Who We Are

Crystal Middlestadt
Pronouns: They/Them

Executive Director

Crystal joined Chinook Fund in April 2018 and brings a depth of experience with nonprofit leadership, resource mobilization, and social justice. Crystal believes that changing our relationship to money has the potential to radically shift the way we mobilize resources for movements. They are thrilled to continue Chinook Fund’s legacy of democratic grantmaking through the innovative Giving Project.

Crystal previously worked for the Grassroots Institute for Fundraising Training (GIFT), Survivors Organizing for Liberation, a former Chinook Fund grantee, and is proud to have helped kickstart resource mobilization gatherings at the Allied Media Conference. During their tenure at GIFT, Crystal was proud to bring the 2016 Money for Our Movements: A Social Justice Fundraising Conference to Denver. Crystal is board co-chair of Resource Generation, serves on the steering committee for the National Giving Project Network, and participated in the Transformative Leadership for Change fellowship for BIPOC leaders in Colorado.

Crystal was raised in a small, working class town in Oregon by a family of paper mill workers and was the first person in their family to graduate from college. After receiving their B.S. in Sociology and Women’s Studies from the University of Oregon in 2003, Crystal moved to Denver and soon began organizing around issues of gender justice, LGBTQ anti-violence, and racial justice, sparking them to put down roots in this mountain state. They are continually inspired by adrienne maree brown, author of Emergent Strategy, who reminds us that what we pay attention to grows.

Crystal lives with in southwest Denver and spends their spare time learning to garden, building their vinyl collection, sneaker shopping, and camping throughout the West.

Mateo Parsons
Pronouns: He/Him

Program Director

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.

P. Barclay Jones
Pronouns: He/Him

Program Manager

Barclay works with donor organizers through the Giving Project at Chinook Fund. His work focuses on facilitating groups of dynamic individuals as they deepen their awareness of their identities (emphasizing race and class), engage in political education and democratically distribute funding to community organizations across Colorado. In addition to this work, he serves as a consultant to nonprofit, public and private organizations seeking to improve their performance.

Having developed and led a number of high-performing teams, Barclay helps organizations and groups to identify challenges and opportunities while acknowledging and integrating the unique skills and abilities of all team members/employees/constituents. Group facilitation, community development, capacity building, grantmaking and strategic planning are areas that he specializes in. During his time in the nonprofit and public sectors he has focused on the subject areas of early childhood education, education, youth development, asset building, leadership development and multicultural education. He has worked diligently to ensure that community/resident engagement is built into programmatic efforts. Selected as a Livingston Fellow of the Bonfils-Stanton Foundation in 2007, he researched collaborative leadership approaches seeking to improve both organizational and community results (outcomes).

Barclay is the parent of two phenomenal children and actively volunteers in the community.

Alma Urbano
Pronouns: She/Her

Grants Manager

Alma Urbano is a Mexican immigrant, community facilitator, and daughter of working-class community organizers and landscapers.

Alma has been able to serve and be trained under community organizations that center collective solution-sprouting practices through Project VOYCE, GES Coalition, and now Chinook Fund.

As a member of Chinook Fund’s 2020 Fall Giving Project, Alma fell in love with the practice of facilitating redistribution of wealth and grassroots fundraising.

Alma also finds lots of joy in reading fiction novels outside, and spending time with her cat and family. Alma was a first generation college student and has a BA in Sociology from Kenyon College. She is now part of the Transformative Leadership for Change 2019 cohort of Colorado BIPOC leaders.

Trena Moya
Pronouns: She/Her

Finance & Operations Manager

Trena’s journey to joining Chinook Fund as the Finance & Operations Manager began in Omaha, NE where she grew up in a middle-class family as the youngest of 5 and granddaughter of Mexican immigrants & Kansas farmers. She followed some of her siblings to Colorado in 1985, which became her heart home at first visit.

After working in the banking industry for several years, Trena’s soul needed recharging and she returned to school, graduating from Metropolitan State University of Denver with a B.A. in Spanish. She then began her 20+ year career in the nonprofit/philanthropic sector, working with both local and international organizations, during which she has developed a range of skills in finance, human resources, administration, and operations.

Trena is a member of Denver Showing Up For Racial Justice (SURJ) and has been active in supporting her communities for many years. However, her participation in the Spring 2021 Giving Project helped her to better understand her responsibility and role in helping to bring about systemic change. She is excited to have the opportunity to apply her skills in support of Colorado’s grassroots organizers and Chinook Fund’s democratic grantmaking model.

