The 

Foundation

Yiriba is a collaboration of well-rounded volunteers with experience doing humanitarian work around the world. We share a passion and commitment to bring orphans and abandoned children off the streets and provide them with an opportunity for a brighter future.  We are a non-profit 501(c)3 corporation based in San Francisco, California, USA.

Yonel Perez

Founder/

Executive Director

As an eight-year old, Yonel lost his mother and was abandoned by his father.  He feels he “was lucky to be brought to an orphanage”, and that “it shaped [his] future”.  Eight years after entering the orphanage, he was discovered by a soccer coach who helped him become a professional soccer player.  He had a short stint on the under 18 Peruvian national team, and played with the Juan Aurich professional team. Yonel believes orphanages play a life changing role for orphans and abandoned children. He met a young boy, Nounmounje in Koloko in 2004, who inspired him to found and support his first orphanage in this village, using his savings and salary.  Yonel is a certified personal trainer and an auto-body technician.  Contact Yonel

Katherine

Hayden

Treasurer

Growing up in Amherst, Massachusetts, Katherine learned the difference a new home and educational opportunities could make in a child's life. In elementary school, she participated in fundraisers for the A Better Chance house and was a classmate of these Scholars as well as refugees from Vietnam and Cambodia. As an adult, she volunteered with organizations providing practical and emotional support to men, women, and children living with HIV/AIDS in the San Francisco Bay Area, planning a Berkeley Earth Day parade, raising money and business planning support for museums and theaters in the Boston area. Katherine currently works as an engineer in Walnut Creek, and has founded and operated small businesses in the martial arts and hotel industries. 

Contact Katherine

Public Relations

Contact Michele

Sports Director

Contact Pino