Our Staff & Board

As a children’s educator, Zabrina guides children through hands-on, outdoor science investigations, cooking activities, and engage children in environmental stewardship tasks that create meaningful connections with the food and natural world.

Zabrina (or Zab) graduated from WSU (Go Cougs!) with a BS in Earth & Environmental Sciences. She grew up mostly in San Diego, but fell in love with the beauty of the PNW and hasn’t looked back! She has a cat named Kumi, a pup named Sandy, and too many houseplants. In her free time, you can usually find her hiking, running, reading, and cooking/baking.

Nancy coordinates children’s programs at Rainier Beach Urban Farm & Wetlands. She helps develop interdisciplinary garden curriculum and teaches in our summer camps, after-school programs, and school-year camps in SE Seattle. She is passionate about outdoor education because of the relationships it brings about with the natural world!

Nancy holds a B.A. in Education, Communities & Organizations from the University of Washington and has been teaching in classroom and outdoor settings for over 5 years. In her free time, you may find her making art, looking at tiny things or gardening!

Kerri’s team organizes Tilth Alliance’s food access programming including Good Food Bags, our pay-what-you-can Farm Stand & CSA, as well as the online Marketplace. We focus on thoughtful sourcing and community impact. 

Outside of TIlth Alliance, Kerri is the Board Treasurer for Delridge Grocery Co-op, an avid thrifter, decent stained glass artist and befriender of all cats. 

Ariel has worked in Tilth Alliance’s Finance and Administration department since 2019 and has been in the accounting field since 2016. Ariel works with every team at Tilth Alliance to manage all things accounting and finance including invoicing, accounts payable, payroll, and reporting.

Originally from the Palouse region of Idaho/Washington, Ariel has lived in Seattle for 13 years. She is an avid walking and public transit commuter, sometimes jogger, desert camping enthusiast, and happy cat mom.

Lexa manages the summer farm stand at Rainier Beach Urban Farm & Wetlands, as well as the customer-facing side of our Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program. In 2021, she also started a cut floral project at the farm. Her job is to connect the community with the bounty of Rainier Beach Urban Farm & Wetlands and our partner farms.

Lexa has worked in community food systems for over 10 years, ranging from being hands on in the kitchen and field to designing local food policy. Her master’s degree in urban and regional planning focused on building more equitable food systems. In her free time, she enjoys cooking up and preserving the harvest, getting out to the mountains and waterways, and foraging for mushrooms. 

Tanya supports our multicultural senior meal programs throughout the greater Seattle area with relevant food safety and nutrition education. She also provides nutrition and gardening education to preschool sites and their families in the Farm to Table program. 

Tanya has her Masters in Nutrition from Bastyr University and is passionate about functional and integrative nutrition, sustainable food systems, and helping foster joyful, positive relationships with food. In her free time, she loves hosting shabbat dinners, making cheeseboards, playing with her dog Izzy, and exploring the outdoors. 

As Development Coordinator, Jenny wears many hats and works in several areas within Tilth Alliance’s development team. She supports volunteer management, event planning, donor relations, and database management, as well as lending a hand with Tilth Alliance’s communications.

Jenny is from the Atlanta area and new to Seattle! In her free time she enjoys reading, biking, foraging and generally spending as much time outside as possible.

Suez manages our youth employment programs which focus on farming, wetland restoration, and personal and professional development. She also manages food production at Rainier Beach Urban Farm & Wetlands and distributes produce to the community through our CSA program, pay-what-you can farm stand, U-pick garden, the East African Senior meal program, and donations to local community organizations.

Suez has grown food alongside community members in Rainier Beach for several years and she is passionate about supporting young people of color in leadership roles. 

Chris joined Tilth Alliance in 2014 and is thrilled to support the Community Education team, which builds community through a variety of programs: classes for adults; senior wellness and nutrition education; environmental stewardship; community learning gardens and orchards; and partnerships with community-based organizations.

Outside of work, Chris enjoys cooking, creating an edible home landscape, restoring Seattle’s urban forest in the East Duwamish greenbelt and backpacking throughout the Northwest. Chris lives with his husband in Highland Park in Southwest Seattle.

Selena is a Garden Hotline coordinator and project manager for the Natural Yard Care Program that offers free gardening resources to individuals and professionals. Selena manages the Culturally Relevant Edible Plant Start program that helps to grow, trial and distribute edible plant starts to community partners in Seatle and King County. 

She loves the outdoors, hiking, camping and immersing herself in nature. When she am not in the mountains, she is gardening in her own backyard, cooking ,and sharing food with family and friends.

