David and Leigh joined SDSVP in the summer of 2006 and jumped right in. David was elected to the SDSVP Board, served as Co-Chair of the Investment Working Group and created our first Discovery Team to research the issues facing the elderly in San Diego. Leigh brought her dynamic energy to the Social Chair position by adding a new flair to our ever growing parties and as well being instrumental in enhancing our Education Committee.
Leigh’s years of experience at Microsoft helped her to create a very successful executive coaching practice, and David, after working with McKenzie and Bain, has his own private investment firm. Their family consists of their five-year-old daughter, Mallory; David’s thirteen-year-old son, Nathaniel; and their dog, Dulce de Leche.
Philanthropy has always been a family tradition for the Johnsons, first being introduced to SDSVP through Leigh’s parents, Partners, Mike and Joyce Kole. One of their favorite books is entitled Three Cups of Tea, about how one person can make all the difference in the world. David and Leigh find participating in SDSVP a great way to make that difference in San Diego and they want to pass that family tradition to Mallory.
September 1, 2008
Corporation for Supportive Housing
Sherri Neasham, Lead Partner
“Supportive housing enables the homeless with disabling conditions to live independently and is the most effective strategy to end long-term homelessness. With the help of San Diego Social Venture Partners, CSH has been able to clearly identify critical success factors to ensure the creation of new housing for the homeless in our region and not let precious resources go unspent.”
Simonne Ruff, Director
With over $100 million available to the San Diego region to develop housing for homeless people with disabling health conditions, the Corporation for Supportive Housing’s challenge in 2007-08 was to ensure that this money would not be returned to the State for yet another year. Working with San Diego Social Venture Partners, it became clear that the most important strategy to use (and not lose) this money would be to create a mandate requiring developers to build supportive housing.
The Centre City Development Corporation (CCDC) took up this challenge to end homelessness in downtown San Diego. CCDC has mandated that supportive housing be included in projects in the downtown area, creating 95 new units in the coming years.
The Corporation for Supportive Housing (CSH) is celebrating last year’s achievements as they pursue their newly defined mission to be a catalyst in the development of quality permanent supportive housing. CSH’s vision is to promote the creation of 2,000 units of supportive housing over the next 10 years to end long-term homelessness in San Diego. Over the next three years, CSH will enable 250 homeless individuals with disabling health conditions to leave the streets and remain housed for one year.
“Supportive housing enables the homeless with disabling conditions to live independently and is the most effective strategy to end long-term homelessness. With the help of San Diego Social Venture Partners, CSH has been able to clearly identify critical success factors to ensure the creation of new housing for the homeless in our region and not let precious resources go unspent.”
Simonne Ruff, Director
With over $100 million available to the San Diego region to develop housing for homeless people with disabling health conditions, the Corporation for Supportive Housing’s challenge in 2007-08 was to ensure that this money would not be returned to the State for yet another year. Working with San Diego Social Venture Partners, it became clear that the most important strategy to use (and not lose) this money would be to create a mandate requiring developers to build supportive housing.
The Centre City Development Corporation (CCDC) took up this challenge to end homelessness in downtown San Diego. CCDC has mandated that supportive housing be included in projects in the downtown area, creating 95 new units in the coming years.
The Corporation for Supportive Housing (CSH) is celebrating last year’s achievements as they pursue their newly defined mission to be a catalyst in the development of quality permanent supportive housing. CSH’s vision is to promote the creation of 2,000 units of supportive housing over the next 10 years to end long-term homelessness in San Diego. Over the next three years, CSH will enable 250 homeless individuals with disabling health conditions to leave the streets and remain housed for one year.
Community Resource Center
Morgan Day and Bob Papera, Lead Partners
“The impact of SDSVP on day-to-day operations at Community Resource Center is evident across the organization. From board development to improving infrastructure, SDSVP support has increased our productivity and enhanced our ability to provide services to our clients.”
