Support Structure: Endeavor Foundation Joins Philanthropic Field
The Dome is the only indoor facility in the state equipped to host more than 1,000 athletes, families, and spectators for the Big C Relays.
Photo Credit: The Dome
One of Alaska’s richest businessmen is sharing the wealth in a new way. Jonathan Rubini—co-founder, chairman, and CEO of Alaska’s largest real estate development firm, JL Properties—now has two philanthropic entities to support charitable causes. One is a private family foundation, and the other is the Endeavor Foundation, which announced itself this month with a gift of $500,000 to The Dome, the largest indoor sports facility in Anchorage.
Rubini’s daughter Sam LaPierre is executive director of the Endeavor Foundation. She notes that Rubini has quietly contributed to various nonprofits for decades. “He’s a large supporter of organizations like the ACLU and the museum. He’s done stuff within UAA and The Dome,” she says. “Historically, my family has just given donations independently, not from a formalized foundation. This is our attempt to formalize that work via these two different foundations.”
Supporting Vehicle
JL Properties, co-founded in 1990 with Leonard Hyde, has developed some of Alaska’s most prominent commercial properties. It owns more than 2 million square feet of Class A office space in Alaska, or approximately 25 percent of the market, including Alaska’s tallest building, the ConocoPhillips Tower.
To put some of those assets to work, Rubini has endowed Endeavor Foundation with $10 million worth of properties. “Those assets are core real estate assets that were owned via JL Properties that have been donated to this foundation,” explains LaPierre. “The assets that are donated to these foundations will provide distributions that will be donated across the state.”
Endeavor Foundation is under the umbrella of Alaska Community Foundation (ACF), a nonprofit which manages more than $280 million in assets across more than 2,800 funds. Twelve of those funds are classified as affiliates of ACF, and seven are classified as partners.
Endeavor Foundation is a new classification: a supporting vehicle. “They’ve never had a ‘supporting vehicle,’ which is this new type of model,” says LaPierre. “It’s different than them having complete autonomy over strategy; this is like working in partnership with a family that wants to set up a foundation.”
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August 2026
LaPierre says the new structure was necessary because certain assets that can’t go into the family foundation can be included in the supporting vehicle. “A private foundation has restrictions on what types of assets can go into it. For example, important in this context because my family is in real estate, certain assets with debt on them can’t go into a private foundation,” she says. The real estate continues to generate income to sustain the Endeavor Foundation’s endowment.
As the controlling entity, ACF provides back-office support for grantmaking and processing. “It’s like a partnership with an existing organization as opposed to starting a new foundation where you’d be doing all that on your own, building it from the ground up and hiring people to do accounting and whatnot,” says LaPierre. “It’s nice to be able to work hand in hand with the community foundation.”
With ACF providing administrative support, Endeavor Foundation’s board can focus on the organizations it funds.
The name alludes to the adventurous and entrepreneurial spirit of Alaska, LaPierre says. It also tangentially connects to Alaska history: before Captain James Cook sought the Northwest Passage during his third voyage aboard HMS Resolution, he commanded HMS Endeavour on his first round-the-world voyage, stopping in New Zealand. LaPierre recalls a visit to the islands a few years ago, when she and her father were hiking around Endeavour Inlet. “We were at the time brainstorming what the foundation should be named, and that one struck a chord with all of us,” she says.
The family launched two philanthropic entities this year, and the other is the more plainly named Rubini Family Foundation. LaPierre says the family decided to advance both, partly to set an example as a supporting vehicle within ACF. She explains, “We wanted to set this up to show other people who are potentially interested in starting foundations that this is possible. If they don’t want to do it all on their own, it’s a little bit easier.”
The family foundation receives back-office support through JL Properties, which is paid a management fee.
Endeavor Foundation is dedicated to strengthening communities and landscapes in Alaska. Rubini states, “We seek out the organizations already doing the work, and we fund them in a way that lets them stay focused on it.”
LaPierre adds that previous relationships through direct donations also connect the foundations with potential recipients. “Eventually we may decide to open up an application; for now, we’ve taken a different approach,” she says.
To determine which causes are worthy of donations, LaPierre brings a decade of experience in private equity and venture capital. “I’ve done independent research to source and identify a hundred-plus organizations in these focus areas,” she says. “Going through all of them and reaching out.”
The foundation began grantmaking earlier this year, investing $150,000 in eight Alaska nonprofits, to be named later. LaPierre says additional funding announcements will follow.
The public launch more than tripled that amount, with a $500,000 match in support of The Dome. Every gift to The Dome’s fundraising campaign will be matched, with no minimum gift, until the campaign is fully funded.
Supporting Vehicle
The Dome opened in 2007. It collapsed under heavy snow in January 2017 and was reinflated with financial support from Jonathan Rubini.
Photo Credit: Alaska Business
Alaska’s largest indoor field and the only full-size indoor track in the state is trying to raise $6 million to replace its entire fabric shell in 2027, renewing the building for another twenty years. More than $4.5 million is already committed, including $2 million from the Rubini Family Foundation and Endeavor Foundation, $1 million from Rasmuson Foundation, and a commercial loan from Northrim Bank.
Work on The Dome is scheduled for next May through October so that the building reopens on its 20th anniversary.
“The Dome belongs to Alaskans. For nearly twenty years it has been where our kids play and compete, where families stay active all year, and where the community comes to improve our health,” says The Dome CEO Curtis Penney. “We are more than three-quarters of the way there, and we are inviting the whole community to help us finish.” Penney adds with some urgency that if the fundraising campaign falls short, The Dome cannot remain open.
More than twenty nonprofits call The Dome home, and its Community Health Initiative has provided more than $2 million in free public access since 2019. It’s exactly what Endeavor Foundation was built to support, according to Rubini. “The Dome is that kind of organization, and keeping its doors open with the new fabric shell is the right way to begin,” he says.
Beyond The Dome, Endeavor Foundation will invest across five areas: civic engagement, entrepreneurship, arts and humanities, environment, and recreation. LaPierre says those broad interests provide flexibility as the foundation takes shape. “The goal is to be intentionally flexible. These are our core focus areas, but we are totally open to funding other things as they come up,” she says.
LaPierre expects both foundations will grow within the next decade. “It’s nascent still, and we are building that in tandem,” she says.
