Every team — be it sports, business or Denver Health Medical Center — has its most valuable player; sometimes a whole bunch of them.
At the sports-themed Triumph Over Challenge Gala, Denver’s safety-net hospital saluted seven of its most treasured resources: Bruce and Lisa Alexander, Barbara Burry, Hubert Farbes, Chris and Yvette Frampton and Evi Makovsky.Dan and Cheri Issel (he’s the former head coach of the Denver Nuggets) chaired the dinner, dance and auction held at the Sheraton Denver; Denver Broncos head coach Mike Shanahan and his wife, Peggy, were the honorary chairs. The record 1,200-plus guests tally was a 20 percent increase in attendance over last year.
“At our first gala, almost everyone (present) was a Denver Health employee,” recalled medical director and CEO Patricia Gabow. “But this year’s record-setting event demonstrates the noble role Denver Health plays” in the community at large.
Each has made a unique contribution to Denver Health, going the distance to help make it a national model for delivering Level 1 health care for all.
Bruce Alexander, the president and CEO of Vectra Bank Colorado, is chairman of the Denver Health and Hospitals Authority board, while Lisa, who left a rewarding interior design career to be a full-time mom to the couple’s three children, co-chaired the 2007 Denver Health gala. Burry, a nine-year member of the gala committee, has an MBA from Boston University and was president of Medibanc, an emergency medical services billing company.
Farbes, a shareholder at Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, earned his law degree from Yale, serves on the Denver Health and Hospitals Authority board, and was a state assistant attorney general before going into private practice. The Framptons (he’s managing partner at Riverfront Park and she is a documentary filmmaker) met at Davidson College and are the parents of two. Her service at Denver Health includes volunteering as a Spanish interpreter, membership on the Denver Health Foundation board, and serving as president of the Denver Health Volunteer Association. They will chair the 10th-anniversary gala in 2009.
Evi Makovsky’s interest in Denver Health began when her husband, Evan, became a member of the Denver Health Foundation board. An attorney and former social worker, she is a longtime member of the gala’s auction committee.
Guests included Colorado first lady Jeannie Ritter; Mayor John Hickenlooper and wife Helen Thorpe; and Denver City Council members Michael Hancock, Jeanne Robb, Carla Madison and Marcia Johnson, who was high bidder on a pedicure. She said she was going to have her toenails painted with a pink ribbon to support her daughter, who was walking in the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer.
Society editor Joanne Davidson: 303-809-1314 or jdavidson@denver ; also, blogs.denverpost
