James W. Gerard

James W. Gerard is a Senior Partner and Managing Director of North Sea Partners LLC. He is responsible for raising equity for alternative fund groups, both private equity and hedge funds. His target markets include family offices, foundations, endowments, and institutional investors in the US and Europe. Prior to joining North Sea, he was a Principal at Juniper Capital Group, a private placement agency, where his clients included LCF Rothschild's European Buyout Funds of Funds, J. Hirsh & Co (an Italian buyout firm), Piper Jaffray's CleanTech Funds of Funds, Excelsior Capital, Galtere Capital, Rosinus Financial Fund, Zilkha Investment Partners, and De Visscher & Co. He is a former director of ASPCA and Phoenix House and holds a BA from George Washington University's Elliott School of International Affairs.

Don P. Moriarty, Jr.

Don Moriarty’s advertising career spans over twenty-five years. During this time, he has worked for several of New York’s largest advertising agencies and many of the best-known advertisers in the United States. Clients with whom Don has worked include Procter & Gamble, Kraft, Miller Brewing Company, Virgin Atlantic Airways, The Trump Organization, JP Morgan/Chase, Merck, Johnnie Walker and its parent company Diageo. In 1991, Don founded his own advertising agency, Moriarty Communications. He later formed a partnership with Sir Richard Branson of the Virgin Group in London to form CMG Communications, an award-winning agency best known for its humorous advertising created for Virgin Atlantic Airways. In 2004, Don formed Moriarty, Dougherty and Partners, a spin-off of his former agency CMG. Today, his company is focused on custom software development for the beer and distilled spirits industries.

Alan Mattone

Alan Mattone is a private investor focusing on investments in entertainment and the Internet. Alan is currently a principal at RegiPort.com—a startup company focusing on web-based software solutions for small businesses. Prior to RegiPort, Alan focused his investments on documentary films including serving as Executive Producer on the documentary TOOTS, a portrait of New York saloonkeeper and personality Toots Shor, which garnered several nominations and awards. Alan is a graduate of Villanova University.

Patricia Ardigo

Patricia H.C. Ardigo is a First Vice President in the Westchester-Connecticut office of CB Richard Ellis. She has over 18 years of experience in commercial real estate, most of which were spent providing service to clients in the Fairfield County, CT and Westchester County, NY markets. Throughout her career, Ms. Ardigo has acted as both tenant and landlord agent for clients in industries of all kinds. Her current focus, however, is on servicing the growing real estate needs of biotechnology, life sciences and pharmaceutical companies, and working with owners and developers to provide appropriate operational facilities for these firms. To aid her efforts in this concentration, Ms. Ardigo is the Director of CB Richard Ellis’ Life Sciences Group, a consortium of domestic and international brokers who not only look to educate and represent biotechnology, life science and pharmaceutical companies as tenant or landlord’s broker, but seek to facilitate the development of research parks.

Barbara Klippert, Esq., Secretary

Barbara Klippert is a partner in the New York City office of the international law firm Bingham McCutchen LLP where she specializes in the employee benefit aspects of capital market transactions. Ms. Klippert has been a member of numerous Boards of Directors and fund raising committees, as well as serving as pro bono legal counsel for, a variety of charitable and civic organizations and educational institutions in Rochester and Buffalo, New York and New York City

Lawrence E. May, Treasurer

Lawrence E. May, Certified Financial Planner, is the President of May Financial Group Ltd, a financial planning firm, Chief Executive Officer of May Capital Group, a FINRA registered licensed broker-dealer, and Managing Director of Strategic Advisors, LLC, a Registered Investment Advisory Firm. Larry’s primary role as a principal in a financial planning firm is to advise clients, both individuals and businesses, on how to effectively manage and maximize all aspects of their finances. He also dedicates his organizational talents to his passion for community involvement, which presently includes being the President of the Board of the Sara Chait Memorial Foundation. The Sara Chait Memorial Foundation provides grants for medical research to such esteemed hospitals as Mount Sinai, Memorial Sloan Kettering, NYU, and New York Presbyterian amongst others.

Lauralouise Duffy-Blatt, Vice President

Lauralouise Duffy Blatt is a Principal and the CEO of Global Fund Exchange. Ms. Duffy was instrumental in creating Global Fund Exchange in order to provide clients with a compelling purpose-driven and integrity based investment strategy to leave a sustainable legacy. Ms. Duffy has created multiple strategies for institutional investors who wish to invest with purpose and leave a legacy for future generations through prudent and profitable investments in the most compelling and important vital asset classes, including water, clean energy, agriculture and natural resources. As co-portfolio manager, Ms. Duffy carries out the fund management activities including portfolio construction, manager selection, due diligence, macro overlay, asset allocation and portfolio management from the New York headquarters.

For 6 years prior to Global Fund Exchange, Ms. Duffy was a Partner and the Chief Operating Officer of FNY Capital, the alternative investment arm of First New York Securities. Since the year 2000, Ms. Duffy managed the operations, compliance and administration of 11 hedge funds and a managed account platform for the firm. Ms. Duffy has spent over 20 years running the operations, due diligence, administration and compliance for hedge funds, fund of funds, and investment businesses in geographies around the world including Europe, Eastern Europe, Russia, Asia and South America. Strategies have included global macro, energy, commodities, emerging markets, public and private equities.

A hands-on self-starter, Ms. Duffy is known for defining goals, initiating actions and achieving outcomes. She has applied the same vigor to active philanthropy. Prior to co-founding LBFF she participated in such Organizations as AHRC, Special Olympics, New York Blood Center, Breast Cancer Foundation, Aids Rides USA.

Diane Romo
Surgical Coordinator

From email to the operating room, in her role as Surgical Coordinator, Diane Romo manages all aspects of the Little Baby Face Foundation experience. Talking through surgery procedures, securing passports and medical visas, assisting with travel plans, coordinating places to stay pre- and post-operation, and helping to create a network among patients are just a few of the services Diane provides each day.

“I have the best job in the world. I am the first person that parents speak with, so I get to offer them the hope that their child can be helped. There is a need to reach out to children with birth defects across the globe, and we work with families from as far away as Malaysia, and as close as New York City’s five boroughs. LBFF families are so appreciative of our work, but it’s me who is honored. I get to assist in providing stellar medical care for children who would never otherwise receive it.”

Thomas Romo, III, M.D., President

Dr. Thomas Romo is currently the director of facial, plastic and reconstructive surgery at Lenox Hill Hospital and the Manhattan Eye, Ear and Throat Hospital. He is a world-renowned innovator in surgical techniques involving reconstruction of the nose, ear and face. For the past twenty years, Dr. Romo has also dedicated his considerable talents to advancing microtia surgery. Dr. Romo is a graduate of Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, TX, and has completed fellowships in facial plastic and reconstructive surgery at The New York Eye and Ear Infirmary and Tampa General Hospital. He is past president of the New York Facial Plastic Surgery Society, and the eastern section vice president of the American Academy of Facial, Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery. He has published more than seventy-five chapters and papers on the latest techniques in facial plastic surgery, and his textbook, “Aesthetic Facial Plastic Surgery,” is considered a landmark on the topic. Dr. Romo is a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons and a member of the New York State and county medical societies.