Board of Directors

Eric is a nationally-recognized expert on the relationship between hate violence and preserving democratic governance and inclusive societies. His 30 years of leadership includes founding the Community Alliance of Lane County; establishing over 120 task forces in six states through the Northwest Coalition Against Malicious Harassment; supporting immigrant rights advocates as National Field Director for the Center for New Community; serving as The Atlantic Philanthropies’ U.S. Reconciliation and Human Rights Executive and Ford Foundation Program Officer; and volunteer leadership with numerous organizations. Eric’s writings and speeches are widely quoted and credited with key narrative shifts in defense of inclusive democracy.

Natasha was most recently the Director of the ACLU of California Center for Advocacy & Policy for 14 years, advocating for criminal justice, education, freedom of expression, immigrants’ rights, LGBT rights, privacy, racial justice, reproductive justice, and voting rights throughout the state. She is a strong leader in the national movement to abolish the death penalty.

Odell is the founder and Principal of Mays2 Consulting LLC, a specialized management consultancy focused on working with non-profits in fiscal management and operations, in addition to governance and compliance issues. Odell has over 25 years of management experience in nonprofits and board leadership including chair and co-chair of the board of Gay Men’s Health Crisis and as treasurer of the NYC LGBTQ Community Services Center. He is also an adjunct faculty instructor at Columbia University and NYU.

Nima Shirazi is a communications and program strategist with over two decades of eclectic experience working at the intersection of culture and politics, media and narrative, advocacy and the arts.

A senior leader in Spitfire’s New York office, Nima develops strategy, campaigns and messages alongside fearless partners dedicated to dismantling systems of discrimination and disinformation; redistributing power and wealth from corporations to communities; and demanding that our environment and economy are abundant and shared.

Nima has trained foundation and nonprofit communications professionals across the country in storytelling, messaging and narrative. He has led presentations at the PolicyLink Equity Summit, Narrative Power Summit, frank gathering and multiple Communications Network conferences. Nima has also moderated discussions and been featured on panels on the media, power, pop culture and disinformation at Cornell University, Northwestern University, Orange County Art Museum and the Museum of the Moving Image in New York City.

Prior to joining Spitfire, Nima was a senior fellow and founding member of the Narrative Initiative, a training and network-building start-up designed to equip leaders and their organizations with a better understanding of how deeply-embedded stories and stereotypes shape the common sense, collective consciousness and the unwritten rules of society. Previously, Nima managed communications strategies, media relations, multimedia production and media-related grantmaking for The Atlantic Philanthropies.

Nima is a member of the Radical Communicators Network and the Gulf/2000 Project, an academic forum and online resource service sponsored by the School of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University. A published political and media analyst and former editor-at-large for the digital foreign affairs magazine Muftah, Nima currently co-hosts the Webby-honored and Davey Award-winning podcast “Citations Needed.”

Richard D. Burns is a non-profit management consultant and activist who is the Interim Executive Director of the Johnson Family Foundation. He has served as Interim Executive Director of the Drug Policy Alliance, Lambda Legal, the North Star Fund, PENCIL, The Funding Exchange, Funders for LGBTQ Issues and the Stonewall Community Foundation.

He was previously the Chief Operating Officer of the Arcus Foundation and was Executive Director of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center in New York City for 22 years, from 1986 to 2009.

Richard serves on the boards of directors of the Proteus Fund and the New York City AIDS Memorial Park. He recently retired from the board of Nonprofit New York and was a longtime member of the Selection Committee of the New York Community Trust Nonprofit Excellence Awards.

He serves on the Advisory Board of the Center for HIV Law & Policy and was president of the founding board of directors of GLAD in Boston from 1978 through 1986.

He is a graduate of Hamilton College and the Northeastern University School of Law.

Tammy Dowley-Blackman, a graduate of Oberlin College and Harvard University, is an author, entrepreneur, leadership expert, executive, and professor. Her company, Tammy Dowley-Blackman Group, LLC, includes a suite of brands, including TDB Group Strategic Advisory, a management consulting firm specializing in organizational and leadership development for the corporate, government, nonprofit and philanthropic sectors, as well as Looking Forward Lab, which partners with corporations and higher education systems to create workplace solutions for Gen Z and their managers.

