Ann Alpers
President
Ann Alpers joined the S.H. Cowell board in 2004 and was elected president of the Foundation in 2005. Prior to joining the Foundation, Ms. Alpers held public office as Deputy City Attorney for Health and Human Services for the City and County of San Francisco.
Ms. Alpers graduated from Stanford Law School. Following law school, she clerked for Judge William A. Norris of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and then for Justice Harry A. Blackmun of the United States Supreme Court. She joined the faculty of the Program in Medical Ethics in 1992. At the University of California, San Francisco she co-directed the required medical ethics course and sat on the ethics committee. She has taught health law and bioethics as a visiting professor at Stanford Law School, St. Louis University School of Law, and the University of California, Berkeley.
Ms. Alpers was a Mayday Faculty Scholar through the American Society of Law, Medicine and Ethics and the Mayday Foundation in New York, New York. She has published numerous articles on physician-assisted suicide, legal and ethical issues in caring for adolescents and children, and legal and ethical issues involving end-of-life care.
She currently serves on the Organizational Effectiveness and Professional Development Committee for Northern California Grantmakers.
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Dr. Lisa Backus
Dr. Lisa Backus joined the S.H. Cowell Foundation board in 2007, bringing an extensive background in community health. She currently works at the Department of Veteran’s Affairs Office of Public Health and Environmental Hazards. In that role, she began by assuring the quality of HIV care nationwide but now monitors a range of public health issues, including avian flu, pandemic flu, hepatitis C, and health care related infections. She is deeply committed to the well-being of San Francisco’s poorest communities and volunteers at a free clinic at San Francisco General Hospital.
Dr. Backus holds a B.S. from Harvard University, completed a Ph.D. at Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar, and graduated from University of California, San Francisco Medical School. She also completed a fellowship in public health and bioinformatics (the study of extracting data from medical records for improving health care). Dr. Backus serves on the advisory board for several of the National Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s projects, including the assessment of HIV treatment and outcomes nationwide.
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Jack W. Chu
Jack W. Chu has been an S.H. Cowell Foundation board member since 2000. A Certified Public Accountant, Mr. Chu is founder and managing partner of CHU and WATERS, LLP, providing audit, accounting, tax compliance, financial planning, corporate strategic and organization consulting and forward tax planning services to middle-market clientele.
As part of his long history of community involvement in the Bay Area, Mr. Chu is a co-founder of the East Bay Asian Local Development Corporation, an Oakland-based nonprofit that develops affordable and low-income housing.
Mr. Chu holds a B.S. from the University of California at Berkeley. He received his master’s degree in taxation from Golden Gate University and he is a member of the California Society of Certified Public Accountants and American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.
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Charles E. Ellwein
Charles E. Ellwein joined the S.H. Cowell Foundation board in 2008. Mr. Ellwein is an equity investment analyst at Capital Research Global Investors, a division of the Capital Group Companies. Prior to joining Capital Group, he was a partner at Farallon Capital Management, an institutional investment manager that manages assets on behalf of college endowments and other organizations. Early in his career he worked at BlackRock Financial Management where he specialized in structuring investment portfolios for financial institutions. He graduated from Stanford's Graduate School of Business where he was an Arjay Miller Scholar. He also attended Brown University where he received a Sc.B. with Honors in Electrical Engineering. Mr. Ellwein grew up in San Diego, California and Omaha, Nebraska.
Mr. Ellwein is personally committed to philanthropy and community service. He and his wife Nel live in San Francisco and have two daughters.
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Dr. Mikiko Huang
Dr. Mikiko Huang joined the S.H. Cowell Foundation board in 2007. A pediatrician, she has a strong commitment to community involvement.
Dr. Huang serves on the board of Marin Country Day School (MCDS) and the advisory board of Beyond Borders, an MCDS-sponsored program that brings together Bay Area children from diverse socioeconomic and cultural backgrounds to share in a summer experience where stereotypes are broken down and respect, collaboration and creativity are fostered. Dr. Huang also serves on the Health Advisory Group and the Bay Area Advisory Council of Common Sense Media (CSM), a non-partisan nonprofit that is dedicated to improving the media and entertainment lives of kids and families. In addition, she serves on the board of directors of Camp Tawonga.