Laurin Pause, Executive Director
Community Resource Center (CRC) unveiled its Food Stamp Outreach program, funded by SDSVP, in the fall of 2007. Since that time, over 1,150 Food Stamp Outreach materials have been distributed to families, over 200 applications have been issued to qualified individuals or families, and over 60 households have received application assistance. The North County welfare office has already documented an increase in the number of families receiving food stamp assistance.
With SDSVP support, CRC has not only realigned its food services to a more outcome-based model, but has also embarked on a major organizational transformation—including board education and expansion, improved information technology systems, and development of capable senior leadership within the agency. These enhancements have positively impacted the growth of CRC’s Holiday Baskets program, the largest holiday distribution of its kind in the county. In 2007, Holiday Baskets served a record 1,200 low-income households.
In addition, SDSVP’s contacts within the business community have provided CRC the opportunity to enhance its public image and marketing ability through the creation of a new website. The collateral benefits have included increased public awareness of and financial support for their fund-raising events and programs. CRC has clearly gained from this increased exposure.
SDSVP's Bingham Stone Award 2008
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
Angels Foster Family Network
Amy Larson, Lead Partner
“The partnership between Angels and SDSVP has been a great one since day one. The talent and support of many of their members has been an impetus, resulting in more funding, successful marketing, and a record-breaking number of babies being rescued.”
Cathy Richman, Founder and Executive Director
Founder Cathy Richman developed the Angels foster program’s unique methodology in 1998 because she saw a need for a new way to address a chronic problem—how to protect the most fragile of children within a system that can do further damage by constantly moving infants and toddlers from foster home to foster home.
Angels is a licensed, private nonprofit foster family agency with a unique emphasis on the stable placement of abused foster infants with healthy, nurturing families who promote emotional bonding, helping the children grow into happy, productive, secure adults. Since January 2000, Angels has placed 250 babies with some of the finest, most loving and committed foster families available, and the organization expects to place an additional 60 babies in 2008.
SDSVP has provided a capacity-building grant and committed Partners who have helped establish a marketing brand for Angels, helped create a five-year strategic plan, assisted with board development, and financed an outside funding consultant who helped hire their first Director of Development. The social return on investment will be measured by the number of children now living healthy, happy lives and families that have been made whole after what seemed like such a tragic start.
“The partnership between Angels and SDSVP has been a great one since day one. The talent and support of many of their members has been an impetus, resulting in more funding, successful marketing, and a record-breaking number of babies being rescued.”
Cathy Richman, Founder and Executive Director
Founder Cathy Richman developed the Angels foster program’s unique methodology in 1998 because she saw a need for a new way to address a chronic problem—how to protect the most fragile of children within a system that can do further damage by constantly moving infants and toddlers from foster home to foster home.
Angels is a licensed, private nonprofit foster family agency with a unique emphasis on the stable placement of abused foster infants with healthy, nurturing families who promote emotional bonding, helping the children grow into happy, productive, secure adults. Since January 2000, Angels has placed 250 babies with some of the finest, most loving and committed foster families available, and the organization expects to place an additional 60 babies in 2008.
SDSVP has provided a capacity-building grant and committed Partners who have helped establish a marketing brand for Angels, helped create a five-year strategic plan, assisted with board development, and financed an outside funding consultant who helped hire their first Director of Development. The social return on investment will be measured by the number of children now living healthy, happy lives and families that have been made whole after what seemed like such a tragic start.
August 28, 2008
SDSU Social Entrepreneur Internship Program
Are you working with a nonprofit who may be interested in an intern? The QUALCOMM EMC Social Entrepreneur Internship Program may be a good fit.
The program at San Diego State University matches talented graduate business students with nonprofit organizations. Interns work with the organization's senior management to improve performance and achieve their goals through entrepreneurial initiatives.
The internships unite academic, corporate and social concepts in entrepreneurship for a unique educational MBA experience. Over the course of a 150-hour internship, students identify a strategic objective, perform related business analysis and develop a substantive report.
