About Firedoll Foundation

Sandor and Faye Straus
Sandor and Faye Straus are unrepentant liberals who met in Berkeley during Senator Eugene McCarthy's campaign for the Presidency in 1968. Faye received her B.A. in Political Science from the University of California, Berkeley that year. Sandor completed his Ph.D. in Mathematics at Berkeley in 1972.

Sandor Straus taught mathematics and computer science at the Universitat Erlangen-Nurnberg in Germany, and at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. He has been involved in financial modeling and investing since 1980 with Renaissance Technology Corp. and Merfin LLC, a financial consulting company.

Faye worked in government at the federal and local levels, including positions in budget analysis and research for the Suffolk County Legislature and the Suffolk County Probation Department in New York. For the past sixteen years she has concentrated on raising their two children, Aaron and Anna, and has been a "professional volunteer," focusing on maternal and child health issues.


The Foundation
In 1993, Sandor and Faye set up the donor-advised "Straus Family Fund" with the San Francisco Foundation. In 1998, they launched the privately funded, Firedoll Foundation. Named after their cats Fireworks and Dolly, The Firedoll Foundation helps non-profits fight the good fight for environmental conservation and justice, immigrant rights, community development, Mid-East peace, and offers support for those affected by traumatic brain injury.

Neil Sims, Program Officer for Firedoll Foundation has a background in environmental non-profit work and holds a degree in environmental science.

For information about applying for a grant from the Firedoll Foundation, please see information for grant seekers. If you have further questions, please feel free to email: neil@firedoll.org.