Chicago, IL - Visions Ball 2010

The bi-yearly Visions Ball took place on October 16, 2010 at 6:30 pm at The Ritz-Carlton Chicago.  The gala raised over $600,000 to drive research for treatments and cures for blindness caused by retinal diseases.  The event had 320 attendees.

In attendance were co-chairs Dale & Nancy Pollak, with Visions Ball Founder and Foundation National Trustee Ira Schulman of Walton Street Capital serving as the honorary chair.  Among those gathered at the gala were families with loved ones affected by eye diseases that cause blindness.  

Tom Bernardin, Chairman and CEO of Leo Burnett Worldwide, was honored at the event with a Visionary Award for his philanthropic contributions to the Foundation.  He was accompanied by his twin nieces, Riley and Kelsey and nephew, Jim.  Young adults, Jim, 25, and Kelsey and Riley, 21 all have Stargardt disease.  Riley and Kelsey are college students, and Jim, lives in Chicago, is a student at Second City.  Tom has made it his mission to help his family and others with blinding diseases.

Event Co-chair Dale Pollak, founder and chairman of vAuto, also has Stargardt disease.  The winner of the 2010 Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of The Year award for Emerging Companies in the Midwest Region, he is also the author of two books featuring best practices and strategies for used car department: Velocity: From the Front Line to the Bottom Line and Velocity 2.0: Paint, Pixels & Profitability.

Also attending the gala were David Brint, CEO of Brinshore Development, LLC, and his wife Betsy, parents of a 13 year-old affected by Leber’s congenital amaurosis (LCA).    David serves as vice president of the Foundation’s Board of Directors.

“The Visions Ball is a wonderful event for such an important cause, “said Leo Burnett Worldwide Chairman & CEO, Tom Bernardin.  “I am honored to receive the Foundation’s Visionary Award. I see by working with the Foundation Fighting Blindness that treatments and cures for retinal diseases are possible, and I am hopeful that my nieces and nephew and the millions of others with blinding diseases will one day have their sight.”

The event included cocktails, an award ceremony and dinner, a raffle, auction and a performance by comedian/actor Alonzo Bodden. A performance by the Swing Shift Orchestra capped off the evening.