The Jake Koenigsdorf Foundation

Who we are.

On July 16, 2013, Jake Koenigsdorf was found alone in his apartment, dead from a heroin overdose. He was 21. Like millions of others, his opiate addiction started with painkillers. Heroin use is the last and cheapest option for kids like Jake who get hooked on opiates and can’t find a solution to get clean and stay that way.  

You see, most addicts and alcoholics have three options. Find a solution, get locked up, or die. Until one of those options happens, we’re a tornado ripping through the lives of everyone in our path.  The wreckage impacts us all, including those of you who have lost loved ones or personal property to drug-related theft, DUI accidents, etc.  

Jake’s biggest wish was to leave his mark in the world. He wanted to matter. His mom and his friends want to achieve for him in death what he wasn’t able to in life.  In his name, we've founded the Jake Koenigsdorf Foundation to raise money to help alcoholics and addicts who are willing to do whatever it takes to get clean but don't have the financial means to find a solution - those that slip through the cracks, without wealthy families, insurance or access to state support. 
We assist these willing addicts seeking recovery by providing knowledge and grant funding for entry into long term facilities that enable them to work towards a solution for lasting recovery. 

They must be desperate and willing. That is the key, you see. Willingness. If we addicts are not willing to do whatever it takes to get clean, we will likely fail. It takes a level of desperation to commit to the program and way of life necessary to get and stay clean.
The Foundation isn't just a dream.  We incorporated as a not for profit in the state of Delaware in November 2013 and received 501c3 status from the IRS in early 2014. We've already raised enough to support many addicts from across the nation on their journey.   Will they succeed?  To be frank, if there was a cure, there would be no need for this Foundation.  But there is at least one solution that has helped many addicts and alcoholics stay clean for their whole lives.  We hope the ones we help will join the ranks of these survivors.
We've also quickly become an easily accessible and free resource for parents and loved ones of addicts and alcoholics.  By giving them direct access to those that have survived both sides of the disease of addiction, we hope that they are better able to cope with the tragedy in their own lives.

We want Jake's Foundation to be a force for change in the addiction community. If one addict survives because of what we do here, then Jake did not die in vain.