MAYA BAXTER is Executive Director of the Statewide Poverty Action Network in Washington. Maya has eight years of community organizing experience and has worked directly with low income and homeless families. She holds a Masters degree in Social Work.

MARCY BOWERS is the Membership and Field Coordinator for the Statewide Poverty Action Network. She has been working or volunteering for social justice for seven years in Seattle, Texas, and Central America.

NED DEL CALLEJO is a founder of and currently organizes with Q-Team. Ned is a 23-year-old trans identified, queer, low-income youth and student of color from Los Angeles. A first generation Mexican in the U.S., Ned came from the environmental justice movement in southeast Los Angeles, where Ned has lived since birth.

PETER CERVANTES-GAUTSCHI is Co-Director of ENLACE in Portland. He started organizing in 1965 as a young farm worker in Southern California. He has organized for HERE, SEIU, and CWA; headed two prominent labor councils; started two low-wage worker organizations; and co-founded several labor-community coalitions, membership organizations, and political action committees.

JOYTI CHAND, of South Asian Network, is a 25-year old queer Fijian Indian immigrant. She works with South Asian immigrant communities in Los Angeles in the areas of hate crimes, discrimination, police brutality and worker rights issues. She spearheaded an advisory committee in Artesia, California that released, in 2007, the first ever LGBTIQ South Asian community needs assessment report.

GARY DELGADO is a nationally recognized researcher, lecturer, and activist on issues of race and social justice. Gary was one of the initial organizers of ACORN, cofounder and director of the Center for Third World Organizing (CTWO), and founding executive director of the Applied Research Center. Gary’s analytical work includes over 40 articles and studies on social change practice in the arena of racial justice.

EMERJ (Expanding the Movement for Empowerment and Reproductive Justice) is a national movement building initiative to grow and strengthen the Reproductive Justice movement. EMERJ provides tools, models, training, research, analysis, and technical assistance to support a vibrant reproductive justice movement.

ZACK EXLEY is a co-founder and president of the New Organizing Institute and a writer with the Huffington Post. He served as Director of Online Organizing and Communications at Kerry-Edwards 2004, as Organizing Director at MoveOn.org, and was an adviser to the early Dean campaign. He is currently a strategic consultant with ThoughtWorks, Inc., where he advises organizations on communications, organizing, and technology.

JUANA FLORES is Co-Director of Mujeres Unidas y Activas, a grassroots Latina immigrant women’s organization based in the San Francisco Bay Area. An immigrant from Mexico, Juana has taken leadership in numerous community campaigns to fight direct attacks against immigrant women and their communities.

MARISOL FRANCO is Policy and Advocacy Manager for California Latinas for Reproductive Justice, where she connects Latina/o communities across the state to policy efforts in order to increase Latinas’overall reproductive health. Marisol graduated from Yale University with a B.A. in Latin American Studies and is a University of California Public Policy and International Affairs Fellow.

GUADALUPE GUAJARDO is a Senior Associate with Technical Assistance for Community Services specializing in organizational development, board trainings, leadership development, and cultural competency. She is co-founder of Tools for Diversity, a training team that presents solutions to problems caused by privilege, prejudice, discrimination, and oppression.

NANCY HAQUE is Director of the Civic Engagement Program for Western States Center. She earned a Masters degree in Public Policy from University of Massachusetts in 2007. Nancy previously worked as Western Region Field Organizer for National Jobs with Justice, based out of Washington, DC, at the AFL-CIO, and for Portland Jobs with Justice.

AUBREY HARRISON is Basic Rights Oregon’s Field Organizer for Portland and Washington County. She came back to Portland after graduating with a BA in Gender Studies and Literary Arts from Brown University. While in college, she was an executive board member of Brown’s Queer Alliance and the facilitator of a support group for LGBTQ students in the process of coming out.

ANNE HARVEY is a faculty member at Antioch University Seattle and teaches subjects such as power, privilege and diversity, community organizing and issues regarding women and mental health. She has been involved with non-profit boards, education, and group facilitation for the past 25 years. She was Executive Director of the Kitsap County YWCA and a founding mother of the the Women’s Funding Alliance in Seattle.