Tammy recently completed her six-year term as the president of the TSNE MissionWorks Board of Directors, where she led the $50 million-dollar organization through unprecedented leadership and business model strategic alignment and planning. She also provides leadership as an Advisory Board member for the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. Tammy has been part of the Proteus Fund team before, serving as the founding Director of the Proteus Fund Diversity Fellowship, a successful nationally recognized program designed to bring more equitable representation and systemic change to large-scale philanthropic institutional systems.

Pat is President & CEO of Asian Americans/Pacific Islanders in Philanthropy (AAPIP), working to build democratic philanthropy through a racial and gender equity lens. Prior to her role at AAPIP, Pat served as Chief Service Officer at the Mayor's Office of the City of NY. Pat has served in various positions within the philanthropic and non-profit communities. She founded the first organization on the East Coast working with battered immigrant Asian women in the early days of this new national movement. She managed a portfolio of programs including 8 shelters, 4 citywide 24-hour hotlines, and one of the largest batterer intervention programs and anti-trafficking programs in the country. In philanthropy, at the Ms. Foundation for Women, Pat innovated grantmaking strategy in several areas including early support for men’s efforts to address masculinity and violence and supporting the emerging movement to prevent child sexual abuse. At the New York Women’s Foundation, she launched and managed the NYC Fund for Girls and Young Women of Color, the first collaborative fund in the country focused on young women and gender non-binary youth of color.

Desiree Flores (she/her) brings 20 years of social justice grant making and program development experience funding social justice movement building at the local, state, and national levels. She was previously the Program Director of U.S. Social Justice at the Arcus Foundation, a global LGBTQ philanthropy, supporting policy and culture change determined by LGBTQ people pushed to the margins. Earlier in her career, she served as Director of Board Affairs at Planned Parenthood Federation of America, and as a longtime program officer at the Ms. Foundation for Women supporting more powerful gender and racial justice movements. Desiree earned a bachelor’s degree from UCLA and a master’s in public administration from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

Tia has been active in community organizing, issue advocacy, and nonprofit development for social, cultural, and environmental justice for over three decades. She serves as the CEO of the Seventh Generation Fund for Indigenous Peoples, the oldest Native identity-based philanthropic, advocacy, leadership development and capacity building organization that supports community generated strategies for Native Peoples’ cultural revitalization, movement building, self-determination, and Re-Indigenization. A mother and grandmother, writer and cultural artist, Tia is a recognized expert on the protection of Water as a sacred element for Indigenous Peoples’ cultural and spiritual sustainability; in Indigenous women’s leadership, and on the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

She earned a BA in Law & Society from the University of California, Santa Barbara, and an MFA in Creative Writing from Antioch University, Los Angeles. She and her husband, Christopher Peters, live in the far north in California redwood country, where they have created the Red Deer Center for Indigenous Thinking, Creating, and Being. Part of the NFG and Aspen Institute’s Philanthropy Forward 2019-2020 cohort focused on supporting grassroots power building for racial equity and social justice, Tia also serves on the board of Tools and Tiaras and is honored and thrilled to join the Proteus Fund board of directors, Spring 2020.

Over her career, she served on the board of directors for Native Americans in Philanthropy, the Paul Robeson Fund for Independent Media, and the Resist Fund, and on the Advisory Boards of Youth United for Community Action, the A:shiwi A:wan Museum and Heritage Center in Zuni, and the Women’s Building of New York. Tia has received the honor of a Louis T. Delgado Distinguished Grantmaker Award from Native Americans in Philanthropy; a Center for Civic Partnerships Executive Leadership Fellowship; a Silver Cloud Award for Indigenous Peoples’ international diplomacy, and a Shannon Institute Leadership Fellowship.

Risa Jaz Rifkind (she/her) is a justice advocate who seeks to make change by shifting access to power and influence. As the Director of Civic Engagement and Marketing for Disability Lead, she propels the organization to realize its vision to have people with disabilities lead with power and influence. By identifying and developing strategic partnerships, Risa positions Members to take on leadership roles that advance their careers, civic engagement, and equity for people with disabilities. By integrating this vision into all internal and external communications, she leads Disability Lead’s brand awareness, public and private Member programming, and community engagement and outreach. She is also a Disability Lead Member.

Outside of Disability Lead, Risa is involved in various leadership roles. In 2022, she was appointed to the National Council on Disability by President Biden. In 2020, Risa participated on the Disability Inclusion Fund’s grantmaking committee. Previously, Risa was Program Manager at The Chicago Community Trust where she developed their disability inclusion priorities and practices and managed several disability inclusion initiatives including the Disabilities Fund, ADA 25 Advancing Leadership, and ADA 25 Chicago.

