CNNHANH.COM - Key Persons

Aisha Esquivel

Job Titles:

Manager
Outreach Manager, Illinois Helpline

Aisha Esquivel is an Outreach Manager for the Illinois Helpline at HRiA. Hailing from the Chicagoland area, Aisha has a diverse background including home health care, project coordination, and customer service. She founded the #breanaland project in honor of her daughter who passed away in 2019 to support bereaved mothers as well as raise awareness and stop the stigma related to mental health and substance use disorders. Aisha enjoys reading, writing, listening to podcasts, and spending time with her children and grandchild.

Allison Egan

Job Titles:

Senior Manager of Health & Racial Equity at HRiA
Senior Manager, Health & Racial Equity

Allison Egan is a Senior Manager of Health & Racial Equity at HRiA. Allison is focused primarily on the launch and execution of the Root Cause Solutions Exchange, helping lead community engagement and coaching efforts across Massachusetts. Allison has a rich history in local and regional public health, where she has previously led efforts around neighborhood revitalization and community engagement, climate and environmental justice, emergency preparedness, and harm reduction efforts in communities in Western Massachusetts. Allison has a Bachelor of Science in Public Health and a Master of Science in Epidemiology from the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

Allyson Auerbach

aa..@hria.org

Job Titles:

Director on the Research
Director, Research & Evaluation

Allyson Auerbach is a Director on the Research and Evaluation team. In this role, Allyson develops comprehensive research plans, conducts community health assessments, and evaluates the impact of health programs and policies. Allyson has significant quantitative and qualitative research experience organizing, collecting, analyzing, and reporting data for numerous assessments and evaluations, including several assessments that have focused on behavioral health. For the 2021 Statewide Assessment of Gambling and Problem Gambling in Illinois, Allyson led the stakeholder engagement and qualitative data components. Allyson has previously served as an evaluation manager for the Si Texas behavioral health integration evaluation, a study of integrated behavioral health models at nine sites throughout South Texas. Allyson has also managed an assessment of the impact of energy development on the behavioral health of women in Eastern Montana and Western North Dakota. In earlier years at HRiA, Allyson has been the project manager and core researcher for two county-level behavioral health assessments in Maryland. Prior to joining HRiA, Allyson worked in Southeastern Massachusetts where she provided technical assistance and training to substance abuse coalitions regarding assessment, planning, and implementation of policy, systems, and environmental strategies. Allyson holds a Master of Public Health degree from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Bachelor of Science degree in public health from Haverford College.

An Bui

ab..@hria.org

Job Titles:

Administrative Coordinator
Administrative Coordinator for the LEAH Project at HRiA

Angie Kuzma

Job Titles:

Policy & Advocacy Manager, NACHW

Angie Kuzma is the Policy & Advocacy Manager for the National Association of Community Health Workers (NACHW), a fiscally sponsored program of HRiA. She is a community health worker (CHW) based in Portland, Oregon. In her role at NACHW, Angie works in solidarity with CHWs to promote CHW self-determination, leadership, and sustainability in local, state, and federal policy. In her previous role at the Oregon Community Health Workers Association, she served as Chair for the Payment Models Subcommittee of the Traditional Health Worker Commission and worked to integrate CHWs, doulas, peers, and additional community-based workers in Oregon's Medicaid program. Angie is in her second term as an elected Section Councilor and Policy Committee Co-Chair for the CHW Section within the American Public Health Association. Her experience in direct service as a CHW working with people experiencing house/homelessness spans a decade, two Federally Qualified Health Centers, and multiple volunteer settings.

Anne Lyness

Job Titles:

Managing Director, Accounting

Ben Hires

Job Titles:

Member of the Board
CEO of the Boston Chinatown Neighborhood Center

Ben Hires is the CEO of the Boston Chinatown Neighborhood Center and a member of the HRiA Board of Directors. Since his first job as a youth counselor at a therapeutic program, Ben has gained significant experience in nonprofit leadership and serving young people and families. Most recently as Director of Strategic Partnerships at the Boston Public Library, he established and maintained strong relationships across education, cultural, and civic engagement sectors to advance the BPL鈥檚 mission of providing educational and cultural enrichment free to all Boston residents. Before the Library, he played a key role elevating the Boston Children's Chorus鈥� social justice mission to bring diverse young people and their families together. He earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Philosophy and Political Science, a Master of Theological Studies, and a Master of Science.

