"For to be free is not merely to cast off one's chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others."
Who's Participating?
The Let Us Rise Task ForceThe Leadership Circle is our primary decision-making body.
Voradel Carey
Voradel is currently pursuing a Masters degree in Nonprofit Management at Regis University. Voradel brings a variety of fundraising and technical skills to the leadership of Let Us Rise. She is currently the athletic director at Loyola Catholic School, is on the board of directors at ArtReach and is on the volunteer committee for Warren Village.
Brenda Cleary
Brenda Cleary is a long time community arts activist committed to using art as an instrument for social justice. Her specialty as an artist is facilitating a collective vision from a group of participants that results in a large scale work of public art. She believes firmly that creativity must reach beyond the canvas and extend into our daily lives: how we create our identities, values, and outwards into how we create our community and society as a whole. She is excited to continue collaborating with Let Us Rise both as a Task Force member and creative artist because “To dream alone is just a dream but to dream together reality is born.”
Homero Ocon
Homero was born in Durango, Mexico and has lived in Denver for the past 12 years. His community work dates back to his time in Mexico, where he worked in the barrios and villages of his hometown for the rights of subsistence farmers. Some of his earliest memories include his father being jailed for his efforts to recover land for their small community. During his time in Denver, Homero has worked with organizations committed to immigrant rights and racial justice, including Rights for All People, Hispanos Buscando Justicia, Comite en Defensa del Pueblo and Centro Humanitario. Homero knows that the only way to turn the tide on the increase in deportations and exploitation we must change our approach in a way that courageously and un-apologetically follows the leadership of those being deported and exploited.
Candace Redshirt
Candace is committed to building capacity and knowledge within marginalized communities. She is a long time volunteer with Chinook Fund, helping to develop their social justice curriculum and as a member of the Grantmaking Committee. She believes in the power of storytelling to engage people in marginalized and low income communities. Candace grew up in South Dakota and has lived in the Westwood neighborhood in southwest Denver for nearly a decade.
Francesca Santistevan
Francesca works toward developing neighborhood capacity and grassroots leadership. As a 40-something Chicana with deep Southwestern and West Denver roots and 20 years of social activism for systems change and equitable neighborhood redevelopment practices, she applies social network principles and empowerment models to her profession as community organizer, trainer, group facilitator, and consultant. Francesca specializes in developing multi-organizational partnerships, community collaborations, and facilitating inclusive dialogue among diverse communities while striving toward family-strengthening and advocating for progressive systems change.
Staff
Dara Burwell
Chair of Foundation Funding
Transformative Alliances
Dara Burwell has worked as a writer and community organizer dedicated to personal and collective liberation. Her upbringing as a queer woman of mixed racial heritage has always provided her with multifaceted observations on privilege and power. Dara has worked as a staff person for the Center on Disability Studies at the University of Hawai’i at Manoa, and then became a community organizer for 9to5, the National Association of Working Women. Because of Dara’s deep commitment to anti-oppression principles, she served as a co-leader of Prax(us), a social justice based organization dedicated to ending domestic human trafficking, for two years and has worked as an independent anti-oppression consultant and coach for three years. In 2010, Dara founded Transformative Alliances, an anti-oppression consulting business. Dara continues to support social justice based organizations in their anti-oppression work and organizational development, and is pleased to be working with Let Us Rise.
Mu Son Chi
Outreach and Programs Director
Mu Son's family immigrated to the U.S. when he was two years old from Seoul, South Korea. He grew up in the small town of Temple, Texas and has lived in Colorado for the last 20 years. He began his community work with Ethical Trade Action Group (E-TAG), has served on the local steering committee for Jobs with Justice and on the board of SweatFree Communities a national anti-sweatshop organization. Mu Son draws his inspiration from work with the community at organizations like Centro Humanitario, Chinook Fund, Denver Fair Food and Let Us Rise.
email: muson(at)letusrise.org
phone: 720-570-4908
Jes Ward
Vision Organizing Director
Jes Ward is the director of the Rocky Mountain PeaceJam affiliate office. She also serves as the coordinator of PeaceJam's Global Call to Action (GCA)--an effort to mobilize the creation of 1 billion projects addressing the most pressing issues of our time. She has been the lead coordinator for both of PeaceJam's GCA conferences which have been attended by over 4,000 youth and 10 Nobel Peace Laureates. Personally, Jes is deeply committed to family and loves everything that it encompasses. She is also a magician (watch out!) and believes deeply in the healing properties of play.