Laura develops and oversees programs that encompass natural yard care education focused on soil health, resource conservation and pesticide reduction. These include the Garden Hotline, Master Composter/Sustainability Steward programs, our natural yard care classes for northwest cities outside of Seattle, and a culturally relevant plant growing campaign. She is also the primary buyer for plants for the annual Edible Plant Sale and teaches our botany and propagation classes.

Laura has more than 40 years of education and experience working in horticulture in the northwest including studies in landscape horticulture, a Bachelor of Arts degree in Botany from the University of Washington, and work experience in local utility and private garden landscapes as well as the nursery trade. When not engrossed in all things plant oriented she can be found on a beach enjoying the sand, marine birds and mammals and the salty Salish Sea air.

As a part of the Development Team, Kala supports Tilth Alliance’s events and volunteers. She loves bringing people together to experience and champion the mission of Tilth Alliance.

With a history in education program management, she is excited to contribute her event planning and volunteer management skills towards building a better food future with Tilth Alliance. She relocated to Washington from Colorado and is making it her mission to experience all things Seattle. The first thing on her agenda is learning to row on Lake Union.

Melissa is part of a team of professional horticultural educators that answer gardening questions, teach classes, and do outreach within our community to help reduce pesticide and herbicide use and educate best waste management practices. She also helps manage the Children’s Garden at the Good Shepherd Center. If you ask her what her favorite plant is, it will change from season to season, but she named her daughter after the Calla Lily. 

She is the mom of a spunky little girl and married to a web programmer. They spend their shared time on day trip adventures, gardening in their community garden, and playing online and board games. When the weather cooperates, swimming, camping, and trips to national parks bring her joy.

Coral works with farmers, teachers, and volunteers, to get local, seasonal, organic, produce out to South East Seattle and beyond. Through Good Food Bag Program, we are able to support our local farmers and producers while connecting our community with nutrient dense produce.

They are a house plant enthusiast, yarn crafter, thrift store scavenger, singer song-writer and general homebody. 

Daniella helps to run educational programming on the farm in collaboration with various Rainier Beach community groups and her co-workers. She helps facilitate the monthly Community Kitchen events, the Dandelion Club work party for herbalists, the annual Farm Festival, develops educational materials, and manages the farm’s social media outreach, among many other fun things.

Daniella grew up on the East Coast, on Cape Cod, MA. She is the daughter of a social worker and a house painter who moonlight as musicians. She’s passionate about stewarding the earth in ways that also heal people, which brought her into the study and practices of herbalism, ancestral foods, indigenous cultural reclamation, social and earth justice work. She’s also an artist, dancer, and a rescue parrot parent!

Benay works on our Youth and Families team, coordinating, teaching, and planning curriculum. She also helps coordinate the Children’s Garden at the Good Shepherd Center. She loves to share her passion for gardening and the natural world with children and adults at Tilth Alliance!

She grew up attending outdoor education camps most summers in the oceans, gardens, and redwood forests of Santa Cruz, CA, which first introduced her to the wonders of environmental learning. As an adult, she attended IslandWood, leading field groups on Bainbridge Island, and completed a Masters in Environmental and Community Education. In her free time, she loves traveling, reading, hiking, plants, Harry Potter, cooking and dancing.

Kana teaches school-aged children about how to take care of plants and animals in the farm, how to cook with vegetables and fruits, and how to make arts and crafts with natural materials. You’ll find Kana co-leading fun activities in the after-school programs and weekends camps at Rainier Beach Urban Farm & Wetlands!

Kana is originally from Japan. After starting a family in Seattle, she realized the importance of teaching young children about where food comes from and how food is grown. She loves teaching children about harvesting fruits that are native to our lands at Tilth Alliance. 

As Market Programs Coordinator, Ren drives the work van, schleps vegetables and sometimes lifts heavy things.

Rumored to be several raccoons in a trench masquerading as a person, they moonlight as a good barista and a bad musician. Will complain about coffee sizes to anyone that will listen. 

Juan manages operations of Rainier Beach Urban Farm & Wetlands to ensure it serves the needs and requirements of the Rainier Beach community, Tilth Alliance staff and programming and the Seattle Department of Parks & Recreation.

Teri helps facilitate farmer education and support through Farm Walks and the Farm Walks Podcast, Tilth Conference, and the Washington State Organic & Sustainable Farming Fund. 

