State’s Con Alma Foundation celebrates its 20th anniversary

As the Con Alma Foundation nears its 20th anniversary and is about to award its latest Health Hero, it’s an appropriate time to recognize the work of this unique health foundation.

I was superintendent of insurance for New Mexico Public Regulation Commission in 2001 when Blue/Cross Blue Shield decided to become a for-profit organization and to sell its nonprofit entity. That transaction came under my purview, so I contacted lawmakers, health professionals, policymakers, medical school officials and community leaders to organize statewide meetings to determine how best to utilize those health proceeds and to assist underserved communities such as Latino and Native Americans.

We decided to create the foundation, and as the president and chairman of the first board, I enlisted what could be called a who’s who of New Mexicans.

Literally hundreds of people were involved in creating the foundation. (I undoubtedly will forget someone and I ask you to forgive me if I don’t include you.)

Key players included then-Attorney General Patricia Madrid; then-Assistant Attorney General Don Trigg; former Children, Youth and Families Secretary Debbie Hartz; attorney Richard Carpenter; former state Democratic Party Chairman Mike Anaya; Roswell grassroots leader Frank Sanchez; and nurse Elaine Montaño, who started clinics in underserved areas of Northern New Mexico. They and Arturo Gonzales were key members of the Community Advisory Committee.

Robert Desiderio, the former dean of the University of New Mexico law school, became the first executive director and, along with Cynthia Delgado, ran the organization for several years. Delgado is now a marketing director for the National Dance Institute of New Mexico, a phenomenal organization working with young people. Raymond Sanchez, the longest serving speaker of the state House of Representatives volunteered to become part of our board, as did Arturo Jaramillo, another former New Mexico Cabinet secretary for General Services and a past New Mexico Bar Association president. This was a true community effort.

The foundation created an endowment that began with $18 million that has now granted millions of dollars to community nonprofits that serve tens of thousands of clients across the state. Con Alma Foundation became the largest foundation serving health needs in New Mexico. I believe it’s a model for the rest of the country.

From the start, the foundation was unique in that it was organized not only with a board of directors but also a diverse Community Advisory Council called the “soul” of the foundation. That organizational structure remains in place today.

Dolores Roybal, executive director for 14 years, will retire next year, and she will pass on a foundation that has established a national model for others to emulate.

In 2003 Imagen Magazine ,an award-winning publication in New Mexico, did a cover story that focused on Latino health and wellness in New Mexico and the efforts we at Con Alma were making to serve the minority and majority populations. New Mexico is the only Latino-majority state in the country, and it has the highest number of uninsured residents. Con Alma Foundation’s work made an impact from its beginning.

The foundation has gone on to garner even more success. Its reputation attracted the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Kellogg Foundation, which approached them and have awarded a million dollars and half-million dollars, respectively, to combat the coronavirus in the state.

I’m proud to have been part of a great community model that included government, the corporate sector and small nonprofit health organizations to serve the disenfranchised rural and urban communities to improve the well-being of all New Mexicans.

All the founders and the staff are to be recognized and honored as heroes in their own right.