Advisory Circle
This Circle is for people who provide strategic support to Let Us Rise.
Kris Abrams
Founder
Let Us Rise
Kris is the former senior producer of Democracy Now!, a national, independent news program, for which she coordinated the daily newscast, helped lead the program’s dramatic expansion, and reported from around the world. She then moved to Colorado to lead community radio station KGNU’s expansion into Denver. She has studied the liberation movement in South Africa, and recently obtained her certification in peacemaking through the Peacemaker Institute of Colorado. She practices meditation, yoga and loves to hike in the mountains. Email: kris at letusrise dot org
Wendy Emrich
Co-Founder
Chinook Fund, board member Lambi Fund of Haiti
Wendy Emrich is a third generation Coloradan who has traveled extensively around the world. She is a peace and environmental activist, philanthropist, fundraiser and single mother of two adopted Haitian children. She has helped several organizations get off the ground including an organic farm school, and two grassroots funding organizations, one funding social change in Colorado and another funding environmental groups in developing countries. She currently sits on the board of the Lambi Fund of Haiti.
Jordan Garcia
Immigrant Rights Organizer
American Friends Service Committee; co-chair, Chinook Grantmaking Committee
Jordan Garcia s an Immigrant Rights Organizer with Coloradans For Immigrant Rights, a project of the American Friends Service Committee. He serves as the chair of the board of directors for the Colorado Anti-Violence Program, ending violence within and against the LGBTQ community and volunteers for their 24-hour crisis hotline. He also sit on the boards of the Chinook Fund and the Grassroots Institute for Fundraising Training, and is a member of the Denver Mayor’s LGBTQ Commission.
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Sonya Garcia Ulibarri
Sonya Garcia-Ulibarri is the Executive Director for YouthBiz, Inc., a Denver-based youth development agency. With a passion for community-based work and a love of fundraising, Sonya has been working in nonprofit sector for over ten years. After receiving degrees in Political Science and Psychology from the University of Colorado at Denver, she spent six years with the Grassroots Institute for Fundraising Training (GIFT) working to strengthen the capacity of grassroots social justice organizations across the country. Sonya is an experienced fundraiser, trainer, and consultant and currently serves as Board member for several Denver-based organizations She has a life-long commitment to working toward social change.
Jamie Laurie (aka Jonny 5)
Lyricist
The Flobots
Jonny 5 (Jamie Laurie) has been writing and performing raps since 1996. He is a lead vocalist with the Denver-based band Flobots, and a founding member of Flobots.org, a non-profit organization integrating music and activism. After graduating from Brown University, he worked for three years in the field of youth development as an Americorps *VISTA. Returning to Denver in 2004, he created a voter engagement campaign and worked as a mentoring/tutoring coordinator at East High School. He enjoys learning new languages and currently speaks and writes various amounts of English, Spanish, Japanese, ASL, French, Arabic, and Mandarin. The Flobots provided instrumentals for the homepage video on this site.
Media Team
Tony Shawcross
Founder and Executive Director
Deproduction
After graduating with a degree in marketing and business administration from the University of Colorado, Tony worked briefly in marketing for the IT industry before leaving to focus on socially relevant video production, working with Little Voice Productions, the Colorado State House of Representatives, the Pan African Arts Society, and Free Speech TV, among others. Tony has presented over 100 media education courses with various non-profits and at conferences, schools and universities. Tony is also an experienced video producer with hundreds of films and videos produced for local and national television, film festivals, and community screenings. Deproduction edited the videos for this site.
Web and Design Team
Peju Alawusa
Sharee Dieringer
Graphic Designer
Civic Pixel
Brian Hiatt
Web Programmer
Civic Pixel
Here are the organizations and people who have held visioning salons:
Our Sector, Our Community, Our Time; 2 Day Summit on Colorado Non Profits and the Econony 03/02/2009 View
Team Cheesman 01/17/2009 - 7:35pm View
In Search of Values for a New Society – a PC4C Event 09/03/2008 - 2:29pm View
Coloradans for Immigrant Rights Visioning Circle 05/02/2008 - 8:32am View
Community Resource Center Staff 04/30/2008 - 1:02pm View
