arcus foundation senior staff and program officer bios

Fred Davie, interim executive director and senior program director, Social Justice and LGBT Programs, New York
Fred is a proven social justice leader with extensive experience in social policy development and evaluation, philanthropy, government and management. In February 2009, Fred was named by President Obama to the Advisory Council of the White House Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships. Prior to joining Arcus, Fred served as president and chief executive officer of Public/Private Ventures, a national, action-based research and evaluation institute. He served as program officer for Faith-based Community Development at the Ford Foundation, and held senior positions within New York City government, including Deputy Borough President of the Office of Manhattan Borough President, Chief of Staff to the Deputy Mayor for Community and Public Affairs and Special Assistant to the President of the New York Board of Education. Fred holds a MDiv. from Yale University and received his BA in political science from Greensboro College in North Carolina, where he was elected the first African-America President of the Student Government Association.

Richard Burns, chief operating officer, New York
Richard is the chief operating officer of the Arcus Foundation and a longtime leader in the LGBT movement. He served as executive director of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Community Center of New York from 1986 to 2009. Under his leadership, the organization became the largest LGBT multiservice organization on the East Coast and second largest LGBT community center in the world. An attorney, he is the former managing editor (1978-1980) of the Gay Community News, Boston, a national nonprofit LGBT newsweekly published from 1973 to 1995. He was the founding president (1978-1986) of the board of directors of GLAD (Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders) in Boston, and was the founding co-chair and served on the board of directors (1994-2009) of CenterLink. Richard holds a BA from Hamilton College and a JD from the Northeastern University School of Law. He serves on the board of directors and the Government Relations Committee of the NonProfit Coordinating Committee.

Cindy Rizzo, senior director, Grantmaking and Evaluation, New York
Prior to joining Arcus, Cindy was director of Grantmaking at the Boston Foundation where she specialized in the areas of Health and Human Services, homelessness prevention, LGBT rights and HIV/AIDS. Cindy worked for more than six years on the staff of the Fenway Community Health Center. Past and present board positions include Funders Concerned About AIDS, Massachusetts Health Council, Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders, Gay Community News and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force. Ms. Rizzo holds a JD from Suffolk University School of Law in Boston and is a published author on the subject of LGBT parenting.

Kristine Stallone, chief financial officer, New York
Kristine is the former controller of Americas and of Global Functional teams for Bloomberg LP, the New York-based global information service, news and media company, where she led a team that worked on financial reporting as well as the development and implementation of the company-wide financial system. She also was chief financial officer for NOBOK, Inc., where she developed the finance function for this sports media start-up with offices in London and New York. Prior to joining Bloomberg in 1998, Kristine was the assistant controller and manager of corporate accounting for World Color Press, Inc. in Greenwich, Conn., and also was an independent consultant, serving as controller for Ithaka Harbors and Teach for America. Active in the community, Kristine is a supporter and volunteer for Raising Malawi, Spirituality for Kids, LGBT Media Team and Tanzania Malaria Project. She is a Certified Public Accountant and holds a BS in accounting from Mercy College.

Arcus Great Apes Program

Annette Lanjouw, senior program director, Great Apes Program, Cambridge
A highly regarded expert in the field of great ape conservation, Annette has worked with chimpanzees, bonobos and gorillas in the wild with years of experience in the areas of conservation strategy, program implementation, research and field work. She was the director of the International Gorilla Conservation Programme (IGCP), which works to conserve and build support for the fewer than 800 mountain gorillas that inhabit the mountain forests that span the borders of Rwanda, Uganda and Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Annette worked as scientific advisor to Alan Root, cinematographer of the Survival Anglia wildlife films, as Central Africa program officer for the Wildlife Conservation Society, and was project manager and field director for the Frankfurt Zoological Society's Chimpanzee Conservation Project in eastern DRC. Prior to joining Arcus, Annette served as international program officer for the Howard G. Buffett Foundation. Annette holds a BSc in Zoology and Psychology from Victoria University, Wellington, New Zealand and a Doctorandus in Behavioral Ecology from the Rijks Universiteit in Utrecht, The Netherlands. She is scientific advisor to the Trust for African Rock Art, and a member of the Species Survival Commission Primate Specialist Group, the Transboundary Conservation Specialist Group, and the World Commission on Protected Areas.

Linda May, senior program officer, Great Apes Program, Kalamazoo
Arcus' founding executive director, Linda was the first staff person at the Arcus Foundation and helped establish the framework for the Foundation's vision, grantmaking and general operations. Currently, she is the senior program officer for the Great Apes program, specializing in sanctuary support. Prior to joining Arcus, Linda worked in financial management and the insurance industry. She is particularly interested in the fight for social justice, compassion regarding the treatment of animals and great ape sanctuary and conservation.

