Lady Gaga, Robin Hood Raise $47 Million to Help New York’s Poor, Veterans

Patrick Cole Bloomberg.com 05/09/2011 18:00

Lady Gaga, who performed at the annual Robin Hood gala last night.

The Robin Hood Foundation gala, Wall Street’s largest single-evening fundraising event, had Lady Gaga onstage and took in $47.4 million last night at its annual New York dinner.

The sum, which fell short of last year’s record of $87.8 million, will go to groups fighting poverty in the city. The total included $11.9 million raised at tables for a new program that will assist veterans of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars and National Reservists, as well as $400,000 for an auction item to fly to Los Angeles and record a song with Black Eyed Peas front man will.i.am.

The 2010 total included a matching gift from billionaire George Soros and Robin Hood board members.

Last night’s event, held at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center, sold out in mid-April after the foundation announced that Lady Gaga would perform.

Founded in 1988, the Robin Hood Foundation raises money for 200 of New York’s poverty-fighting organizations. Its board -- which includes Paul Tudor Jones II, Greenlight Capital’s David Einhorn, SAC Capital Advisors LP’s Steven A. Cohen, film producer Harvey Weinstein and actor Gwyneth Paltrow -- covers the gala’s cost so that all proceeds go to the beneficiaries.

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