Britta Magnuson

bm..@hria.org

Job Titles:

Senior Scientific Advisor

Britta Magnuson is a Senior Scientific Advisor on the Biomedical Research Grantmaking team at HRiA. She has over 20 years of experience in designing and conducting research, grant writing, and training and mentoring pre-doctoral, post-graduate, and early career clinician researchers. Prior to joining HRiA, Dr. Magnuson was an Associate Professor at Tufts University School of Dental Medicine, where she also was Associate Director of Regulatory Knowledge and Support at the Tufts Clinical and Translational Science Institute. She is passionate about research-driven solutions for the promotion of overall health and improving people鈥檚 lives. She received a B.S. degree from Calvin University and a D.M.D. degree from Tufts University School of Dental Medicine.

Brittany Chen

bc..@hria.org

Job Titles:

Vice President, Health Equity

Brittany Chen, DrPH, is the Vice President of Health Equity at 抖淫. She has extensive expertise in policy research, analysis, and translation, community engagement and mobilization, training and facilitation, and youth development. In her role, she oversees HRiA鈥檚 internal health equity strategic planning work, and conducts health and racial equity assessment, capacity building, and strategic planning efforts for diverse entities including state and local government, community collaboratives, educational institutions, and philanthropic organizations. She holds a DrPH from Boston University鈥檚 School of Public Health and an MPH from the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University.

Bruce E. Landon

Job Titles:

Member of the Board

Dr. Landon鈥檚 primary research interest is assessing how different characteristics of physicians and health care organizations, ranging from health plans to physician group practices, impact physician behavior and health care service provision. Through this work, he has developed a theoretical model to explain how health care organizations affect the quality of care. He is currently involved in several projects to describe and quantify the impact of organizational characteristics and strategies, including quality improvement activities and financial incentives, on the provision of care. Dr. Landon has been funded as a Principal Investigator by the National Institute of Aging, the National Cancer Institute, and the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. Dr. Landon graduated summa cum laude from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania with a major in finance. He received his MD degree from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, and an MBA with a concentration in health care management from the Wharton School. He also received an MSc in health policy and management from the Harvard School of Public Health. Dr. Landon is a Fellow of the American College of Physicians and an elected member of the American Society of Clinical Investigation and the Association of American Professors.

Carole Allen

Job Titles:

Member of the Board
Community Leader in Her Town of Arlington

Carole Allen, MD, MBA is a board certified pediatrician with extensive experience in clinical practice, practice administration, public health and health care policy. Before retiring from clinical practice in 2011, Dr. Allen was聽Director of Pediatrics for Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates, where聽she was responsible for oversight of the health care of more than 70,000 children. From 2012 through 2017, she served on the Board of the Massachusetts Health Policy Commission that was created to improve quality of care while reducing total medical costs. Dr. Allen represent ed New England on the Board of Directors of the American Academy of Pediatrics, and served two years as president of its Massachusetts Chapter.聽Under her guidance, the Chapter engaged state officials in discussions of the role of the medical home, focused on the importance of investing in early childhood to pave the way to lifelong health and success, and partnered with the Massachusetts Department of Public Health in obesity prevention and tobacco protection initiatives. Dr. Allen is Immediate Past President of 聽the Massachusetts Medical Society, and served as 聽president of the Tufts Medical Alumni Association. Dr. Allen is also a community leader in her town of Arlington, where she has helped to develop and enforce regulations restricting the use of tobacco in public places.聽 As Chair of the Tobacco Free Mass Coalition in 2004, she helped to pave the way to establish Massachusetts as a smoke-free workplaces聽 state.

Charles Lord - Treasurer

Job Titles:

Member of the Board Leadership Team
Treasurer

Charles Lord, JD is a Principal at Renew Energy Partners (RENEW), an energy efficiency and clean energy finance and development firm serving the retrofit market for commercial and industrial buildings. RENEW finances and develops the renovation of existing buildings to improve their energy performance, reduce climate emissions, provide a market-rate return to investors, and create jobs in cities. Prior to RENEW, Charles worked at C-Quest Capital (CQC), where he helped launch CQC鈥檚 Global Cook Stoves Program. CQC is a carbon finance business dedicated to developing high-quality emission reduction projects that provide superior returns for investors and energy services to low-income communities in Africa, India, and Latin America. Prior to CQC, Charles was a principal at SCRC, where he focused on sustainable infrastructure for energy, waste, and water. Charles also founded Alternatives for Community & Environment (Roxbury, MA), the largest environmental justice center in the Northeast, where he served as Co-Director until 1998 and member of the Board until 2004. In 1998, Charles founded the Urban Ecology Institute at Boston College, and served as its Executive Director until 2008. He also taught in the Environmental Studies Program at Boston College until 2010. 聽He has published numerous articles on environmental law, environmental justice and environmental policy. After completing law school, Charles clerked on the United States Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit. Charles is a recipient of the Echoing Green Fellowship and the Barr Foundation Fellowship, and was Editor-in-Chief of the Virginia Law Review.

