News

Rockefeller Brothers Fund trustee Justin Rockefeller is part of a new generation of philanthropists leading a shift toward socially responsible investing, according to an article in Institutional Investor. This transition is changing the country's wealth management industry, as Millennials, those born between 1978 and 2000, embrace impact investing, the idea that financial and social interests should go hand-in-hand.

The New York Times offered a stark assessment of New York City's preparedness for serious flooding, which would have a crippling impact on its 520 miles of coast. In the article, executive director Eddie Bautista of the New York City Environmental Justice Alliance, Inc., an RBF grantee, highlighted the urgency of preparing industrial areas on the waterfront, where many low-income residents live.

Four of the Fund’s Charles E. Culpeper Arts and Culture grantees—Creative Time, Gallim Dance, Spanish Theatre Repertory Company, and The Jazz Gallery—are featured in the videos, which take the viewer from behind the scenes to actual performances.

The Story of Brownfields, written by Anita Nager, a recognized leader in the environmental field, documents the Rockefeller Brothers Fund’s 14-year history of brownfield grantmaking and presents a narrative of the foundation’s choices, against a timeline its grantees’ activities and the brownfield remediation and redevelopment efforts of New York City and New York state.

New York City's Office of Environmental Remediation has published a series of videos on brownfields reclamation and remediation. Cleaning Up NYC is a four-part video series about these previously developed urban sites that have been affected by environmental contamination limiting their future uses and often falling into disuse.

Doreen Wang, program assistant for the Rockefeller Brothers Fund’s New York City and Southern China programs, reflects on her experience of discovering that “those random, fenced in strips of land in New York City, that that have been empty and abandoned for years” were brownfields.

Advocates working toward the establishment of a regional commission (RECOM) to identify and disclose facts about war crimes that occurred in the Balkans during the 1990s, met with European Union ambassadors in Belgrade, Serbia on June 21, 2012. Maja Mićić of the Youth Initiative for Human Rights, an RBF grantee, represented the coalition for RECOM.

The Rockefeller Brothers Fund has released a report examining its Sustainable Development grantmaking from 2005–2010. The RBF first began grantmaking on climate change in 1984. The most recent phase of the RBF‘s work on climate change began in 2005, with the board‘s endorsement of the proposal to shift the bulk of the Fund‘s Sustainable Development resources toward combating climate change.

At Rio+20, innovative and determined leaders committed to advancing climate change solutions outside the bureaucratic process, according to Michael Northrop, program director of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund's Sustainable Development program. In a blog entry for the Huffington Post, he highlights some of the positive outcomes of the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development, which took place June 20–22, 2012 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Vice President for Programs Elizabeth Campbell was elected chair of the Winrock International board of directors at its May 7 meeting. Winrock International is a nonprofit organization that works nationally and globally to empower disadvantaged people, stimulate economic development, and promote sustainable use of natural resources. Ms. Campbell has served on the Winrock International board since 2006, most recently as vice chair since May 2009.