When the Castellano Family Foundation announced last month it was shutting down its operations in June, people wondered if anything would take its place to provide funding for nonprofits serving the Latino community.
The answer came Thursday with the announcement of the Alcario and Carmen Castellano/Silicon Valley Community Foundation Endowment Fund. It will be seeded with $500,000 from the Castellano foundation that will be matched by the community foundation. The announcement was made at a lunch celebrating the foundation’s grantees at the Hotel De Anza in downtown San Jose.
This legacy will continue supporting the LatinX community in perpetuity,” Silicon Valley Community Foundation Executive Vice President Gina Dalmas said. “This fund, in effect, transfers the stewardship of the work of the Castellano Family Foundation to the community itself to continue the Castellanos’ proud tradition of investing in LatinX leaders in our LatinX community.”
The story behind the Castellano Family Foundation is legendary in Silicon Valley, with Alcario and Carmen Castellano winning a record $141 million lottery jackpot in 2001. Alcario Castellano, who was at Thursday’s lunch, says he was making plans to go to Bermuda while his wife — who passed away in 2020 — was thinking of all the community organizations they could help with the windfall. Carmen’s idea won out, though the couple “went to Bermuda plenty of times,” Alcario Castellano said.
Camela Castellano-Garcia, the couple’s daughter who succeeded her mom as president of the foundation, said partnering with the Silicon Valley Community Foundation was the right choice following the sunsetting of the family foundation — and one that her mom started laying the groundwork for years ago.
“This was a long-term vision, to look at the largest community foundation in the world right in our backyard,” said Castellano-Garcia, who will advise the endowment fund along with her brother, Armando Castellano. “That seemed like the best possible partner we could find if we want to wield influence and attempt to correct the inequity.”
Alcario Castellano said he was proud of the work his family had done to create more opportunities for Latinos in Silicon Valley and happy their work will continue, a sentiment echoed by Diane Ortiz, executive director of a grantee, Youth Alliance. “The Castellanos, their voice in philanthropy has been vocal and persistent for decades. Now, philanthropy has to step up and step into that.”
FEAST FOR 49ERS FANS: The Dwight Clark Legacy Series is coming to the California Theatre in downtown San Jose on May 10, featuring current and former 49ers, and it should be quite a treat for fans.
Coach Kyle Shanahan will have a state-of-the-team conversation with NBC Sports Bay Area’s Matt Maiocco and Laura Britt; TJ Rodgers — a hall-of-famer in Silicon Valley CEO circles — and Mike Holmgren will have a conversation with Brent Jones about leadership and building teams; and Hall of Famer Bryant Young will present the Dwight Clark Award to Fred Warner, the Niners linebacker who was selected as best representing Clark’s spirit of teamwork, commitment and camaraderie. And there will be one more conversation with some of the team’s biggest names: Jerry Rice, John Taylor, Ed McCaffrey and his son, Christian McCaffrey.
The Dwight Clark Legacy Series has its roots in “Letters to 87,” a book by Maiocco containing letters fans wrote about what “The Catch” meant to them at Clark’s request after he was diagnosed with ALS. Clark died in 2018 before the book’s publication, but in December 2019, Maiocco sat down with some of Clark’s former teammates to talk about his legacy in a sold-out event at the Lesher Center
“We knew then that we had something that would allow us to celebrate Dwight and continue to keep his legacy shining bright,” said Kirk Reynolds, the 49ers director of public relations from 1997-2005 who has been involved with the event since the start. “The Dwight Clark Legacy Series, featuring lively conversations with current and former 49ers, was born.”
Tickets to next Wednesday’s event are $87 — Clark’s number, naturally — and proceeds benefit the Golden Heart Fund, an initiative through which former 49ers players support one another through post-career challenges. Go to goldenheartfund.org/dcls for more information and tickets.
LAST LUNAFEST?: Lunafest, the annual festival of films made by women about women, is back at the San Jose Woman’s Club on May 12. It’s the first time the festival has been in person after two years as a virtual event, but it also might be the last time. Luna — the company behind the nutrition bars — started the traveling festival in 2001, and has raised more than $7 million since then. The late Lani Luthard brought it to San Jose in 2009, hosting it at her home, and it has continued to be held in her honor since her death in 2015.
Lynda Sereno, the current organizer with the Woman’s Club, said Luna cut short this year’s season and has put the 2024 plans on hold.
Tickets are $90, including a four-course dinner and popcorn, and there’s also a boutique for local businesses, cancer prevention tips and an auction that includes “living room” seating with tables for the two halves of the film festival. Proceeds benefit Breast Cancer Prevention Partners, Chicken and Egg Pictures (a local nonprofit supporting women filmmakers) and the SJWC Charitable Giving Program, which funds nonprofits including the San Jose Day Nursery and Next Door Solutions. You can get tickets at lunafest-sj.eventbrite.com, and there’s also an online viewing option.