A Seattle transplant, Teri is originally from the Southeast where she received a BS in Horticulture from the University of Georgia. Before coming to Tilth Alliance, she worked on various diversified vegetable operations in Georgia, Maine, and Washington. She is passionate about sustainable growers and constantly in awe of their resilience and the amazing work they do. Outside of her work, you can find her testing out new recipes in the kitchen, birding, and generally seeking out the sunshine.

Reingard deeply enjoys teaching people about the how’s and why’s of composting and all benefits of good compost. She is a 2016 graduate of the Master Composter Sustainability Steward program and now leads and co-teaches this extensive volunteer training program for Tilth Alliance and Seattle Public Utilities. 

Reingard’s passion for organic approaches to growing food, gardening, and farming goes back to when her grandmother started one of the first organic farms in Austria in 1962. She holds a PhD in biology, managed large software projects for many years, loves soil science, gardening, and vermicompost – and mealworms! Reingard has been gardening in the Pacific Northwest for over 20 years. 

Georgina oversees 20+ senior congregate meal sites where immigrant and refugee seniors can socialize, exercise,  learn, and eat culturally appropriate, nourishing meals. Her team creatively shares nutrition education and resources around relevant health topics and the importance of eating local, seasonal whole foods. They also plan programming and activities that support social, intellectual, and physical well-being such as farm field trips, Good Food Bags, gardening and cooking classes.

Georgina is a Salvadorean-American, San Francisco native with a Masters Degree in Nutrition. Georgina has always prioritized working with underserved communities and especially loves working with multicultural groups, seniors and kids of all ages!  Her goal is to bring a practical, whole foods approach that encompasses culturally relevant nutrition interventions. She believes nutrition education is context-dependent, so she tries to understand different perspectives (cultural, age, ability, etc.) in order to bridge nutrition education gaps within diverse groups and help heal communities and in turn hopefully heal mother nature.

She loves spending time with her husband, son and family on foodie adventures, breathing in different biomes, spending quiet time near water and creating new ways to educate the public.

Sharon joined Tilth Alliance (then Seattle Tilth) in 2013. As the Youth & Families Program Director, she oversees educational programming at Tilth Alliance’s gardens and farm for children, youth, families, and schools; partnerships with schools and organizations; and trainings for garden educators, teachers, and families. Sharon is a co-Principal Investigator of the Learning in Places, a National Science Foundation-funded research project. She is a co-leader in the Washington Farm to School Network, and co-facilitates the School Learning Garden Network with Seattle Public Schools, and along with connecting with other national garden education efforts. 

Sharon has been an informal garden educator for over 17 years, and has led programming in Houston, TX, Columbus, OH, and Seattle, WA. She holds a Masters in Public Policy and Administration from Northwestern University, where she focused on food policy and community work. She loves to garden at home when she can with her husband and two sons, and enjoys cooking, reading, and exploring new places. 

Kalee works with community volunteers, seniors, and youth to help care for the wetlands at Rainier Beach Urban Farm a& Wetlands. She also leads the Soil and Water Stewardship training and other programming at the farm.

In her free time, Kalee enjoys exploring the Pacific Northwest, working on various DIY projects and learning new things while sharing them with friends and family both here and back home in Indiana. She has many houseplants and likes spending time caring for them.

Marni works as a garden educator with Tilth Alliance. She manages the adult education program, teaches gardening classes, and cares for the Good Shepherd Center Learning Garden, along with our community volunteers.

For over a decade, Marni has worked as a farmer, a gardener, and an environmental educator – spending time with plants and people outside is what brings her joy. In her free time, you can find her birding, cooking, playing with clay, and adventuring with her partner and pup.

Melissa has served as Tilth Alliance’s Executive Director since December of 2018.

Melissa has led non-profits working in environmental conservation and sustainability for over 20 years. Before moving to Washington 3 years ago she served on the Steering Committee of Working Lands Alliance advocating on behalf of Connecticut’s agricultural community for over a decade. Organic and regenerative agriculture have become her passion since moving to Washington and taking the reigns at Tilth Alliance. She has enjoyed exploring Washington’s great outdoors backpacking, hiking, snowshoeing, kayaking and cross-country skiing. Melissa has an MBA from IESE business school in Barcelona and a Masters in Forest Science from the Yale School of the Environment. She is fluent in Spanish and enjoys practicing whenever possible!

As a member of the farm program team, Nate develops and implements programs that support farmers, the farming community, and all others involved in organic, sustainable, and regenerative food production.

