter willed her family’s Victorian mansion to the borough, Jim Thorpe is taking steps to ensure the landmark never runs short of money to sustain it.

Borough Council heard a proposal Thursday from the Carbon County Community Foundation to establish a formal endowment fund for the Asa Packer Mansion, a mechanism that would invest donated dollars, generate annual distributions for the property’s upkeep and, if council chooses, permanently lock away the principal so no future governing body could spend it down.

Sharon Alexander, president of the foundation, walked council through the framework during the borough’s monthly workshop session. Under the proposal, the foundation would hold and manage the fund’s assets under its nonprofit umbrella, handle all administrative functions and charge a 2% annual fee. The fund would need to reach a minimum balance of $2,500 before distributions could begin.

“We would be investing those dollars on the borough’s behalf,” Alexander said. “The earnings would be distributed annually to support the mansion and its preservation.”

On the question of what distribution rate to recommend, Alexander was specific.

“What I’m recommending is you don’t pull more than a 4.25% distribution annually,” she said. “That protects the principal and allows the fund to grow over time.”

The structure, she said, can be made as permanent as the borough wants it to be.

Council President Connor Rodgers pressed on that point, asking whether future councils could simply decide to pull the money out.

“The fund can be made permanent, meaning neither the borough nor future councils could spend down the principal,” Alexander said. “It would exist in perpetuity.”

The Asa Packer Mansion, completed in 1861 for railroad and coal magnate Asa Packer — founder of Lehigh University and a driving force behind the Lehigh Valley Railroad — has been borough property since 1912, when Packer’s daughter, Mary Packer Cummings, willed the home and all its original contents to what was then the Borough of Mauch Chunk as a memorial to her father. The borough sealed the house for 44 years before it opened as a museum in 1956. The mansion was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1985.

Guided tours run from April through October with tours also usually taking place over Olde Time Christmas.

The proposal is on the action agenda for the borough’s regular council session Thursday, when a formal partnership agreement with the Carbon County Community Foundation is expected to come to a vote.