The Bingham Stone Award is named in recognition of the founders of San Diego Social Venture Partners, Darcy Bingham and Carrie Stone. Each year, a Partner is given the Bingham Stone Award to honor outstanding leadership skills, commitment and “no BS” attitude. Each recipient exemplifies our goal of developing engaged philanthropists who are accelerating social change in the community.
Working for Bill Gates in Seattle in 1997, Aaron Contorer could not help but notice Gates’ benevolence as a philanthropist. After cashing in some Microsoft stock options, Aaron saw some successful colleagues follow Gates’ lead by doing good in their communities. Aaron felt a moral responsibility to share his good fortune with his community. He was introduced to the SVP group in Seattle but chose instead to pursue philanthropic causes as an individual and by starting a family foundation.
When Aaron moved to San Diego in 2004 to start a company, he recognized that his real passion was for giving something back to society while continuing to grow as an individual, surrounded by great people. That’s exactly what SDSVP offered him.
Aaron and several other Partners created SDSVP’s Environment Accelerator Fund (EAF). The team met with leaders in the nonprofit, business, academic, military, and philanthropic communities and identified a need to address issues concerning San Diego’s future growth and development resulting in the creation of Equinox Center. Aaron is now chair of Equinox and believes that working with SDSVP partners to create Equinox Center has been one of the most gratifying experiences of his career.
Aaron was awarded the 2008 BS Award due to his significant contributions to SDSVP’s Board of Directors and Executive Committee also serving on the Investment Working Group and Communication Working Group while launching the EAF. The commitment to create a start-up, personally commit major funds, reach out across various stakeholders groups to conduct research, enroll up to 20 SDSVP partners, and remain committed to building SDSVP is an amazing accomplishment! Thanks, Aaron, for all you do for SDSVP and the community!
Past Bingham Stone Award Recipients:
2007 Diane Rosenberg
2006 Richard Bockoff
2005 Dale Stein
2004 Alan Sorkin
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