I grew up in the Saint Louis metro east area. I graduated from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with a degree in Computer Science. After the Saint Louis Rams left for Los Angeles, I got really interested in economics impact analysis. I created a company, Dynammek, to help build communities and businesses. Dynammek will develop an economic impact scores that will more precisely quantify the actual money a business generates in a community. The hope is with this information people and businesses will support those businesses that are truly beneficial to them.
Olive Watkins
Olive is a returning-generation farmer and organizer. She is the newest land steward of her family’s 4th generation timber farm in North Carolina. Olive is passionate about building equitable food economies for black farmers and food business owners and is co-creating an investment fund to support and center black folks in the food system.
Shirah Dedman
Shirah Dedman is a filmmaker, attorney and activist. After dropping out of high school at 15, she became a licensed attorney by the age of 23 yet subsequently found herself un- and under-employed. But through perseverance, she managed to build a career in film that included positions at William Morris Agency, DirecTV, and Paramount Pictures. So after her last layoff, she decided to relentlessly pursue her true passion: creating content reflecting the intersection between economics, race and the environment. Shirah is a 2018-2019 Associate of the Investigative Reporting Program at UC Berkeley and an Associate of the Equal Justice Initiative.
David Jaber
As a Project Drawdown Fellow (www.drawdown.org), the author of Our Historic Moment (www.ourhistoricmoment.com), and an advisor, I advance better decision-making through greenhouse gas (GHG) analysis, zero waste audits, green building investigation, life-cycle analysis and climate action/adaptation planning. I actively work with Native American tribes, where I have long-held a commitment to justice.
Ojan Mobedshahi
Finance Director of the East Bay Permanent Real Estate Cooperative, Ojan is a 2nd generation Iranian American, born and raised in the Bay Area. His past work, from healthy land use to real estate development, informs his mission driven integration of social justice and real estate finance. Ojan lives in a co-op in Oakland and is also a landscape contractor and regenerative permaculture designer. While earning his B.A. in Economics from Pitzer College, Ojan was inducted into the Economic Honors Society and organized a local chapter of the Occupy movement.
Rebekah Papé
Rebekah works as the Director of Community and Outreach at Ecolibrium Farms and as the Executive Director of the Papé Family Foundation. She is also a writer, yoga teacher, and mother. She has an MA from in Whole Systems Design, specializing in Sustainable Food Systems, Permaculture Design, and Sustainable Change. Rebekah is passionate about exploring wellness, community, and social change through our connection to food and participating in social justice efforts that shift patterns of inequality by focusing on food access and affordability. Near and dear to her heart are the rituals of gathering, preparing, and eating food together.
Brandon Harrell
An urban planning and software product management consultant turned full time diversity, equity and inclusion advocate who digests permaculture systems design on nights and weekends :)
Annie Zeng
I am currently working in scientific and engineering R&D within the field of CO2 utilization (www.opus-12.com). Very interested in learning more about socio-cultural and economic systems which affect richness of life and the ability to thrive for all.
Doningnon Soro
Doni Soro is CEO/Founder of Unsounded African Minds, a strategic advisory and consulting firm supporting organizations and communities implementation of cultural, diversity and programs.
Amelia Ahl
Amelia is honing her expertise in understanding and investing in the human component of supply chains as a good business practice. Her experience includes research and advocacy for protection of women and children refugees at UNHCR, managing development projects in India with women as the central agents of change at Traditional Medicinals Foundation, and for profit supply chain engagement strategy development at Traditional Medicinals.
Faith Gilbert
Faith is a farmer, educator and initiator of collaborative projects in the food system.
Matthew Rose-Stark
Matthew Rose-Stark is a first generation regenerative farmer, currently working as a manager at Be Love Farm. He is passionate about addressing issues of justice, equality, deep ecology, through changing the way we relate to food and land. He is currently working to develop a cooperatively owned and managed farm grounded in a new economy and culture that heals, helps, and holds all life.
Charlotte X. C. Sullivan
Charlotte X.C. Sullivan works as the Social Entrepreneurship Program Associate at Middlebury College. She is the co-founder of May West, a design studio and material research laboratory specializing in milkweed-based textile innovation. She serves on the Board of Directors at Cabin-Time, a roaming artist residency program to remote places. Previously, she co-founded the Frontier Fellowship with Epicenter, a rural design resource center in Green River, Utah. For several years she worked at Queens County Farm, the longest continuously operated farm in the state of New York on the largest tract of undisturbed farm land left in New York City.