Fred Brown, President and CEO of The Forbes Funds, explains how connecting with the Cancer Free Economy Network has helped create, expand, and enhance local Pittsburgh initiatives to create a Global City that serves the health and well-being of its people.
The Cancer Free Economy Network (CFEN) is connecting an extended community of people to collaborate on phasing out toxic chemicals in industrial and consumer products through changing the story, advancing the science, shifting the market and building power to implement system changes.
How can traditional environmental conservation work be part of a collaborative effort to ensure clean water? Nathan Boon, Program Officer, Watershed Protection, at the William Penn Foundation, tells how grantmaking has helped bring environmental organizations together to successfully protect and restore clean water in the Delaware River watershed.
(Photo caption: This natural spring emerges from a white cedar bog in the heart of the Pine Barrens wilderness.)
With our democracy and climate in crisis, what if all of philanthropy channeled more of its investment gains into deeper support for grant making? Scott Fitzmorris, board chair of the Wallace Global Fund, and Ellen Dorsey, executive director, explain why the Wallace Global Fund is nearly doubling its grant budget this year to tackle the extraordinary challenges facing our country.
This post is a tribute letter from the Trustees of the John Merck Fund, expressing their gratitude to Andy Igrejas, National Campaign Director of the Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families coalition, for his “superb skills and devotion to mission” over years of effort for a safer, healthier world for all.
What does the future look like? Michael Lerner, President of the Jenifer Altman Foundation and the Barbara Smith Fund, and HEFN co-founder, reflects upon seeking the path to courage in the face of prospects for global and regional collapse and resilience in the near future.
Climate change is impacting many natural and human systems that are critical for supporting human health such as agriculture, infrastructure, and the economy. Nearly eighty funders from different fields convened in Detroit, Michigan, to explore these interconnections among climate change, health, and social equity interests at the “Charting a Climate, Health, and Equity Agenda” meeting in November.
In practice, the quality of drinking water varies greatly depending on where the water comes from and what system delivers it. In essence, where a person lives in the U.S. can define whether the water that he or she receives is clean and safe. In fact, millions of Americans suffer from a lack of clean and safe drinking water. Read how foundations can and should lead the way to tackle this public health crisis.
It was a year of change, as HEFN helped funders respond to new challenges while steadily progressing in work to mobilize philanthropy for environmental health and justice solutions. With appreciation to all of our members, partners, and colleagues, here’s a snapshot of HEFN’s work in 2017.
We asked funders who attended HEFN’s 2017 Annual Meeting on “Rewriting the Rules” to share their top takeaways in a post-meeting survey. The myriad thoughtful responses ranged from the pointed – “Flint still has a water crisis” -- to the poignant – “It is incredibly frightening the trajectory of increased health and environmental threats that will be growing under the current political and economic paradigm and the people in the room give me HOPE” – to the poetic – “Funders need to learn how to dance.”