Dr. Huang graduated from Harvard University and Baylor College of Medicine. She did her pediatric residency at Stanford University Hospital and has been practicing medicine in San Francisco since 1986.
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Deborah Ortiz
Deborah Ortiz joined the S.H. Cowell Foundation board in 2007. Ms. Ortiz was elected to the California State Senate in 1998 where she served until reaching her term limit in December 2006. As chair of the Senate Health Committee, she was responsible for making California the first state in the nation to expressly authorize embryonic stem cell research and enact a statewide biomonitoring program to measure chemicals Californians are exposed to and carry in their bodies. She authored legislation to create a state Department of Public Health and to fund research on gender-specific cancers, such as breast, ovarian, testicular and prostate cancers. She also passed the landmark Cal Grant Scholarship program that guarantees financial assistance to needy students that attend California schools and universities.
Prior to her election to the State Senate, Ms. Ortiz served on the Sacramento City Council, where she chaired the Ad Hoc Committee to create the Neighborhood Services Department. In 1996, she received the Sacramento Housing Alliance Award for improving housing in Sacramento's toughest neighborhoods. She was elected to the State Assembly in 1996 and served there for two terms during which time she helped to establish a statewide after-school tutoring program modeled on the Sacramento START program.
Ms. Ortiz attended the University of California at Davis and graduated from the University of the Pacific McGeorge School of Law.
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Donald D. Roberts
Secretary and General Counsel
Donald D. Roberts has served on the S.H. Cowell Foundation board and provided general counsel to the Foundation since 2004. He is a retired partner of the international law firm Thelen, Reid, Brown, Raysman & Steiner, LLP. His primary area of legal and practice includes probate and estate planning, real estate and related business and tax matters.
He has been admitted to the State Bar of California, the U.S. Tax Court, the U.S. District Court, the Northern District of California, and the U.S. Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit. He is a member of the California Bar Association.
He holds a B.A. from the University of California at Berkeley and received his law degree from University of California’s Boalt Hall School of Law.
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Cora M. Tellez
Vice President
Cora M. Tellez has been an S.H. Cowell Foundation board member since 1996, and has over 25 years experience in the health care industry.
Ms. Tellez has held executive positions with leading health insurance companies. She began her career with Kaiser Foundation Health Plan, eventually becoming the vice president and regional manager of its Hawaii health plan. From there she served as CEO of Blue Shield's Bay Region, and was later recruited to serve as president of Prudential Health Care's western operations. She then joined Health Net of California as its president and CEO, and eventually led its health plan operations in California, Oregon, Arizona, Connecticut, New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania serving more than 3.6 million members with revenues of $8 billion. More recently, Ms. Tellez founded Sterling HSA which administers health savings accounts nationally.
Ms. Tellez serves on several boards, including Mills College, Crescent Healthcare, and First Consulting Group. In the past she has served on the boards of the Bank of Hawaii, Glendale Federal Bank, Cal Fed Bank, and Catellus Development Corporation. She received a B.A. from Mills College and a master’s degree in public administration from California State University at Hayward.
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Mary Lee Widener
Mary Lee Widener has been an S.H. Cowell Foundation board member since 2000.
Ms. Widener is the president and chief executive officer of Neighborhood Housing Services of America, an organization she co-founded in 1974 and grew from a $250,000 pilot project into a social investment conduit now worth more than one and a half billion dollars.
In addition to the Cowell Foundation, Ms. Widener also serves on the Board of Directors of The PMI Group, the First American Corporation, Social Compact, the National Housing Conference, and Operation HOPE, Inc. Her past professional activity includes serving as Chair of the Federal Home Loan Bank of San Francisco, participating on the U.S. Senate's National Housing Task Force, and in the International Exchange of Housing Professionals sponsored by the Ford Foundation.
She has received numerous awards and honors throughout her career, including the National Housing Conference 2000 Housing Person of the Year Award, an Honorary Doctor of Laws Degree from John F. Kennedy University, and The Candace Award for Business Economic Development from the New York-based National Coalition of 100 Black Women. Ms. Widener graduated from Heald Business College, attended Southwestern State College and completed the Public Administration Program at the University of San Francisco School of Professional Studies.