For certain projects, SDSU faculty advisors may act as facilitators and QUALCOMM employees mentor the interns to enable agency implementation of recommended courses of action.
Program Background
The QUALCOMM EMC Social Entrepreneur Internship Program began when the Kauffman Foundation for Entrepreneurial Leadership recognized that the internships they had been sponsoring in For-Profit enterprises could benefit Non-Profit organizations.
In early 1999, Kauffman provided SDSU's Entrepreneurial Management Center with seed money to launch a social entrepreneur internship initiative with the goal of securing permanent local funding. Later that year, the EMC announced a grant from its partner QUALCOMM, Inc. to continue the social internship program.
How the Program Works
The program at San Diego State University matches talented graduate business students with nonprofit organizations. Interns work with the organization's senior management to improve performance and achieve their goals through entrepreneurial initiatives.
The internships unite academic, corporate and social concepts in entrepreneurship for a unique educational MBA experience. Over the course of a 150-hour internship, students identify a strategic objective, perform related business analysis and develop a substantive report.
For certain projects, SDSU faculty advisors may act as facilitators and QUALCOMM employees mentor the interns to enable agency implementation of recommended courses of action.
Program Background
The QUALCOMM EMC Social Entrepreneur Internship Program began when the Kauffman Foundation for Entrepreneurial Leadership recognized that the internships they had been sponsoring in For-Profit enterprises could benefit Non-Profit organizations.
In early 1999, Kauffman provided SDSU's Entrepreneurial Management Center with seed money to launch a social entrepreneur internship initiative with the goal of securing permanent local funding. Later that year, the EMC announced a grant from its partner QUALCOMM, Inc. to continue the social internship program.
How the Program Works
- Phase One:
Each semester (Fall, Spring and Summer) the EMC invites nonprofit organizations to submit internship project proposals. After they are reviewed to insure they are compatible with program goals, the project descriptions are posted on our website. Student’s request interviews based upon their experience, skills and interests. The agencies receive copies of resumes of those students desiring an interview. - Phase Two:
In a single afternoon the students and agency representatives meet on campus for "match day." In most instances the preferences of the agencies and students are mutually selective, and a one-to-one match is made. Each intern is assigned a program advisor for purposes of guidance, as a source of technical assistance and to insure a quality learning experience results. A mentor from QUALCOMM also becomes part of the internship team. - Phase Three:
The intern, host organization supervisor and QUALCOMM mentor meet to establish and confirm the scope of the engagement and agree upon deliverables. Additional meetings and conferences occur on an as-needed basis. The intern is the individual primarily responsible for the successful outcome of the project and is expected to take on a leadership role to insure that occurs.
If you are interested in participating in this program, please complete a nonprofit application form (found on the EMC website www.sdsu.edu/emc ) and send it to Bernhard Schroeder at bschroeder@projects.sdsu.edu.
Peggy Kidd, A Lifetime Mission Helping People
By Abe Ordover
SDSVP Executive Director Peggy Kidd has dedicated her life to a personal, spiritual mission to be of help to people and communities. Her deep sense of purpose comes from observing at close hand and being amidst some of the catastrophes of humankind. She came from these experiences with a profound sense of purpose.
Peggy received her B.S. in Marketing from Miami University of Ohio, where she spent her junior year studying abroad. After college, she moved to San Diego to work on a cruise ship as black jack dealer. Following her Fun Ship experience, she decided to get serious about her career and launched into the corporate world. She served as Marketing Director for a small agency, then accepted a position leading a division of a consumer based research firm and then was lured to the client side by working at Jenny Craig International as Director of Marketing Research, supervising clinical trials and working with the advertising and creative teams.
To find balance in her life, Peggy started volunteering as a “big sister” for an abused little girl, whom she still helps today. The impact that one person can have on the life of another convinced her of the importance of giving back.