Nathan was born and raised in St. Louis, MO. Most recently he was a Postdoctoral Research Associate with WSU’s, Center for Sustaining Agriculture and Natural Resources (CSANR). There, his research focused on the beneficial use of recycled organic materials as soil amendments, but he also evaluated various strategies for cover cropping and composting. As the Farm Program Director for Tilth Alliance he hopes to help local, regional, and statewide producers find solutions to their problems. When not digging in the dirt, he enjoys, running, reading, cooking, and hiking.

Gayle leads Tilth Alliance’s fundraising and has oversight of the volunteer and marketing programs. She seeks to ensure that individuals, businesses and foundations have the insight into Tilth Alliance’s work that enables them to make meaningful philanthropic decisions — for themselves, their families, their employees, their community and the environment.

A lover of ocean views, stretching out on trails, working the soil, preparing dinner, and reading by a cozy fire… Gayle joined Tilth Alliance in 2021. Originally from the UK, she has 30 years of non-profit experience, centered in partnership working. Gayle is committed to building lasting relationships with those who value Tilth Alliance’s mission for a sustainable, healthy and equitable food future. 

Carey has been gardening and teaching classes with Tilth Alliance for over a decade, with expertise in organic gardening, food preservation and permaculture. She works at Rainier Beach Urban Farm & Wetlands, manages Tilth Alliance’s community learning garden at Bradner Park, and has also worked as an educator for the Garden Hotline. 

Carey grew up in a family where incredible amounts of food were central to every gathering and so developed a strong love for growing, cooking and sharing food with others. Before coming to work at Tilth Alliance, she taught gardening and nutrition in elementary schools and cooked in restaurants around Seattle. As a self proclaimed garden nerd, she loves to talk about wild and perennial food plants, making herbal medicine, and experimenting with microorganisms through fermentation and composting. Drawing and painting are new hobbies.

Gwen supports many projects of the Farm Program, including the Tilth Conference, Eat Local First, Farm Walks and CORA. She also leads or provides support to new projects and initiatives, and provides Spanish translation and interpreting services.

Gwen has worked for almost 30 years in the environmental sustainability sector, with a focus on sustainable landscaping since 2005 and on food systems and sustainable agriculture since 2017. She completed WSU’s Cultivating Success Agricultural Entrepreneurship program, is a Master Gardener, and co-founded Washington Women in Food Systems. She speaks fluent Spanish, is a yoga teacher, and has a passion for the outdoors and organic, locally-grown food.

Anita leads environmental stewardship and gardening programs, including water conservation, sustainable gardening education and the Soil and Water Stewardship (SWS) program. The SWS program trains community members on land stewardship, social justice and growing food organically at Tilth Alliance’s community learning garden at McAuliffe Park in Kirkland.

Anita has a passion for community healing, regenerative farming, and urban forest restoration. Anita is passionate about building a diverse, inclusive and a caring community connected to the land. She is trained in Permaculture Design, Soil and Water Stewardship and is a Master Gardener. She is constantly learning and experimenting with using local, seasonal ingredients to make her family recipes or herbal teas or medicines. She is an avid yoga practitioner.

In her role, Sheryl leads Tilth Alliance’s work with the Eat Local First Collaborative, as well as managing strategic partnerships and media relations for the organization.

Sheryl joined Tilth Alliance in 2020, bringing nearly three decades of experience in strategic communications, community engagement and coalition building with her. An established communicator and narrative storyteller, her career experience has spanned non-profit, corporate, civic and media sectors. When not advocating for local food, farms and all things Tilth Alliance, she is also a long-time Seattle musician who’s “Pie + Persistence” house concert series has raised over $50,000 for non-profit organizations around the country. She also makes great jam, and loves to cook, garden, and play in the great outdoors!

Nancy currently serves as the chairperson of our Board of Directors. She is a soil scientist by education. She is currently retired, although is serving her second term as a member of the Burien City Council. She had a long career working in the public sector in natural resources management, information technology (GIS), and regional growth management and as a consultant to foundations and state and federal agencies. She is passionate about cooking, gardening, photography, and grandparenting. In her next life, she envisions being a regenerative farmer in Utah.

AJulie Keeler, a Seattle native, graduated from Scripps College and worked in marketing and communications. She currently works in a local family office that invests in real estate, early stage and private equity companies. She is responsible for a range of activities including setting priorities and strategy, managing budgets and relationship management. Growing up, Julie learned to love eating, growing and preserving healthy foods and is still an avid gardener, cook, and busy mother.

While Tilth Alliance has been Michelle’s first experience serving on a board, she has over 25 years of experience of organizational and fiscal management. She has served as CFO and Finance/ Business Manager across for-profit and non-profit organizations with a focus on fiscal, grant/contract management, HR, and business systems. She connects to Tilth Alliance’s mission through her passion about access to healthy food for all and the relationship between food and climate change. She lives in Burien with her partner, son, cats, and dog, and loves being part of a community where neighbors are out in their yards gardening and growing. 

