Mary-Alice Frank, the CEO of the American Red Cross’ Northeast Ohio region, often says everyone has a Red Cross story – and to prove it, she often shares her family’s story.
In the early 1900s, Frank’s grandmother was orphaned in Turkey. She and her sister spent most of their youth in an orphanage.
After her grandmother immigrated to America in her teens, the sisters lost touch with each other. Nearly 60 years later, with the help of the American, Turkish and Greek Red Cross Societies, Frank’s grandmother found her sister living in Greece and brought her to the U.S.
It’s that family story that helped spur Frank to pursue a career with the Red Cross, which has now spanned 33 years — the last 13 as CEO of the region, which encompasses 11 Red Cross chapters.
As CEO, Frank has been instrumental in establishing Operation Save-A-Life, which has enhanced endowment funding to ensure that free smoke alarms, batteries and installations will continue in at-risk homes throughout Cleveland, Cleveland Heights, Euclid and South Euclid.
Frank has also lent strategic leadership to the growth of a training program for state certified nurse assistants, which is now the largest in Ohio.
Under Frank’s leadership, the Red Cross has achieved some key regional fundraising goals, including a spike in fee-for-service income from negligible to more than $4 million annually with a 10-percent margin. Frank’s leadership has also led to the conceptualization and execution of an endowment campaign, approximately $1 million in received gifts annually, the cultivation of more than $5 million in federal and state grants annually and the implementation of a board committee to convert international disaster relief donors into donors who give to local causes.
Frank has also helped to develop a matrix-based sales process for fundraising, which is now being implemented by the Red Cross on a nationwide basis.
How to reach: American Red Cross, (216) 431-3010 or www.redcross-cleveland.org
