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Glaucoma Research Foundation Announces First Annual "Speeding The Cure. Spreading The Word" Benefit 1/24/07
SF-Based Foundation’s Benefit to Include Prestigious Catalyst Award Honors and Unveiling of Latest Glaucoma Research Breakthroughs by Field’s Brightest Young Scientists
SAN FRANCISCO, CA (January 11th, 2007) — San Francisco-based Glaucoma Research Foundation (GRF) is pleased to announce its first annual “Speeding the Cure. Spreading the Word” benefit, at 5:00 PM Wednesday, January 24th at The Westin St. Francis Hotel, 335 Powell Street, San Francisco. Highlighting GRF’s benefit will be the presentation of the third annual Catalyst Award to Houston geologist and philanthropist F. T. “Ted” Barr by the Silicon Valley entrepreneur who inspired the award, Steven Kirsch. Approximately 260 people are expected to attend with all proceeds benefiting GRF, the nation’s oldest foundation dedicated to speeding the discovery of a cure for glaucoma and to providing educational information. Tickets are $250; tables $2,500, $3,500, $5,000, $10,000 and $25,000. January is National Glaucoma Awareness Month.
“Speeding the Cure. Spreading the Word” event co-chairs are Piedmont resident H. Allen Bouch, managing director of Citigroup Global Markets, and San Ramon resident Gena Harper, senior vice president, investments at SmithBarney Berkeley. Producing Sponsors ($25,000 level) are Citigroup and Deirdre Porter and Bradford Hall; Porter is GRF’s board chair and is executive vice president and portfolio manager at the firm Wentworth, Hauser & Violich.
Amidst a classic floral and event décor created by Woodside’s Andi Mallinckrodt Events and Floral Design, the evening will commence at 5:00 PM with presentations on glaucoma research breakthroughs by some of the field’s brightest young scientists who serve as principal investigators for GRF’s Catalyst for a Cure (CFC) research consortium. They include: David Calkins, Ph.D., Vanderbilt; Philip Horner, Ph.D., University of Washington; Nicholas Marsh-Armstrong, Ph.D., Johns Hopkins; and Monica Vetter, Ph.D., University of Utah. A reception with the scientists follows at 6:00 PM, with dinner and the Catalyst Award Presentation at 7:00 PM.
Remarked Porter, “GRF was founded in the spirit of innovation and discovery and the Catalyst Award is our highest honor, presented for exemplary leadership in sustaining cutting-edge research. Following the impressive results of our CFC research consortium nearly three years ago, we embarked on a $7.5 million capital campaign that concludes this June, 2007. Board member Ted Barr’s generous $1 million gift anchored this campaign, inspired the board to increase its giving by over 200%, and has enabled our CFC researchers to make the discoveries now being heralded in prestigious peer journals.”
The first Catalyst Award was presented to Steve and Michele Kirsch in December 2004, to acknowledge the Kirsch Foundation’s role in co-conceiving the CFC idea, co-funding with GRF the start-up phase for the CFC, and participating in the recruitment of the team of principal investigator scientists. Importantly, CFC broke with “old school” traditions with two key innovations: recognizing that the ophthalmic approach to glaucoma was well represented, CFC chose instead to reach into the burgeoning promise of the neurosciences and genetics for its investigators; and rather than have individual scientists work in anonymous isolation, all four laboratories would work together in real-time collaboration. Ultimately, laboratories at Johns Hopkins, University of Utah, University of Washington and Vanderbilt were brought together, and the CFC was launched.
Event Host Committee members include: GRF’s immediate past Chair Dennis and Charlot Singleton (Woodside); Board Vice Chair Timothy and Germaine Dwyer (Woodside); Daly Foundation Executive Director June Behrendt (San Francisco); Art and Sharon Takahara (Mountain View); Silicon Valley developer Lydia and John Vidovich; Cleopatra Vaughns (Oakland); Michael L. Penn Sr. (San Francisco); San Francisco Foundation Rotary Club President Lisa Moscaret-Burr and co-founder of Burr, Pilger & Mayer, Curtis Burr; GRF co-founders H. Dunbar Hoskins Jr., M.D. and John Hetherington, M.D. (both of Tiburon); GRF President & CEO Thomas and Wallace Brunner (Los Altos Hills); Cynthia and Frederick Brinkmann (Palo Alto); Carl Zeiss MediTec President and CEO Jim and Amy Taylor (Tiburon); Guide Dogs for the Blind President and CEO Robert Philips; and Linda Linck (Lafayette), who arranged for the Diablo Valley Chapter of Delta Gammas to volunteer for the evening.
“Glaucoma is the leading cause of preventable blindness in America,” reports GRF President and CEO Thomas M. Brunner. “There is an epidemic of blindness looming if we can’t get in front of this silent thief of sight. Everyone—from infants to adults—is vulnerable, with diverse populations including African-Americans and Hispanic/Latinos at highest risk.”
Established in 1978 and based in San Francisco, the Glaucoma Research Foundation is the nation’s oldest foundation dedicated to protecting the sight and independence of people with glaucoma through research and education, and ultimately, to finding the cure. In its research initiatives, in addition to the CFC, GRF annually awards one-year Pilot Project grants to fund initial studies that address an especially novel idea or determine the feasibility of a larger-scale project. Education resources offer several publications including Understanding and Living with Glaucoma, widely regarded as the definitive introductory resource for newly diagnosed patients, now in its 14th printing and also available in Spanish. Outreach activities include the Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) Glaucoma Awareness Initiative targeting the 420,000 students of the 100-plus campuses of the HBCUs nationally. GRF’s website, www.glaucoma.org, is the number one search engine choice for “glaucoma,” attracting 500,000 unique visitors annually and serving as a national model of internet accessibility for the vision impaired. For information on the event or GRF, please contact Craig Palmer, 415.986.3162, cpalmer@glaucoma.org.