Allen Andersson

Allen Andersson describes himself as a mathematician by training, an engineer by trade, an entrepreneur by vocation, and now a plutocrat by circumstance. A decade ago, his telecommunications start-up invented the software basis for internet telephony, and he began to finance projects designed to bring Central America into the First World. He is the principal owner of WaveCrest Laboratories, Amylin Pharmaceuticals, and a portfolio of smaller science-based companies, as well as the president of Paperboy Ventures. He is also president of The Riecken Foundation, whose first project is the construction and incubation of one thousand community libraries and internet centers in Central America. Follow-on projects include agriculture reform, anti-corruption programs, progressive schooling, and transparent business practices.

Joseph Eldridge

Reverend Joseph Eldridge is university chaplain and adjunct faculty member in the School of International Service at American University. Eldridge has spent more than twenty-five years working in the public policy arena as an advocate and analyst on international human rights and humanitarian issues. He has published a number of op-eds and book chapters and has been interviewed for “60 Minutes” by Mike Wallace and by Bill Moyers for a special of “God and Politics.” In 1991 he established the Washington office of the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights; during the mid-1980s he worked in Honduras consulting on human rights and development issues; and after a three year sojourn in Chile in the early 1970s he founded the Washington Office on Latin America and served as its first director. He has an M.A. from American University and a Masters in Divinity from Southern Methodist University.

Mike Farrell

Co-chair of the California Committee of Human Rights Watch, Mike Farrell is also spokesperson for CONCERN/America, an international refugee aid and development organization, chair of Death Penalty Focus and, occasionally, a Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. Known to millions of the world’s viewers as “B.J. Hunnicutt” of television’s historic “M*A*S*H” series and to fewer as the producer of Universal Pictures’ hit “Patch Adams,” he most recently starred in NBC-TV’s “Providence.” A refugee aid and human rights activist for over 20 years, Farrell has taken part in aid missions and human rights delegations to El Salvador, Nicaragua and Honduras, among numerous others, and represented one such delegation in testimony before the U.S. Congress. An opponent of the death penalty and an advocate of prison reform, Farrell has visited prisons and has been involved in death penalty cases across the U.S. and in many foreign lands.

Kathleen Kennedy Townsend

Kathleen Kennedy Townsend served as Lieutenant Governor of Maryland from January 18, 1995 to January 15, 2003. Upon taking office in 1995, Townsend made a national name for herself as an advocate of victims’ rights and an innovator in the fight against crime. She served as chair of the Maryland Cabinet Council on Criminal and Juvenile Justice, and in that capacity, developed the first statewide initiative in the nation that targets crime hotspots. As lieutenant governor, she was also at the forefront on issues such as quality education and healthcare. Before becoming Lt. Governor, Townsend served as Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the U.S. Department of Justice, during which time she worked to establish community policing programs across the country. She is the founder of the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award, the former chair of the board of the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Foundation, and serves on the board of directors of the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation.

CIP Board Members

Lowell Blankfort

President of Blankfort Unlimited Inc., a firm specializing in media consulting, article and column writing. In addition Lowell has done special articles, mostly on foreign countries, from in-depth series on political hot spots like Afganistan, Iraq and Cuba to colorful travel articles on primitive backwaters like Benin, Outer Mongolia and Papua New Guinea. Lowell has interviewed many heads of state and of governments, including Fidel Castro in Cuba, Kim Dae Jung in Korea, Li Peng and Li Xiannian in China, Paul Kagame in Rwanda, Keith Mitchell in Granada, Joaquin Balaguer in the Dominican Republic, Rodrigo Carazo in Costa Rica, in addition to two Nobel Peace Prize winners – Kim Dae Jung and Shirin Ebadi, in Iran. He has won a series of awards including the Best Editorial in the United States from the National Newspaper Association, Civic Recognition Award, City of Chula Vista, for outstanding service to the community and Headliner of the Year San Diego Press Club, for nationwide recognition for editorial writing among others.

Thomas Cooper

Thomas Cooper, founder and CEO of Gulfstream International Airlines, has been significantly involved for numerous years in the airline industry, specifically in the development of charter air service between Cuba and the United States. A graduate of Embry Riddle Aeronautical University where he earned his Bachelor of Science degree in Management, Mr. Cooper has an Airline Transport rating, Flight Engineer License, and a Flight Instructor’s License. In 1976, he established Air Florida Commuter, which focused on connecting passengers from Miami with various locations in the Caribbean, and in 1989 founded Gulfstream International, an airline that today operates a fleet of 32 jet-prop aircraft. Gulfstream currently operates two daily flights between Miami and Havana. Mr. Cooper is also the CEO of the Gulfstream Training Academy, one of the nation’s leading professional pilot training companies.

Jeffery Horowitz

Mr. Horowitz founded Urbanists International in September of a non-profit organization offering urban design, planning, and economic development assistance to developing countries. As an architectural designer, he has directed a wide variety of large-scale urban projects with the firms of Skidmore, Owings, and Merrill, and Kaplan, McLaughlin & Diaz. His projects include commercial centers and high-rise office towers across the U.S. and in Paris, Barcelona, Brussels, Milan, Jakarta, Hong Kong, and Singapore. Mr. Horowitz received his Master of Architecture degree from the Harvard University Graduate School of Design, where he founded The Harvard Architecture Review. At the time, Mr. Horowitz was also appointed a Harvard teaching fellow, a Graham Foundation Scholar, and was the recipient of Harvard’s Appleton Award for architectural scholarship. From 1991-1996 he served as chairman of the Planning Commission of Berkeley, California. Mr. Horowitz currently serves as chairman of the board of trustees for the Head-Royce School in Oakland, California. Mr. Horowitz directs the Rosengarten/Horowitz Fund, a non-profit family foundation focused on local and international humanitarian causes.

Conrad Martin

Conrad Martin served in the Peace Corps from 1981 to 1983 as a Forage Agronomist on the island of Barbados and currently is the executive director of the Stewart R. Mott Charitable Trust. He is also executive director of the Fund for Constitutional Government, a tax-exempt publicly supported foundation created to eliminate corruption in government. The Fund sponsors the Project on Government Oversight (POGO), the Government Accountability Project (GAP), and the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), as well as an Investigation Journalism Project. Additionally, Mr. Martin chairs the Board of Directors of HALT, Americans for Legal Reform and the Government Accountability Project, and also serves on the boards of the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy, the Peace and National Security Funders Group, PeacePAC and the Interhemispheric Resource Center.