Energy Probe Research Foundation

Thomas Berger
Thomas Berger served on the EPRF Board of Directors from 1985 to 1988. He has an impressive legal and political history, including representing the New Democratic Party in Parliament from 1962 to 1963 and again in the BC legislature from 1966 to 1969. He was the sole Commissioner of the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline Inquiry (the Berger Commission), a BC Supreme Court Justice, and a pioneer of public consultations with indigenous peoples. Thomas Berger has also received 11 honorary degrees and authored Northern Frontier, Northern Homeland (1977) and Fragile Freedoms: Human Rights and Dissent in Canada (1981), and Village Journey (1986).

Arthur Bielfeld
Rabbi Arthur Bielfeld served on the EPRF Board of Directors from 1981 to 1990, and was Chairman of the Board from 1982 to 1986. Born in the United States, Rabbi Bielfeld was ordained in 1964 and emigrated to Canada in 1967. He is a founding member and continuing Executive Board Member of the Leo Baeck School, a former member of the Executive Board for the North York Mayor's Committee on Community Race & Ethnic Relations, past Chairman of Canadian Council of Reform Rabbis, and a former member of the Executive Board of the Central Conference of American Rabbis. Rabbi Bielfeld has been with the Temple Emanu-El in Toronto since 1967.

George Connell
(BA 1951, PhD 1955, Hon DSc 1993) President Emeritus Connell served as a University of Toronto professor and administrator for 20 years before his tenure as president from 1984 to 1990. He also served as president of the University of Western Ontario from 1977 to 1984. He is currently a senior policy adviser with the Canada Foundation for Innovation and past chair of the Protein Engineering Network of Centres of Excellence and the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy. He is also a director of Allelix Biopharmaceuticals Inc., a member of the Ontario Press Council, and a trustee of the McLaughlin Foundation.

Wendy Dobson
Wendy Dobson served on the EPRF Board of Directors from 1981 to 1983. She is a former president of the CD Howe Institute and associate deputy minister of finance in Ottawa. Ms. Dobson is currently the Director of the Institute for International Business with the Joseph L. Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto. She is also the editor of numerous books, including Fiscal Frameworks and Financial Systems in East Asia: How much do they matter? and East Asian Capitalism: Diversity and Dynamism.

Georges Erasmus
Georges Erasmus served on the EPRF Board of Directors from 1988 to 1998. Perhaps most widely recognized for his role as Chairman of the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples, Georges Erasmus was also chair of the University of Canada North (1971-1975), president of the Indian Brotherhood of Northwest Territories (later the Dene Nation), and elected National Chief for the Assembly of First Nations in 1985. In addition to these achievements, Georges Erasmus has been the Canadian delegate to such international conferences as the World Council of Indigenous Peoples.

John Helliwell
John Helliwell served on the EPRF Board of Directors from 1989 to 1990 and again from 1992 to 1994. He became a member of the Royal Commission on National Passenger Transportation in 1989. As an economist, John Helliwell has affiliations with the Department of Economics at the University of British Columbia and with the Centre for International Affairs at Harvard University.

George Ignatieff
George Ignatieff served on the EPRF Board of Directors from 1981 to 1987. A renowned internationalist, he was once Assistant Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, and a Canadian representative to the United Nations, the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), and the Geneva Disarmament Committee. George Ignatieff also held 8 honorary degrees and was a companion of the Order of Canada. In 1985, the former Chancellor of the University of Toronto wrote his memoirs, entitled The Making of a Peacemonger. Mr. Ignatieff passed away in 1989.

Jane Jacobs
Jane Jacobs is a founding member of EPRF and served on the Board of Directors from 1981 to 1997. A foremost urban theorist, she emphasizes diversified, organic, and sustainable city planning. Ms. Jacobs has explored this philosophy in such works as The Death and Life of Great American Cities, Cities and the Wealth of Nations, Systems of Survival, and The Nature of Economies (published March, 2000).

From Two Ways to Live
Jane Jacobs speaks with David Warren
The Idler, Summer 1993
David Warren: Yet we have a long tradition of government monopolies and monopoly franchises. Are there no natural monopolies? What about railways?

Jane Jacobs: The really important, vital government monopoly is over the use of force. All civilized governments must strive constantly to monopolize vengeance and force. ...

But to extend monopoly powers to things like railways or the the mail service, which are basically commercial, is pretty ridiculous. You see it is perfectly clear that the railway competes with airlines, with buses, and with private cars. And so why not with other railways? There is no natural monopoly in transportation.

Margaret Laurence
Margaret Laurence served on the Board of Directors from 1982 to 1987. The internationally acclaimed author lived all over the world, was named a companion of the Order of Canada, and received 13 honorary degrees. She began her writing career in Winnipeg and went on to publish such works as The Stone Angel, A Jest of God, The Fire Dwellers, Jason's Quest, The Diviners, and Heart of a Stranger. After her death in 1989, our Foundation, with the support of her family, established the Margaret Laurence Fund in order to celebrate her accomplishments and carry on her work.

Walter Pitman
A member of the EPRF Board of Directors from 1983 to 2000, and its chair from 1986 to 1998, Mr. Pitman has served in both the House of Commons and the Ontario Legislature, is an officer of the Order of Canada, and a member of the Order of Ontario. Mr. Pitman was the Dean of Arts and Science at Trent University and the President of Ryerson Polytechnic University, director of the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE) and the Ontario Arts Council (OAC), and president of the Ontario Educational Association. He has also received honourary degrees from McGill, York, and Trent Universities and is the author of Learning the Arts in an Age of Uncertainty.

David Suzuki
Dr. David Suzuki served on the EPRF Board of Directors from 1988 to 1990. He is now chair of the David Suzuki Foundation. A renowned geneticist and Canadian broadcaster, Dr. Suzuki has received 15 honorary doctorates from schools in Canada, Australia, and the United States. He has also been part of such critically acclaimed series as The Nature of Things (CBC-TV), A Planet for the Taking, The Secret of Life (PBS), The Brain (Discovery Channel), From Naked Ape to Superspecies, It's a Matter of Survival, and Quirks and Quarks (CBC-radio).

Harry Swain
Harry Swain is a company director and management consultant. On leaving the Canadian federal government, where he had worked for 22 years, including eight as a deputy minister (Indian Affairs, Industry), he became CEO of Hambros Canada and a director of its UK merchant banking parent. When Hambros was bought by Société Générale, he stayed for the transition but left in September 1998 to found the Toronto office of Sussex Circle, a consultancy concentrating on strategic and financial advice for public and private sector clients. He is currently a director of Canadian Bank Note Limited, Canadian Geographic Enterprises, and several philanthropic organizations. Educated at UBC, Minnesota and Cambridge, he holds a doctorate in economic geography.

Lois Wilson
The Very Rev. Dr. Lois Wilson served on the EPRF Board of Directors from 1981 to 1987. She was the first woman Moderator of the United Church of Canada (1980-1982), an Officer for the Ontario Human Rights Commission, and past President of the World Council of Churches, North America region. Dr. Wilson holds 2 honorary degrees, was named a Senator in 1999, and is Canada's special envoy to the Sudan Peace Process.

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