Deondra Rattler

Job Titles:

Contracts Administrator

Deondra Rattler is a Contracts Administrator on the Budgets and Contracts team at HRiA. She has a Bachelors in Business Administration as well as experience across many industries such as transportation and infrastructure, healthcare, emergency management and response, oil and gas, and logistics. Deondra is a strategic, results-driven professional with a focus on holistic solutions. She seeks to make a genuine difference in people's lives through her work.

Eric Gurna

eg..@hria.org

Job Titles:

Consultant
Executive
Interim Director, the LEAH Project

Eric Gurna is an experienced nonprofit executive and consultant committed to supporting the work of organizations dedicated to community & youth development and social justice. From 2015 to 2021, Eric served as President & CEO of LA's BEST Afterschool Enrichment Program, a partnership of the City of Los Angeles, the Los Angeles Unified School District and the private sector serving 25,000 children at nearly 200 Los Angeles elementary schools. Prior to leading LA鈥檚 BEST, Eric was the founder, President and CEO of Development Without Limits, where he led a team that designed and facilitated staff development, curriculum and other resources for community organizations and schools nationwide. Eric holds a B.S. in Political Science from the University of California at Irvine and an M.S. in Urban Policy Analysis and Management from the New School for Social Research in New York. He has participated in several intensive professional development experiences, including Foundations for Systems Leadership with Peter Senge, Trauma-Informed Practice with Pia Escudero, Open Space Technology with Harrison Owen and Theater of the Oppressed with Augusto Boal. Eric brings a deep commitment to positive youth development to his work, and a national reputation for thought leadership in the Expanded Learning movement. He also brings a nuanced understanding and appreciation for how children learn and develop, and a passion for staff and program development. 鈥�

Eric Kramer

Job Titles:

Member of the Board

Erika Sturm

es..@hria.org

Job Titles:

Managing Director of Budgets and Contracts at HRiA
Managing Director, Budgets and Contracts

Erika Sturm is a Managing Director of Budgets and Contracts at HRiA. Erika has over a decade of experience in non-profit grants management, finance, and budgeting and planning. Prior to joining HRiA, Erika led a team in the planning and administration of an $88M portfolio of public awards. Erika earned her Masters in Business Administration from Boston University's Questrom School of Business, and her Bachelors of Science in Business Administration and Bachelors of Arts in Psychology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Gail Latimore

Job Titles:

Member of the Board

Hannah Carliner

hc..@hria.org

Job Titles:

Director, Research & Evaluation

Dr. Carliner is a social epidemiologist with expertise on the effects of stress, trauma, and social inequities on risk for psychiatric and substance use disorders across the life course. As a Director in Research and Evaluation, Dr. Carliner led the 2021 Statewide Assessment of Gambling and Problem Gambling in Illinois; she is Evaluation Lead of the Massachusetts Statewide Community Health and Healthy Aging Funds; and she leads the evaluation of the BeHERE Workplace initiative to prevent pain, injury, and opioid use in the workplace. Prior to HRiA, Dr. Carliner was the Project Director for the NIH-funded Environmental influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) Program for the Boricua Youth Study (BYS) in New York City. Dr. Carliner completed a post-doctoral fellowship in substance use epidemiology at Columbia鈥檚 Mailman School of Public Health. She received her Doctor of Science in Social and Behavioral Sciences from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, her Master鈥檚 in Public Health from Columbia鈥檚 Mailman School of Public Health, and her Bachelor of Arts in Human Biology from Stanford University.

Harriet G. Tolpin

Job Titles:

Member of the Emeritus Board
Board Member ( Emeritus )

Heather Hyden

Job Titles:

Senior Program Officer
Senior Program Officer - Operations, Health & Equitable Communities

Heather Hyden is a Senior Program Officer-Operations on the Healthy and Equitable Communities Grantmaking team at HRiA. She has over 14 years of experience in community development and food systems equity. Her career spans diverse sectors with experience in local government, community organizing, academia and philanthropy. Her work has focused on participatory planning, coalition development, story-based evaluation, racial equity and liberatory education. She recently served as Senior Portfolio Officer at the Humana Foundation where she oversaw grantmaking in Kentucky, Louisiana and across the Southeast. She has a B.A. Honors in Geography and Urban Planning from the University of Memphis and M.S. in Community and Leadership Development from the University of Kentucky. Heather lives in Lexington, KY with her son, partner and in-laws.