Derby Girl
KARI YATKOWSKI WORKS TIRELESSLY TO SUPPORT NONPROFIT COMMUNITY
She drives her children to school, heads to
the office to work on a client’s corporate-giving
strategy, conducts a media interview and then
hosts a committee meeting for one of the several
nonprofit committees on which she serves.
And that’s before noon. Kari Yatkowski seems to
do it all – and she hopes to do it well.
Yatkowski is CEO of Corporate Citizen, a business she founded and runs with her husband, Karl, to help clients develop an effective, meaningful giving strategy. She is also the founder and president of Haven Charitable Foundation, whose mission is to assist agencies focused on health, domestic violence and education.
She has chaired – and still serves on – the board of Homeward Bound, she co-chaired the capital campaign for Banner MD Anderson Cancer Center, and she also serves on the Suns Charities board of directors, the Heart Ball committee and the Arizona Women's Board. In early April, she co-chaired Supreme Evening at the Lazy B Ranch for the O’Connor House.
All of that would be enough to wear most people out. But wait: For the O’Connor House event, she and her 10-year-old twin sons, Tate and Tyler, planted succulents for the centerpieces, which she created in burlap-wrapped containers – along with Mason jars for the candles – that adorned the tables. She and co-chair Tracy Bame challenged themselves to keep the expenses down, and they did.
“I’m hands-on,” she says.
She's also given to understatement. For Homeward Bound's Derby Affair, she moved furniture from her home to fill the center grassy area at the Arizona Biltmore event site.
Yatkowski is still going strong. Next up is Off to the Races, a May 3 fundraiser to benefit Banner Alzheimer’s Institute and Banner MD Anderson Cancer Center. Off to the Races is a Derby-style event, complete with Southern fare, cocktails of all sorts, a raffle, and wagering throughout the day. The women will don hats and garden party dresses, and the men will dazzle in gentlemanly seersucker or khaki with ties and hats.
Off to the Races is a sequel of sorts to Derby Affair, a long-standing fundraiser for Homeward Bound. That isn’t surprising: The idea to host an afternoon-long outdoor party on Kentucky Derby day came out of the mind of Kari Yatkowski. When the Homeward Bound board decided to concentrate their fundraising on other projects, she asked the Banner Health Foundation leadership if they would want to host a Derby event. Both boards were in agreement: Homeward Bound was happy to pass on the successful model to Banner, and Banner was eager to take it on. Yatkowski will serve as an advisory chair along with Suzanne Hilton.
“I’m so excited the Derby event landed somewhere where it will flourish,” Yatkowski says.
Then what? She will begin checking out colleges with her son Griffin, who completes his junior year at Brophy in May. Then maybe it will be time for a breather, before fall arrives along with the new social season.