LEAH HENRY-TANNER (NiMiiPu) works as a consultant on maternal & child health issues in Indian Country, focusing primarily on infant mortality and SIDS risk reduction. Leah is a long time activist on the issues of tribal sovereignty, treaty, civil, and human rights, and challenging the anti-democratic far right.

MÓNICA HERNÁNDEZ is lead staff on the immigration work of the Highlander Research and Education Center, where she has worked to develop Latino grassroots leadership and organizations in the Southeastern United States. Mónica also worked for 13 years for the Northern California Coalition for Immigration Rights and was the founding Chair of the Board of the Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition.

SARAH HOWELL is a Trainer/Organizer at Western States Center. Before coming to the Center Sarah was Director of Training for Community HIV/AIDS Mobilization Project (CHAMP), a national organization based in New York City that bridges HIV/AIDS work and struggles for social, racial, and economic justice. Sarah has also worked in violence prevention, queer rights, and economic justice groups.

WALIDAH IMARISHA is a poet, activist, and an independent journalist. She is the bad half of the poetry duo Good Sista/Bad Sista. She currently teaches part-time at Portland State University and engages in prisoner support organizing.

CANDACE INAGI is Deputy Director of Hate Free Zone in Washington. She previously managed Government and Community Affairs and served as chief lobbyist for SEIU Healthcare 775NW. Candace currently serves on the Board of the Japanese American Citizens League-Seattle Chapter.

KALPANA KRISHNAMURTHY is Field Director of the RACE and Gender Justice programs at Western States Center. From 2002-2005 she was Executive Director of the Third Wave Foundation, which works nationally to support and strengthen the next generation of young women activists. Prior to that, Kalpana organized around reproductive health and justice and young women’s empowerment.

JESSICA LEE is the Youth Organizer for Basic Rights Oregon. A graduate of The Evergreen State College, she was also a campus organizer for the Women of Color Coalition. She worked for Planned Parenthood of Western Washington doing clinical work as well as community and patient education from 2002 to 2006.

LUCILENE LIRA is a Trainer/Organizer at Western State Center. She develops, coordinates and implements, civic engagement, organizational, and leadership development for the Center’s programs and projects by immigrants, women, youth, and rural communities. She comes from a long history of international solidarity movements supporting indigenous and peasant communities to resist the privatization of natural resources, food systems, and culture.

DAHNESH MEDORA serves as Director of Strategic Initiatives for Technical Assistance for Community Services, where he provides organizational development consulting support to nonprofits, supports select initiatives and guides the consulting program. As a consultant and coach, Dahnesh has provided support on leadership development, organizational change, and cross cultural effectiveness.

ANA NÁJERA MENDOZA has worked with Chican@/Latin@ youth and student organizations in California, Minnesota, and Ecuador to promote opportunities for higher education, community development, and youth political participation. In 2006 Ana joined the Main Street Project as Coordinator of Leadership and Language Access with the Raíces Project.

CATHERINE HAN MONTOYA is Strategist for the Capacity Building Initiatives of the National Council of La Raza. Her expertise is in state policy analysis focusing on immigration and education; organizational development for community-based organizations; and state ballot initiatives and issue campaigns.

SCOT NAKAGAWA is Grants and Program Director of Social Justice Fund Northwest, a regional, member-driven and supported public foundation that supports community organizing to advance a progressive agenda in Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, Washington, and Oregon. Scott is also Board Chair of Western States Center.

ANGELA OMULEPU is Senior Program Associate/Organizer at Northwest Federation of Community Organizations. A child of immigrants, Angela has worked for social, racial, and economic justice for over 20 years. Poetry and politics are her passions.

KATHLEEN PEQUEÑO is a communications consultant helping groups create websites people can navigate, email that people open, stories people want to remember, and blogs people want to read.

YASMEEN PEREZ is a long time community organizer from the Pacific NW who started out as a youth organizer in Seattle. She is currently the Leadership Development Director at FIERCE, an organization dedicated to building and strengthening the leadership and power of LGBTQ youth of color.

DAN PETEGORSKY has been Executive Director of Western States Center since 1996. He doesn’t lose quite as much sleep over it as he used to.

KENYA PIERCE is board chair of the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada (PLAN) and a leader within the People of Color Caucus and Racial Justice Committees of PLAN. She is a social worker, tenured sociology professor, and co-founder of TRENDZ, a youth mentoring organization.