Helga Rainer, program officer, Great Apes Program, Cambridge
Helga has extensive experience in natural resource management, conflict and development. She has worked with both national and international NGOs in Europe, Asia and Africa on project development and implementation. Her work has included research on urban environment projects in Dhaka, Bangladesh, as well as development of regional conservation strategies in South West Uganda. Helga served as the Uganda Country Program Officer for the International Gorilla Conservation Program, where she strengthened community participation in conservation and also published work on transboundary natural resource management. She is a PhD candidate at the London School of Economics and Political Science, where her doctoral research focuses on linkages between conservation and conflict. She holds an MS in environmental science from the University of Bath and BS in genetics from the University College London.

Arcus LGBT Rights Program

Trishala Deb, program officer, National LGBT Rights Program
Trishala is the former program coordinator of the Training and Resource Center of the Audre Lorde Project, where she led its effort to organize an immigrant rights program for lesbian, gay, bisexual, two spirit, transgender and gender non-conforming people of color. Prior to joining the Audre Lorde Project in 2001, Trishala served as an organizational development consultant in Atlanta and New York. While in Atlanta, she was a program manager for Refugee Family Violence Prevention Project, Newcomers Network; case manager for SHARE House, battered-women's shelter; and development assistant at Men Stopping Violence. She also was a case manager for Triad Health Project in Greensboro, North Carolina. Active in the community, she is a founder of the Community Birthing Project, and has served on such organizations as INCITE, North Star Fund, Desis Rising Up and Moving and the South Asian Lesbian Gay Association. Trishala holds a BSW in social work from the University of North Carolina, Greensboro.

Johnny Jenkins, program officer, Michigan LGBT Rights Program, Kalamazoo
As the leader of Arcus' Michigan initiatives, Johnny brings to Arcus more than a decade of experience working to establish LGBT equality in African American communities. He is the founding director of the Detroit chapter of the Black Pride Society, which produces Hotter Than July, the oldest annual Black Pride celebration in the Midwest, which draws more than 5,000 participants. Johnny holds a B.A. in Business Administration from Western Michigan University and has been the creative director and principle of NoirAmerica, a graphic design and communications firm he founded. He also is an accomplished spoken-word artist known as JyObadele, and currently serves as the resident host and co-producer of Detroit's EchoVerse Poetry Slam Series.

Tom Kam, deputy director, LGBT programs, director, Religion and Values, New York
Tom comes to the Arcus Foundation from the Community Foundation for the National Capital Region, where he served first as senior program officer and later as vice president of Community Investment. He also served as regional manager for Human Services for the County of Fairfax, Virginia, senior public health analyst for the United States Public Health Service and associate director of AIDS Services for the Whitman-Walker Clinic in Washington, DC. Tom holds a Masters of Social Work from the Catholic University of America in Washington DC. He obtained his Masters of Divinity at St. Patrick's Theological Seminary in Menlo Park, California, and was ordained a priest for the Archdiocese of San Francisco in 1983.

Roz Lee, senior program officer, Racial Justice, Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Program, New York
Roz Lee has dedicated her career to fighting all forms of oppression through community organizing, political advocacy, and popular education. She most recently worked as Director of Programs of Stonewall Community Foundation, where she created a Racial Equity Initiative grantmaking- and capacity-building program to support organizations led by and for LGBT people of color. She worked as a Program Officer for the Jewish Fund for Justice, making grants to social and economic justice groups across the country. In 2002, she received a Union Square Award for her work as a cofounder of the New York City Organizing Support Center, an organizing training and political education hub for grassroots social change organizations. Roz volunteers for numerous organizations committed to fostering progressive social change. Roz holds a BA from State University of New York at Albany.

Carla Sutherland, director, International LGBT Rights Program, New York
Carla, a former Ford Foundation program officer known for her groundbreaking human rights work for sexual minorities in Eastern Africa, is the first director of Arcus' new International LGBT Rights Program. Carla led the Ford Foundation's Education and Sexuality program in Eastern Africa, where she was responsible for developing and managing an extensive portfolio of more than 40 grantees in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania. She established this new field of work for the Foundation in 2004, which provides East African women and youth with the education and information necessary to make informed decisions about leading healthy lives. Carla holds a BA and a master's in political studies and anthropology from the University of Cape Town, South Africa, and a PhD in social policy from the London School of Economics.