Ira is the Executive Director of The Atwood Foundation, one of Alaska’s oldest and largest family philanthropies. The foundation provides grants and scholarships for education, arts and journalism projects. A 40-year resident of Spenard, he and his wife Virginia, an avid gardener, live in a picturesque log home surrounded by beautiful flowers. They have two grown daughters, Esther and Sara. The impresario of the Anchorage Concert Association for 20 years and former director of the Alaska Humanities Forum, Perman is a charter member of The Motorheads, Alaska’s Extraordinary Gentlemen Snowmachiners, who each year perform their Motorhead Follies to standing room only crowds in tiny roadhouses in snowy remote corners of our state.