Mateo joined Chinook Fund as Program Director in May 2024. He was born and raised in a working class home in Western CO and is N’de (Apache) and Hispano New Mexican on his maternal grandfather’s side, the grandson of Indigenous Mexican (Yoeme and Tarahumara) farmworkers and UFW members on his maternal grandmother’s side, and Scottish & English on his paternal side.
Inspired by his maternal grandmothers’ family’s participation in the farmworker labor movement, Mateo has dedicated himself to a life in service to his community. He has a background in grassroots community organizing and activism, policy advocacy, and strategic communications. Before coming to Chinook Fund, Mateo served as Co-Executive Director of Four Winds American Indian Council, where he and other Council members organized unhoused and working class Indigenous people in Denver with a focus on community defense & mutual aid, housing justice, and cultural revitalization. Mateo continues to serve on the Board of Directors for Four Winds. Prior to his time with Four Winds, Mateo worked for the Bell Policy Center and Colorado Consumer Health Initiative, where he was a key staff member in advancing several high-profile progressive legislative victories for working class Coloradans.
As a first-generation college student, Mateo earned his BA in Political Science with a focus in Comparative Politics at Colorado College, where he was a student leader and activist with the Native American Student Union. In his free time, you can find him enjoying all that Colorado’s backcountry has to offer with his partner and two dogs.