Karen joined Tilth Allliance’s Board of Directors in 2022. She has a longstanding interest in the ways food relates to our health and livelihoods, and she believes how and by whom it’s produced is foundational to our society. She is interested in finding ways that Tilth Alliance can promote practices and policies that speak to all Washington’s regions and people and also advance the organization’s strategic priorities. Karen hopes to to facilitate connections to other civil-society groups, to address systemic issues to support equitable programs, and to meet, learn from, and work with the many awesome people and organizations in WA who are building “a sustainable, healthy and equitable food future.”

Meriem was born and raised in a small town in Algeria, where she remembers going every week to the local farmers market to buy fresh organic produce and sustainably pasture raised meat. She first immigrated with her parents to Montreal (Canada) then with her own family to the United States. Meriem has a scientific background with a focus on computer science and Mathematics. As a mom, a consumer, and an amateur cook, Meriem grew concerned about the impact of the food system on the land, the climate, and the health of the community.

She is interested in supporting organic and regenerative agriculture, helping to build healthy consumption habits, and developing affordable and equitable access to locally grown, healthy, nutritious food. Meriem has now adopted Seattle and the PNW as her home, where she lives with her husband and two teenagers. She enjoys cooking, photography, and hiking.

Diane has been involved in food and working with growers for 40 years. She served on the board of Tilth Producers and worked at Charlie’s Produce as a buyer and manager of the Farmer’s Own label. She lives in Vancouver, WA with her partner, Chris, 3 cats and a large garden. She works with East West Food Rescue as a buyer and is working with LULAC Grows to provide fresh produce to those in need. She serves on the Boards of Clark County Food Systems Council, Friends of Clark County and the Food Policy Forum. She hopes Tilth Alliance can encourage all producers and gardeners to use organic growing practices and build a sustainable food systems that supports all eaters.

Liz joined Tilth Alliance’s Board of Directors in 2022.

Liz was born in Washington, D.C. but grew up in Alexandria, VA, and received her B.S. in Environmental Geology at University of Mary Washington with a minor in Environmental Sustainability. She then obtained her M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Soil Science at North Carolina State University with a focus on soil and groundwater contamination. Liz hopes to bring the work of Tilth Alliance to Eastern WA, where there is a great need for guidance and advocacy. She hopes to use her extensive network of colleagues and Board of Director experience through the Agronomy Society of America, Crop Science Society of America, and Soil Science Society of America to help accomplish the amazing work of Tilth Alliance. 

Brooke Lucy is the co-owner of Bluebird Grain Farms, a vertically integrated organic grain farm in Winthrop Washington. Bluebird Grain Farms produces, processes, and sells ancient and heritage wheat, milled products, and handcrafted blends throughout the Pacific Northwest. Brooke brings business management, value added food development, leadership, non profit experience, and on-farm experience to Tilth Alliance’s board. She holds a Masters degree in Educational Psychology.

Food writer and culinary consultant Cynthia Nims is a lifelong Northwesterner whose latest cookbooks, Crab and Oysters, were released in 2016. She has authored, edited or otherwise contributed to many other cookbooks, and served as food editor of Seattle magazine as well as editor of Simply Seafood magazine. She is an active member of the International Association of Culinary Professionals and Les Dames d’Escoffier Seattle, having served as president of the board for both those organizations. Cynthia holds the Grand Diplôme d’Etudes Culinaires from La Varenne cooking school in France, where she worked on numerous book projects with owner Anne Willan. She lives in West Seattle with her husband.

Anne Schwartz graduated with a degree in Animal Science from Washington State University (WSU) in 1978 and has been farming in the Skagit Valley in WA ever since. Blue Heron Farm produces certified organic vegetables and berries marketed regionally. Anne has been active with organic certification issues at the state and national levels, especially with livestock issues. Anne was an active advocate in the creation of the Center for Sustaining Agriculture and Natural Resources (CSANR) at WSU. She served on the Board of Tilth Producers of WA for 35 years. She continues to serve on other non-profit boards and advisory councils to promote organic and sustainable agriculture research, and regional food systems. Her latest focus, inspired 40 years ago by the failures of cost/benefit accounting taught in Ag Econ classes to adequately value “externalities,” is to create an initiative to integrate True Cost Accounting into the research and teaching structure of the College of Agriculture at WSU. In her spare time, she trains her Border Collies to work livestock.