She has consulted for organizations to increase their disability inclusion including the University of Indiana Kelley School of Business, Institute for Nonprofit Professionals, Proteus Fund, and has spoken at conferences including the Leadership Exchange in Arts and Disability, Unity Summit, and Upswell Conference.

Maria Teresa is a senior executive with extensive experience building institutions, developing programs, and implementing grantmaking strategies. She recently concluded a long career with the Open Society Foundations, where she was the founder and director of the International Migration Initiative. Prior to that, she served in the Open Society-U.S. program as Associate Director for Grantmaking and Program Development, Deputy Director for the Justice Fund, and Associate Director for Communications. In the latter years of her work at OSF she focused on developing work in the Caribbean on climate displacement.

She is currently Associate Director at Herstory Writers Network where she leads strategic planning and program management, oversees the carceral justice work, and facilitates writing workshops in schools and in community settings. In her earlier career, Maria Teresa worked as a journalist, filmmaker, and television producer. She built a cable television network for the City of New York that instituted unprecedented television coverage of local government proceedings. In addition to the Proteus Fund, she is a member of the board of directors at Futuro Media and Ayiti Demen|Haiti Tomorrow. She was born in Bogota, Colombia and has lived most of her life in the United States. She has traveled extensively on all seven continents and splits her time between New York City and New Jersey.

Elizabeth (Betsy) Schmidt is a Professor of Practice, specializing in nonprofits, social enterprises, and solutions-based policy analysis. She currently teaches two graduate school courses, Nonprofit Law and Management and Social and Environmental Enterprises, and two undergraduate courses, Making a Difference: Policies and Strategies for Successful Social Change and Catalyzing Change: Creating and Operating a Nonprofit.

She has also taught at George Mason University, Vermont Law School, William and Mary Law School, and Marlboro College’s MBA for Sustainability program. Betsy writes in the areas of nonprofit governance, accountability, policies, and ethics. She also writes about the legal framework for social enterprises.

In addition to academic positions, Betsy has practiced law, consulted with nonprofits, and worked directly for nonprofit organizations in legal and management capacities. Among her accomplishments were the creation and development of a data licensing program at GuideStar and a distance learning program at Colonial Williamsburg.

She has an undergraduate degree in history from Princeton and a law degree from Stanford University.

Rick Scott recently retired as the VP of Finance & Compliance at the McKnight Foundation in Minnesota. He oversaw several complex areas, including finance, investments, and legal compliance through periods of significant economic and leadership transitions. Among his accomplishments, he worked closely with McKnight’s president and board of directors to establish the first impact investing program at McKnight. Rick also led the Foundation’s early efforts to leverage its role as an institutional investor and deploy more of its investments to advance its mission.

Before joining McKnight in 1999, Scott was chief financial officer of the Guthrie Theater and a large human services agency after spending 13 years working in the computer industry. His undergraduate and graduate studies were in international economics, supplemented with language studies in Spanish, Russian, German, Italian and French.

Aside from a current focus on community service, Rick is an independent foundation and NGO consultant. His areas of practice cover private foundation and not-for-profit management and governance, including finance, operations, investment, and board. Investment expertise includes development of impact investing programs and board/committee consulting.

Dedicating his career to strengthening people and organizational infrastructure, Thompson has served in both secular organizations and faith-based institutions. His experience includes serving as the Regional Director of Amnesty International USA’s Southern Regional Office, where he worked on abolishing the death penalty in a region comprising eleven states in the Southeastern U.S, also known as the “death belt;” as the National Field Director for the Rights Working Group, a national coalition of over 300 community-based groups and policy organizations dedicated to ending racial and bias profiling across the country; as Political Education and Spiritual Sustenance Specialist at the Unitarian Universalist Association; and as the National Justice and Equity Coordinator for 350.org, an international climate change organization.

Most recently, Thompson served as the Purveyor of Joy and Movement Infrastructure Architect at Grits and Greens, LLC. He is also a trainer with Black Organizing for Leadership and Dignity (B.O.L.D.), a national training intermediary focused on transforming the practice of Black organizers in the US.