TARSO LUÍS RAMOS is the Director of Research for Political Research Associates. From 2000 to 2005 he directed Western States Center’s racial justice program. Tarso spent 2005 in Brazil as a freelance writer, volunteer press assistant, and translator for the MST (Landless Workers Movement).

VALERIE REUTHER began major gifts fundraising for Infact, where she led face-to-face fundraising efforts that increased the major donor income from $45,000 to $450,000 in three years. She has also been Executive Director of A Territory Resource and of the Lesbian Resource Center in Seattle. Since 1997, Valerie has been an independent consultant with social change organizations.

PEDRO RIOS is Director of the American Friends Service Committee’s US/Mexico Border Program in San Diego, California. Originally from San Diego, Pedro has been actively involved inmigrant rights organizing since the mid 1990s.

ANDY ROBINSON is a consultant, facilitator, and long time activist and organizer from Plainfield, Vermont. His latest books are Big Gifts for Small Groups and Great Boards for Small Groups. Andy may hold the record for most years as a trainer at CSTI, but nobody keeps those records and besides, he’s not all that competitive.

GLO ROSS has been organizing at FIERCE for two and half years. She is committed to working to ensure the leadership and organizing capacity of queer and transgender youth of color.

MELISSA NALANI ROSS is Outreach Coordinator for the Campaign for a United America for the Center for New Community. Melissa provides technical, organizing, and research assistance to organizations around the United States committed to resisting attempts by the anti-immigrant movement to divide their communities.

THE RUCKUS SOCIETY sees itself as a toolbox of experience, training, and skills. They provide environmental, human rights, and social justice organizers with the tools, training, and support needed to achieve their goals.

PEDRO SOSA is Coordinator of Project Voz of the American Friends Service Committee. He works to develop the leadership of immigrant communities to build a national agenda around the rights of immigrants and refugees. Originally from Guatemala, Pedro has worked for many years with community organizations in Guatemala, Mexico, and the U.S., including VOZ Workers’ Rights Education Project in Portland.

THENMOZHI SOUNDARARAJAN is a filmmaker, singer, and grassroots media organizer. As a second generation Tamil Dalit Untouchable woman, she strives to connect grassroots organizers with media resources that can widen their base of resistance. She is currently pursuing her Master’s degree in Film and Cinema at the University of Southern California.

CHUCK TANNER is a long time civil and human rights researcher and activist. Chuck has done extensive research on the White nationalist movement and has published numerous articles including Guns and Gavels and Living Like Neighbors: Supporting The Treaty Rights and Sovereignty of Indigenous Nations, among several others.

CARRIE TRACY is the Immigration Project Director at Northwest Federation of Community Organizations. Carrie has clerked at the Washington state Court of Appeals and is a graduate of the University of Washington School of Law.

GABRIELA VALLE is Field Director for California Latinas for Reproductive Justice and has over 10 years of experience in youth leadership development and training with a holistic focus on women’s health and justice issues.

ERIC K. WARD is National Field Director for the Center for New Community, a national civil rights organization based in Chicago. For over 20 years Eric has successfully assisted communities around the U.S. in responding to assaults on democracy by groups like the Aryan Nations, the Wise Use Movement, and the Christian Right.

KELLEY WEIGEL is Associate Director at Western States Center. Kelley’s work history has focused on community organizing in Oregon and included organizing ballot measure campaigns and candidate campaigns, as well as training and leadership development programs. She co directed the Rural Organizing Project from 1998-2002 and got started at the Community Alliance of Lane County.

LYNEE WOLF is the advocacy coordinator at the Center for Social Inclusion. Applying a structural racism analysis, she develops reports and advocacy tools to support the capacity of communities to develop strategies for structural transformation. Lynne works on a range of issues, from land use planning and racial equity to reframing the public conversation on race.

NORMA WONG is an instructor with the Institute of Zen Studies of IZS-Applied Zen. She is a former legislator and strategic planning consultant, with extensive work in policy development and Native Hawaiian issues.

ALICIA YOUNG is Chief Strategist and Director of Communications for Working Films. Over the course of a ten-year career, she has gained familiarity with organizations across the country for whom community outreach is a key component in attaining their social justice goals.