|
Community Impact at Columbia University will host its 14 th Annual Spring Benefit Auction on Tuesday, April 4, at 6:30 p.m. at the Dahesh Museum of Art, the only institution in the United States devoted to collecting, exhibiting and interpreting works by Europe's academically trained artists of the 19 th and early 20 th centuries. Items ranging from a week in the Florida Keys to jewelry from Tiffany's will be auctioned off amid opulent 19 th-century surroundings.
This annual auction is a fundraiser for Community Impact, the University's largest student volunteer organization that provides services and programs to lower-income and homeless children, adults and families in Harlem, Washington Heights and Morningside Heights.
During the event, Community Impact will present its Fourth Annual "Making a Difference" Award to vice chair of the Trustees of Columbia University, Philip L. Milstein, CC'71 and a great supporter of Community Impact. Milstein is the former president and chief executive officer of Emigrant Savings Bank and is now a principal of Ogden CAP Properties, LLC, a real estate company with residential, commercial and hotel assets in New York City and Washington D.C.
The event also will honor James Milligan, former dean of admissions of Columbia Law School and a Community Impact board member for many years.
Items Up for Bid
Items for auction include weeklong stays at houses/condos located in the Florida Keys, Cape Cod and The Hermitage in Montauk; a weekend stay in the Berkshire Mountains at The Red Lion Inn, immortalized in Norman Rockwell's painting Main Street; a horse drawn carriage ride and tour of Shallow Brook Farms in Stillwater, New Jersey; vouchers for travel courtesy of STA Travel; fantastic seats to New York Yankees, Mets, Islanders, Knicks and Jets games, and to events on Broadway, the Shubert Theatre, The Apollo Theater, Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center, including The Marriage of Figaro at the Metropolitan Opera House and the New York Philharmonic at Avery Fisher Hall; a pair of ballet shoes signed by Jenifer Ringer, Principal Dancer with the New York City Ballet; a dinner party catered by Sterling Affair; memberships and passes to the Studio Museum in Harlem and Museum of Modern Art, which includes a 'before hours' tour with Josh Siegel (CC'92), curator of film & media at MoMA; a Ping Retro golf bag complete with Ben Hogan Apex Irons; a case of Brunello Di Montalcino wine; fine jewelry from Tiffany & Co., Rima Jewelry and Lobmeyr, creators of the Metropolitan Opera's "Starburst Chandeliers"; two original prints by world renownedphotographer Ken Heyman; and a commemorative photo of Yogi Berra and Ted Williams, in tribute to James Milligan. Items will be available by paddle bid and through a silent auction.
Members of Milstein's family will attend, including his mother, Vivian Milstein. Also expected to attend are representatives from the auction's sponsors including Friedman, Kaplan, Seiler & Adelman; ING Financial Markets; the New England Patriots Foundation; PricewaterhouseCoopers; Proskauer, Rose, Rivkin Radler, Wasserman, Grubin & Rogers; and West Harlem Group Assistance.
Cocktails and hors d'oeuvres will be served. Tickets start at $100, $250, $500 and $1,000. Sponsorship levels range from $1,000 to $20,000. To purchase tickets, or for more information on sponsorship or donating an item, call Theresa Sun Choi, Community Impact development officer, at (212) 854-5959.
The Dahesh Museum of Art is located at 580 Madison Avenue between 56 th and 57 th Streets.
About Philip L. Milstein
This year's "Making a Difference" Awardee, Philip L. Milstein, knew little of Columbia when he first visited in 1967, then a high school senior from Scarsdale, NY, where he has lived most of his life, and where he and his wife, Cheryl, are raising their children and live today. Even though he looks back on the Columbia of 1967 as a remote, formal place far from -- and a lot less than -- what it is today, he remembers falling in love with the academy on the Heights for qualities still now there. Columbia was, Milstein says, the place where he learned to think, to reason, to deal with complex issues, where he learned to internalize the lesson that most everything of value must be accomplished by oneself through one's own effort, and aided by the talents, affections, and help of those around him. Milstein says that part of Columbia has not changed.
The buildings and programs named for his family weigh on him in many ways. Warm and modest in his always impeccable manners, Milstein talks less reluctantly about projects in which he has played the role Columbia played for him -- the work of helping others improve their lot through their own effort but aided by the people from within their community.
Player-manager for the Varsity Tennis team in his senior year at Columbia, still enjoying his attachment to collegiate sports through his role as an active tennis alumnus, Milstein serves now as vice-chairman of the Columbia Board of Trustees. He credits his commitment to Community Impact to his friend and Columbia co-Trustee, George Van Amson, who also serves as a member of the Community Impact Board. "George is a persuasive guy, but he didn't have to spend any of his persuasive capital to get me to follow his lead on Community Impact," says Milstein. In 2006, Milstein follows Van Amson as the recipient of Community Impact's highest honor -- it's "Making a Difference" Award.
This is the fourth year the award has been given. Past winners are CU Trustee George Van Amson, managing director at Morgan Stanley; Columbia Trustee Marilyn Laurie, former executive of AT&T and co-founder of Earth Day; and Jerome Chazen, Business'50, founding CEO of Liz Claiborne.
Community Impact at Columbia University is a nonprofit organization that strives to serve disadvantaged people in the Harlem, Washington Heights and Morningside Heights neighborhoods, and to provide high-quality programs, advance the public good and foster meaningful volunteer opportunities for students, faculty and staff of Columbia University. Community Impact provides food, clothing, shelter, education, job training and companionship for residents in its surrounding communities. For more information about Community Impact call (212) 854-5959 or visit www.columbia.edu/cu/ci/.
|