Then, life abruptly changed for her in 1999. Knowing that she wanted to give back, she traveled Africa to work with AIDS orphans in Kikuyu and Capetown. However, while traveling to Uganda to track the Mountain Gorillas, she was awakened one morning at 5am by the sounds of people quietly lurking in the camp. Frightened, she rationalized it away as “irrational fear”, although, she quickly packed up her things and fled. An hour later, the Hutu rebels invaded her camp, burned all the tents and kidnapped the tourists, eventually slaying eight of her friends.
As a survivor, she came to feel deeply that she must devote her life to helping others. Her mission to work for nonprofits matured. After returning to San Diego, she decided to leave corporate America for the nonprofit world and accepted a position at Family Literacy Foundation as their Executive Director. Feeling as if she found her purpose, she recalls thinking, “I would do this for free. I’m just lucky to get paid for it.”
Feeling that desire once more to work with the 3rd world population, Peggy lived in Brazil for a year working with the street children in the ghettos, a crime ridden, drug culture where life was cheap and murder abundant. “That was the most challenging experience of my life”, Peggy recalls. “I was teaching the kids English and other life skills, yet they really needed survival skills. They knew once the center closed at night, they’d need to fight in order to make it to the next day.” After a few narrow escapes with her own life, she decided to settle back down in the burbs of San Diego and tackle some of the challenges kids face right here in our community. Moving from the Board of TKF to staff, as Executive Director, she worked to implement violence prevention programs with San Diego City Schools.
In 2006, she started a private consulting practice assisting nonprofit organizations in building their capacity. This led her to SDSVP, which ultimately hired her as its Executive Director. Peggy believes SDSVP is the perfect fit for her –blending her passion for nonprofits and the strategic aspect of business. She’s excited about the impact that SDSVP is making on the community: “if any group in San Diego is going to make a significant change, it’s going to be SDSVP. Our Partners have the intellect, the passion and the resources to make it happen.”
SDSVP Executive Director Peggy Kidd has dedicated her life to a personal, spiritual mission to be of help to people and communities. Her deep sense of purpose comes from observing at close hand and being amidst some of the catastrophes of humankind. She came from these experiences with a profound sense of purpose.
Peggy received her B.S. in Marketing from Miami University of Ohio, where she spent her junior year studying abroad. After college, she moved to San Diego to work on a cruise ship as black jack dealer. Following her Fun Ship experience, she decided to get serious about her career and launched into the corporate world. She served as Marketing Director for a small agency, then accepted a position leading a division of a consumer based research firm and then was lured to the client side by working at Jenny Craig International as Director of Marketing Research, supervising clinical trials and working with the advertising and creative teams.
To find balance in her life, Peggy started volunteering as a “big sister” for an abused little girl, whom she still helps today. The impact that one person can have on the life of another convinced her of the importance of giving back.
Then, life abruptly changed for her in 1999. Knowing that she wanted to give back, she traveled Africa to work with AIDS orphans in Kikuyu and Capetown. However, while traveling to Uganda to track the Mountain Gorillas, she was awakened one morning at 5am by the sounds of people quietly lurking in the camp. Frightened, she rationalized it away as “irrational fear”, although, she quickly packed up her things and fled. An hour later, the Hutu rebels invaded her camp, burned all the tents and kidnapped the tourists, eventually slaying eight of her friends.
As a survivor, she came to feel deeply that she must devote her life to helping others. Her mission to work for nonprofits matured. After returning to San Diego, she decided to leave corporate America for the nonprofit world and accepted a position at Family Literacy Foundation as their Executive Director. Feeling as if she found her purpose, she recalls thinking, “I would do this for free. I’m just lucky to get paid for it.”
Feeling that desire once more to work with the 3rd world population, Peggy lived in Brazil for a year working with the street children in the ghettos, a crime ridden, drug culture where life was cheap and murder abundant. “That was the most challenging experience of my life”, Peggy recalls. “I was teaching the kids English and other life skills, yet they really needed survival skills. They knew once the center closed at night, they’d need to fight in order to make it to the next day.” After a few narrow escapes with her own life, she decided to settle back down in the burbs of San Diego and tackle some of the challenges kids face right here in our community. Moving from the Board of TKF to staff, as Executive Director, she worked to implement violence prevention programs with San Diego City Schools.
