Board of Directors

President: Shaun Bracken
Vice President: Susan Doria
Recording Secretary: Sandy Katzman
Corresponding Secretary: Kimberly Jacobson
Treasurer: Ingrid Haas
Authors Luncheon Chairman: Susan Purtill
Immediate Past President: Jennifer Carmer
Administrative Consultant: Robyn Lee

Board Members

Kimberly Afkhami, Ann Albers, Elise Bard, Laura Bill, Irene Bonadurer, Julie Bowe, Shaun Bracken, Jan Cacheris, Jennifer Carmer, Susan Doria, Lisa Ghelfi, Christine Gustafson, Ingrid Haas, Megan Hackbarth, Carrie Hall, Nadine Hart, Brenda Howard, Jackie Hutt, Carolyn Jackson, Kimberly Jacobsen, Dana Jirauch, Sandy Katzman, Stephanie Kerkorian, Sandy Kostis, Robyn Lee, Sheri Levin, Amy Louis, Lynne Love, Kathleen McClain, Carey Pena Susan Purtill, Alexa Schneider, Margo Shein, Amy Slethaug, Marci Symington, Kristine Thompson, April Ward, and Candyce Williams. In Memoriam, Honorary Member, Glenna Shapiro.

Sustaining Members List

Sydney Anderson, Leslie Berry, Jan Bohannon, Susan Charlton, Jane Christensen, Mary Crozier, Robyn DeBell, Ann Denk, Margie Denton, Jacquie Dorrance, Sydney Dye, Gee Gee Entz, Nancy Hanley Eriksson, Virginia Feffer, Shän Francis, Harriet Friedland, Colleen Gaia, Nancy Gaintner, Erin Gogolak, Babs Gordon, Lenni Griego, Penny Gunning, Leah Hoffman, Nan Howlett, Mary Hudak, Carrie Hulburd, Catherine Jacobson, Donna Johnson, Rona Kasen, Julie Kroot, Patti Lau, Jamie Lendrum, Suzanne Lewis, Judy Linhart, Julie Linhart, Janis Lyon, Sandy Magruder, Brenda Mason, Linda Mattes, Genny Matteucci, Linda Nachman, Virginia Nosky, Susan Palmer-Hunter, Joan Potter, Lois Savage, Judy Schubert, Sallye Schumacher, Susan Segal, Judy Shannon, Beverly Shaver, Susie Small, Betsy Stodola, Sue Stuckey, Sandi Thomas, JoAnn Tull, Polly Turpin, Melani Walton, Joan Warne, Nancy White, Kari Yatkowski and Rachel Zemer.

Past Luncheon Chairs

Erma's Founding Mission

Erma Bombeck invited fellow authors to join her for the country’s first Authors Luncheon in 1980. Why? Erma thought it would be a unique way to raise funds for Arizona kidney patients. She was right. The Authors Luncheon was an immediate success and quickly became an annual event. The Arizona Women’s Board is dedicated to continuing Erma’s tradition of bringing best-selling authors together to help write a brighter future for Arizona kidney patients. The Friends of Erma Bombeck Authors Luncheon has raised more than $12 million for programs that directly benefit Arizona’s kidney patients and their families. The Women’s Board is honored to continue Erma’s legacy each Fall at its gathering of best-selling authors who present their latest releases.

Last Year's Grant Recipients

We are most thankful for your gracious support of our Authors Luncheon. We are proud to have funded the following recipients.

Phoenix Children’s Hospital Foundation - $75,000 - Nephrology Patient Assistance

The Nephrology Patient Assistance Fund supports pediatric kidney patients and their families who may be experiencing hardships while children are undergoing kidney disease treatment. Patient assistance funding includes support for living expenses such as rent, utilities, mobile phone, food and transportation. Additionally, the fund is used to recognize pediatric kidney patients for successfully adhering to treatment protocols as well as to celebrate children following dialysis and/or kidney transplants. This year, the Assistance Fund will be purchasing additional pediatric blood pressure cuffs for monitoring patients at home between appointments.

TGen Foundation - $60,000 - Assessing the contribution of altered RNA splicing events to tumor immunogenicity in clear cell renal cell carcinoma.

The grant will strengthen the clinical study by enabling TGEN to accrue additional ccRCC patients and increase the statistical power of the findings to study these abnormal splicing events and their role in predicting response to immune therapy agents. This funding will go toward performing sequencing of ccRCC patient tumors to identify key mutations in addition to RNA sequencing.

Transplant Community Alliance - $25,000 - Living Assistance Fund for Kidney Transplant Patients.

The program assists transplant patients who have lost income and incurred additional expenses due to a transplant surgery. The eligible expenses covered are rent or mortgage payments, utility bills, transportation costs, co-pays for medication and insurance premiums. Payments are made directly to the provider or landlord on behalf of the kidney patients. TCA celebrated 30 years in 2019 as the only non-profit dedicated to helping AZ kidney transplant recipients.

Valleywise Health Foundation - $100,000 - Food Pharmacy Project

The Food Pharmacy Project provides nutritional food boxes to underserved populations with diabetes that are at high risk of developing advanced stage kidney disease. St. Mary’s Food Bank supplies food boxes to Valleywise Health primary care clinics where diabetic patients are required to attend bi-monthly health check-ups and participate in educational meal planning. Providing food boxes to patients at the health clinics removes the challenges and stigma of having to travel to a food bank and ensures diabetic patients have access to critical nutrition. Additionally, the grant provides for a research medical assistant and bio-statistician to analyze project data. This year’s grant will fund the expansion of this program with the addition of a new Food Pharmacy location at the Avondale Comprehensive Health Center.

St. Joseph’s Foundation - $75,000 - Living Donor RN Coordinator Position for the Kidney Transplant Program at the John and Doris Norton Cardiothoracic & Transplantation Institute at St. Joseph's Hospital and Medical Center.
The funding of the Living Donor RN Coordinator position is critical to the overall growth of St. Joseph's Kidney Transplant Program, which is greatly increasing in volume due to a new partnership with Phoenix Children's Hospital to provide full service care for living donors and transplantation. The grant will provide first year startup cost for the Living Donor RN Coordinator.

National Kidney Foundation of Arizona - $211,390 - Path To Wellness Program

The Path to Wellness program provides mobile wellness screenings in geographically hard-to-reach communities to populations that are at high risk of developing kidney disease.  The mobile van is outfitted with laboratory equipment and supplies, educational materials, translation and interpreter services, and multi-media community outreach toolkits. Additionally, the mobile van can be used for post-screening kidney wellness workshops.

We hope you are as impressed with the great work being done by these organizations to advance kidney health in Arizona as we are! Thank you again for your kind support and generous contribution to furthering the Arizona Women’s Board mission.