Jenifer Altman and Her Foundation: A Brief History
History
Jenifer Altman was an environmentalist, a photographer, and a dancer. She lived in a beautiful loft in Tribeca, in lower Manhattan, before it became fashionable. Jenifer cared about children, about healing, about the environment and about justice. She came to Commonweal with a life-threatening cancer to participate in the Commonweal Cancer Help Program. The experience changed Jenifer's life.
Jenifer stayed in Bolinas to work at Commonweal as a Senior Research Associate. She studied integrative cancer therapies. She practiced healing through the expressive arts. Jenifer died in Bolinas in her home overlooking the Pacific Ocean on November 15, 1991, surrounded by friends. We had just celebrated her fiftieth birthday.
As Jenifer was dying, she asked me to help her create a foundation that would support Commonweal and contribute to other good work in the world. We created the Jenifer Altman Foundation.
Jenifer died before her time. So have hundreds of other young women who have come on the Cancer Help Program since 1986. Cancer is epidemic. So are many other environmentally-mediated diseases – heart disease, learning disabilities, autism, infertility, birth defects, neurodegenerative diseases, and many more. The entire biosphere is permeated with toxic synthetic chemicals. Through green chemistry and safer substitutes, we need to end the poisoning of all life on earth.
Commonweal's mission is to heal ourselves and heal the earth. For thirty years, the Jenifer Altman Foundation has supported Commonweal's work in health and healing, education and the arts, and environment and justice.
We've gone far beyond support for Commonweal. We co-founded the Health and Environmental Funders Network. We've worked with funding partners to support the global movement for environmental health and justice. We've also worked with our partners on global trade, on the new economy, and on new technology issues. In 2019, we co-created OMEGA: The Resilience Funders Network to address the challenges of the global polycrisis.
The Jenifer Altman Foundation has been lead by three remarkable Executive Directors. Elise Miller started as Program Officer in 1993 later becoming Executive Director. Marni Rosen became Executive Director in 1999, and then Shorey Myers became Executive Director in 2017.
Kindness, consciousness and service are our core values. Kindness of heart, consciousness of mind, and service to life. The Jenifer Altman Foundation is small. Yet it has served well in our fields of endeavor. Jenifer's vision has allowed us to be of real service for three decades and counting. We welcome exploring new partnerships with funders who share our values.
Join us.
Michael Lerner
President
December, 2020