In 2006, she started a private consulting practice assisting nonprofit organizations in building their capacity. This led her to SDSVP, which ultimately hired her as its Executive Director. Peggy believes SDSVP is the perfect fit for her –blending her passion for nonprofits and the strategic aspect of business. She’s excited about the impact that SDSVP is making on the community: “if any group in San Diego is going to make a significant change, it’s going to be SDSVP. Our Partners have the intellect, the passion and the resources to make it happen.”
Concierge Club for Seniors
By Cathy Yarbrough
A concierge service may seem an odd fit for a nonprofit community organization that helps low income senior citizens to live in their homes – and to avoid institutionalization – for as long as their health allows.
But, it’s such a good business decision that SDSVP this year selected the organization, ElderHelp, as one of its new three-year Investees. “With SDSVP’s expertise, we will execute a new strategy to provide something to seniors and their families that does not currently exist,” said Leane Marchese, Executive Director of ElderHelp.
For over 35 years, ElderHelp has not charged a fee when its 17-member staff and 200 volunteers transported senior citizens to their medical appointments, grocery-shopped for them or provided other services that enable people to live independently. Last year, ElderHelp helped about 5,000 San Diego senior citizens.
In coming years, ElderHelp will be called upon to help many more people, as the senior citizen population doubles over the next two decades from about 340,000 in 2008 to 740,000 by 2030, Marchese said at SDSVP’s First Friday on August 1. She pointed out that many older individuals are burdened by not only fixed incomes but also high blood pressure, Alzheimer’s and other chronic health problems.
To reach this increasing population of senior citizens, ElderHelp must expand its own financial resources. The concierge program will be one of the initiatives to generate a revenue stream that will enable ElderHelp to become sustainable and viable.
SDSVP will help its new Investee to develop and launch the ElderHelp Concierge Club, which will target seniors and their families who can afford to pay a membership fee for the services that low-income older individuals will continue to receive for free.
Marchese explained that every two paid Concierge Club memberships will provide the income that will enable ElderHelp to provide the same services, but at no cost, to one low-income senior citizen.
In addition to refining a business plan, SDSVP will assist ElderHelp with creating and implementing a web-based information tracking system that will integrate all components and functions for the organization.
Partners also will help ElderHelp to develop and execute a marketing plan to recruit and retain 150 volunteers, each of whom will commit to 6 hours per week for one year.
A system for evaluating ElderHelp’s outcomes against revenue and volunteer and membership retention measures will be devised, so that the organization’s impact on San Diego can be clearly communicated.
A concierge service may seem an odd fit for a nonprofit community organization that helps low income senior citizens to live in their homes – and to avoid institutionalization – for as long as their health allows.
But, it’s such a good business decision that SDSVP this year selected the organization, ElderHelp, as one of its new three-year Investees. “With SDSVP’s expertise, we will execute a new strategy to provide something to seniors and their families that does not currently exist,” said Leane Marchese, Executive Director of ElderHelp.
For over 35 years, ElderHelp has not charged a fee when its 17-member staff and 200 volunteers transported senior citizens to their medical appointments, grocery-shopped for them or provided other services that enable people to live independently. Last year, ElderHelp helped about 5,000 San Diego senior citizens.
In coming years, ElderHelp will be called upon to help many more people, as the senior citizen population doubles over the next two decades from about 340,000 in 2008 to 740,000 by 2030, Marchese said at SDSVP’s First Friday on August 1. She pointed out that many older individuals are burdened by not only fixed incomes but also high blood pressure, Alzheimer’s and other chronic health problems.