Thompson holds a bachelor of arts in English and a bachelor of science in Public Administration from North Carolina Central University (Durham, NC) and a master of arts degree. in Nonprofit Leadership and Development from the University of Delaware (Newark, DE). Currently a master of divinity candidate at Eden Theological Seminary, Everette enjoys cheese grits (only cheese goes in grits) with his husband and sun/son Elijah.

Mai-Anh is the Foundation’s chief financial officer. She was previously the director of financial planning and budgeting. Prior to joining Ford, she worked in mergers and acquisition and private equity, specializing in media and technology. She was also the director at the Alliance for Downtown New York, where she managed a loan and grant portfolio program to help small businesses in Lower Manhattan recover following 9/11. She holds a bachelor’s degree in economics from New York University and an MBA from Yale. Mai-Anh serves on the board of Proteus Fund, a social justice not-for-profit, and is a Certified Financial Analyst.

Quanita is the Senior Director of Groundswell Action Fund. She plays a leading role in Groundswell’s Integrated Voter Engagement (IVE) program, which equips reproductive justice groups with cutting-edge voter engagement skills and technology.

Quanita began organizing for social and racial justice alongside her parents in her native South Africa during the transition from apartheid to democracy. She joined her parents as they voted, for the first time in their lives, for Nelson Mandela in 1994. It was this moment that sparked a lifelong passion for electoral organizing.
Quanita and her family came to the U.S. in 1997. Prior to joining Groundswell Fund first as an IVE coach (2014-2015) and then as Program Organizer in 2016. She is a founding staff member of the New Florida Majority (NFM), where from 2009-2014 she led the creation of statewide, data-driven C3 and C4 electoral campaigns that harnessed the power of civic engagement organizing, technology, and analytics to advance social change.

Before joining NFM, Quanita was a scholar-activist in the fight for housing justice with the Miami Workers Center from 2005-2008. Quanita holds a B.A. in Political Theory, Economic Development, and African Studies from Hampshire College. Her thesis was on the anti-gentrification movement in Miami and the global fight against neoliberal privatization of basic human rights like housing in South Africa. Quanita supports women of color leaders in civic engagement to build skills in data and technology in order to create a more inclusive environment for all.

Paul has been President and CEO of Proteus Fund since 2016. He is a deeply committed activist for comprehensive, progressive social change with a record of over thirty years of accomplishments.

Prior to becoming President, Paul directed Proteus Fund’s Civil Marriage Collaborative (CMC) for eight years. The CMC was a groundbreaking donor collaborative that played a critical role in winning the freedom to marry in the United States in 2015. Under his leadership, the program awarded over $20 million in grants strategically targeted to support a cultural sea change on the issue of marriage equality and LGBTQ justice at the state and national levels.

Before the CMC, Paul worked in San Francisco and New York (where he is still based) pursuing his social justice values and vision as a philanthropic leader, non-profit executive, public policy advocate, consultant, and civil rights litigator. As Executive Director, he transformed Funders Concerned About AIDS into a leading international philanthropic actor in the response to the pandemic while advancing a variety of other initiatives mobilizing grantmakers to fight HIV/AIDS. At the beginning of Paul’s tenure in 1997, global investment in HIV/AIDS by American philanthropy was under $50 million. By the time he left FCAA in 2005, that figure had leaped to over $350 million. As Federal Affairs Director and Public Policy Director at the San Francisco AIDS Foundation and Public Policy Director at the AIDS Legal Referral Panel, Paul provided key leadership on a wide range of national and California-specific HIV/AIDS public policy victories on issues ranging from health care reform and privacy rights to housing and government appropriations. He also served as both Executive and Legal Director for National Gay Rights Advocates, one of the first national LGBTQ legal rights organizations.

Paul has also consulted on high-level strategy, program development and evaluation, leadership coaching and governance with a wide range of philanthropic, non-profit, and academic clients. He has served in several volunteer leadership positions, including the last eighteen years as a Trustee for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS – one of the largest HIV/AIDS grantmakers in the United States, having awarded over $200 million since its founding in 1987.

Paul became an activist as an undergraduate at University of Pennsylvania, where he dedicated his energies to anti-Apartheid, gender, and LGBTQ justice issues. While at Harvard Law School, his summer work at the National Women’s Law Center led to his appointment as the first man to be named a Revson Women’s Law and Public Policy Fellow. As an attorney in private practice, Paul litigated prison reform, employment discrimination, and voting rights cases. Paul is an honors graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard Law School. He lives in New York with his husband.

"Resist much, obey little." - Walt Whitman