Business executive Allen Boerner walked into the office of the Lestonnac Free Clinic in Orange. A member of its board of directors for four years, he liked to visit to see how things were going. The clinic was his passion, and he had a deep interest in its daily operations.
As he entered the nearly full waiting room, he noticed a big man with a small child on his lap. Their eyes met briefly, then the big man turned his head. The encounter stayed with Boerner.
He would learn that the man had just lost his job at an accounting firm. The fall from middle class to on-the-edge had left him and his family in a precarious financial position. Health insurance expired; he was there with his 1-year-old son, seriously ill with the flu, and the free clinic their only option.
That was 26 years ago—a meeting both men now see as serendipitous. The “big man” turned out to be Edward Gerber, and 16 years later he would join forces with Boerner to transform that single free clinic into a vital four-county health resource with 14 locations, 224 volunteer healthcare providers, 120 clinical and administrative volunteers, and 9,000 patients served each year.
Treating Patients as People
“It is an embarrassing situation to have to ask for help,” says Gerber, executive director of the Lestonnac Free Clinic since 2007.
“I have to give kudos to the staff back then and kudos to my staff now. No patient should ever be treated as if they’re being given something. They should be treated just as if they are going to a regular doctor’s office. Here, people are treated with the respect they deserve.”
Boerner, now chief executive of Granite Investment Group, has been an investor in Southern California commercial real estate since the late 1970s. He was introduced to the Lestonnac Free Clinic in 1987 by friend Carl Karcher, founder of the Carl’s Jr. hamburger chain. One of the things that impressed him most, he says, was the compassion of the nuns who ran the clinic and the professionalism of the volunteer nurses and doctors who engaged with patients.
Boerner joined the board, and three decades after his first tour of the clinic is still a board member and has helped steer the organization through expansion from one location to 14 in a decade. He credits Gerber with its success, but seeing the interaction between the two men, it’s evident they’re a team.
Growth Meets Need
Gerber’s son recovered from the flu as Dad reversed his fortunes. He opened his own accounting firm, and about a year later took on the Lestonnac Free Clinic as a client. Gerber admired the clinic and its mission so much that he became its full-time accountant three years after that first visit. And in 2007, he took over as executive director.
Throughout the years, Boerner was ever-present on the board, chairing events, making personal financial contributions, and leveraging his passion to bring others into the fold. He and Gerber became friends, brainstorming operational issues and discussing plans for the future. That future included adding a dozen clinics.
Gerber’s first step was recruiting more doctors and medical staff to volunteer their time, and doctors were quick to join the effort. At the same time he began developing strategic partnerships with hospitals and other clinics throughout Orange County, trading the services of the volunteer doctors and nurses for space in their facilities.
“Honestly, everyone I talked with agreed to our proposal almost immediately,” he recalls. “They see the value in it. The ERs were inundated. People had nowhere else to go. We’re filling a need that these communities desperately need filled.”
Since 2007, Lestonnac has added 13 locations. There are six in OC, two in Los Angeles, five in Riverside County, and one in San Bernardino County.
They also serve as teaching facilities for medical students. Lestonnac has partnered with the University of California-Irvine and Chapman University to allow medical students to treat patients under the supervision of volunteer medical doctors.
Lestonnac clinics provide primary, dental, optometry and even specialty care, including acupuncture, allergy care, cardiology, chiropractic, dermatology, ear, nose and throat, endocrinology, gastroenterology, general surgery, gynecology, nephrology, neurology, obstetrics, ophthalmology, orthopedics, otolaryngology, podiatry, pulmonology and urology.
“The growth has been astounding,” Boerner says. “Without Ed, this clinic would not have grown as fast as it has.”
Gerber is quick to note that Granite Investment Group is the largest financial supporter of the clinics, but Boerner declines to say what his company contributes. He did disclose that for the past decade Granite has underwritten the clinics’ annual Thanksgiving dinner for roughly $50,000 each year (see story, page 15).
Other sponsors are City National Bank, Medtronic, the Orange County Community Foundation, Wells Fargo, Pacific Life Foundation, Kaiser Permanente, Dignity Health and Delta Dental.
The Lestonnac clinics provided care valued at $9.6 million this year. “You can’t put a price on good health,” Boerner says.
Overlapping Missions
While Gerber was building partnerships and recruiting doctors, Boerner was securing donations and spreading the word about the organization. Many people he brings around become supporters. Boerner has also worked to ensure that young people in need have access to the healthcare the clinics provide. He’s actively involved with the Guardian Scholars program, established in 1998 in collaboration with the Orangewood Children’s Foundation to help foster youth achieve education and career goals.
“These students have limited resources,” he says. “I’ll send them here so that they can see the doctor, the dentist, whatever they need.”
The clinic now has political friends. State Sen. Janet Nguyen and Congressman Lou Correa are frequent participants in activities and health fairs with the clinic and have helped raise its profile.
“We have a Republican and a Democrat working together to help out the people,” jokes Gerber. “If we only had that in Congress, imagine what our country could get done.”