To reach this increasing population of senior citizens, ElderHelp must expand its own financial resources. The concierge program will be one of the initiatives to generate a revenue stream that will enable ElderHelp to become sustainable and viable.
SDSVP will help its new Investee to develop and launch the ElderHelp Concierge Club, which will target seniors and their families who can afford to pay a membership fee for the services that low-income older individuals will continue to receive for free.
Marchese explained that every two paid Concierge Club memberships will provide the income that will enable ElderHelp to provide the same services, but at no cost, to one low-income senior citizen.
In addition to refining a business plan, SDSVP will assist ElderHelp with creating and implementing a web-based information tracking system that will integrate all components and functions for the organization.
Partners also will help ElderHelp to develop and execute a marketing plan to recruit and retain 150 volunteers, each of whom will commit to 6 hours per week for one year.
A system for evaluating ElderHelp’s outcomes against revenue and volunteer and membership retention measures will be devised, so that the organization’s impact on San Diego can be clearly communicated.
Supportive Housing Monies Committed in San Diego
By Simonne Ruff
The Corporation for Supportive Housing’s (CSH) fundamental challenge has been to ensure that $100 million currently available to the San Diego region to prevent and end homelessness is not left on the table, as in previous years. San Diego Social Venture Partners worked with CSH to clearly focus on the critical success factors to ensure these monies are directed to housing for the homeless in San Diego - and the results of this hard work are already being seen locally.
San Diego is amongst the first counties in the State to have initial approval of $5 million in Mental Health Services Act funding and $3.5 million in state affordable housing funds for the Cedar Gateway project in downtown San Diego. This exciting project at 6th and Cedar is unique in that it mixes permanent supportive housing with affordable housing, a rooftop garden, commercial retail space and a rejuvenated St. Cecelia’s Chapel. Squier Properties, a for profit affordable housing developer, has worked collaboratively with the Centre City Development Corporation to take on the challenge of creating new units of supportive housing downtown. Squier Properties and CCDC are championing the cause to end homelessness in this showcase project.
The Corporation for Supportive Housing and SDSVP’s strategic planning work has brought to the table a new partner with significant development expertise, Squier Properties, for their first project in San Die
go. Continuing to focus on critical success factors, such as engaging new partners in supportive housing development, will enable CSH to meet its three year vision of enabling 250 homeless individuals with disabling health conditions to exit the streets and remain housed for one year in sustainable permanent supportive housing. Social Venture Partners’ expertise in strategic planning and outcome measurement are key resources that are enabling CSH to meet this vision.
The Corporation for Supportive Housing’s (CSH) fundamental challenge has been to ensure that $100 million currently available to the San Diego region to prevent and end homelessness is not left on the table, as in previous years. San Diego Social Venture Partners worked with CSH to clearly focus on the critical success factors to ensure these monies are directed to housing for the homeless in San Diego - and the results of this hard work are already being seen locally.
San Diego is amongst the first counties in the State to have initial approval of $5 million in Mental Health Services Act funding and $3.5 million in state affordable housing funds for the Cedar Gateway project in downtown San Diego. This exciting project at 6th and Cedar is unique in that it mixes permanent supportive housing with affordable housing, a rooftop garden, commercial retail space and a rejuvenated St. Cecelia’s Chapel. Squier Properties, a for profit affordable housing developer, has worked collaboratively with the Centre City Development Corporation to take on the challenge of creating new units of supportive housing downtown. Squier Properties and CCDC are championing the cause to end homelessness in this showcase project.
The Corporation for Supportive Housing and SDSVP’s strategic planning work has brought to the table a new partner with significant development expertise, Squier Properties, for their first project in San Die
go. Continuing to focus on critical success factors, such as engaging new partners in supportive housing development, will enable CSH to meet its three year vision of enabling 250 homeless individuals with disabling health conditions to exit the streets and remain housed for one year in sustainable permanent supportive housing. Social Venture Partners’ expertise in strategic planning and outcome measurement are key resources that are enabling CSH to meet this vision.
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