Corporate, Philanthropic Leaders to be Honored at World Resources Institute Dinner

MacArthur Foundation to Announce Climate Funding ProgramMajor corporate and philanthropic leaders will be honored, and The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation will announce a new $5 million climate funding program at the 25th Anniversary Dinner of the World Resources Institute here on Tuesday night.

More than 500 people will attend the environmental nonprofit organization’s gala at Cipriani 42nd Street. The theme of the evening is “The Courage to Lead,” with an emphasis on increased cooperation between industry and the environmental community.

Pulitzer Prize-winning author and New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman will serve as master of ceremonies, and those honored will be GE Chairman and CEO Jeffrey R. Immelt, who unveiled GE’s ecomagination strategy in 2005; SC Johnson’s late Chairman Emeritus Samuel C. Johnson, an environmental and business visionary; and Elizabeth J. McCormack, a former chair of The MacArthur Foundation and an advisor when the Foundation launched WRI in 1982 with a $15 million grant.

“We are proud to recognize three outstanding individuals whose vision and actions have exemplified leadership for sustainability,” said Jonathan Lash, WRI’s president. “We hope that the message of the dinner, the examples of our honorees, and the words of our featured speakers will challenge us all.”

Among those who will make brief remarks are: former U.S. Vice President Al Gore; Thomas L. Friedman; MacArthur Foundation President Jonathan Fanton; WRI Board Chairman James A. Harmon; SC Johnson Chairman and CEO H. Fisk Johnson, Ph.D; and WRI Founder and Dean of the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies James Gustave Speth.

The dinner is being underwritten by Citigroup Global Wealth Management.  Citigroup has supported WRI’s work since the early 1990s. The dinner is expected to raise nearly $2 million, which includes $500,000 in gifts from the Alcoa Foundation; DuPont; GE and the GE Foundation; SC Johnson; and the Weyerhaeuser Foundation designed to help strengthen WRI’s use of technology, communications, and engagement.

Representatives from other foundations such as the New York Community Trust, Shell Foundation, V. Kann Rasmussen Foundation, Wallace Global Fund, Surdna Foundation, Winslow Foundation, and the Rockefeller Foundation will also be in attendance.

Some other companies and nonprofits to be represented include AIG, Bank of America, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Caterpillar, Generation Investment Management, Lehman Brothers, the Open Society Institute, Natural Resources Defense Council, the Santa Fe Institute, and The Nature Conservancy.

For more information, please visit: www.wri.org/newsroom/topic_content.cfm?cid=4270.