Trena lives in North Denver with her partner, Don, and their ever-entertaining cat, Juniper. She feels lost without a book to read, treasures time with friends & family, and enjoys making her grandma’s mole every Christmas.

Shelby Bates
Pronouns: She/Her

Development & Communications Manager

Shelby joined Chinook Fund in December 2023 as the Development and Communications Manager. Shelby believes in community engagement as one of the key ways to foster social change. It is that belief that led her to pursue a Master of Social Work, and ultimately community organizing work. Much of her past work experience has been with the disability community, including campaigns around Medicaid Expansion and college access for students with intellectual disabilities. At the heart of her work is a core belief in the need to uplift and amplify constituent voices.

Shelby grew up in a white, upper-class family, with parents raised middle-class. Her participation in a Giving Project in Spring 2021 fundamentally changed her relationship to money. She moved from an individual savings mindset to one that now centers the sharing and redistribution of resources. In her role with Chinook Fund, Shelby is most excited about the opportunity to invest in the many different organizations that Chinook Fund supports, grassroots groups leading powerful and creative social justice work across the state.

Shelby lives in Boulder. Outside of work, she enjoys baking, riding bikes, playing board games, spending time outdoors, and visiting with family and friends.

Anna Eunjoo Ghublikian
Pronouns: They/Them/Theirs

Board Co-Chair

Anna joined the Chinook community as part of the Spring 2019 Giving Project. Their background is in art history, curation, video programming, and production. They currently work as an artist and filmmaker. They are also a practicing artist interested in exploring themes of time and loss. Other organizing work includes Resource Generation and Corporate Accountability. They were raised in Massachusetts and relocated to Denver in 2014 after spending most of their life on the east coast. They received a BA in Art History from Swarthmore College and an MA in Public Humanities from Brown University. They love Murder, She Wrote, and Kate Bush.

Angela Schreffler
Pronouns: She/Her

Board Co-Chair

Angela has been involved with Chinook Fund in a variety of roles for almost ten years, including as a participant of the spring, 2017 Giving Project. She is the owner of Centennial Nonprofit Consulting, LLC and has worked in the nonprofit sector for over twenty years. Angela’s passion is in helping organizations achieve their goals and strives to do so in a collaborative, iterative, practical, and approachable way. Prior to starting Centennial Nonprofit Consulting, LLC in early 2023, Angela spent 10 years as the Chief Operating Officer at Colorado Nonprofit Development Center. Prior to that position, Angela led several organizations including an environmental organization in Kansas City and Denver Regional Mobility and Access Council (DRMAC).

Emma Goldman
Pronouns: She/Her

Board Secretary

Emma joined Chinook Fund as part of the Fall 2022 Giving Project. She is particularly passionate about organizing people of privilege – like herself, in terms of race and class identity – to actively redistribute generational wealth equitably. Holding a Master’s in Social Work, Emma focuses on transformational leadership, individual empowerment and meditation, reflecting her dedication to personal and community well-being. She currently serves as an adjunct professor at the Graduate School of Social Work (GSSW) at the University of Denver. Beyond her professional and philanthropic work, Emma finds joy on the dance floor and seeks solace in the mountains, using movement as a tool for her own well-being.

Erik Ortiz
Pronouns: He/Him

Board Treasurer & Chair of Finance and Investment Committee

Erik is a non-profit leader with expertise in grant administration, capacity building, and strategic planning. A connector, Erik has focused his professional career on advocating for causes and serving communities in the areas of child abuse prevention, HIV/AIDS, cancer awareness and research, public health, and grassroots advocacy. He has served as a bilingual case manager, community organizer, and fundraiser for a number of organizations. Currently, Erik is an Associate Program Officer at the Colorado Health Foundation where he oversees grant administration in the areas of Access to Care and Behavioral Health. Originally from Colorado, Erik is also a dedicated volunteer for the Chinook Fund and an avid traveler and concert goer with his partner, Laura, and pup, Winston!

Dee Arias
Pronouns: He/They

Chair of Resource Mobilizer Committee

Originally from New York, Dee graduated from SUNY Purchase with a BA in Arts Management. They served in administrative and operational roles for non-profits in Denver, primarily planning and executing community events that foster engagement and support local causes. Additionally, they have implemented software solutions to streamline and enhance organizational systems and processes, contributing to improved efficiency across the board. Dee is currently with the Margulf Foundation as their Operations Coordinator.

Dee’s passion for social justice work is reflected in their dedication to creating equitable spaces and supporting marginalized communities. They are also a proud alum of the Chinook Fund’s Giving Project, where in the Spring 2021 cohort, they fundraised for grassroots groups in Colorado. This experience deepened their commitment to community support and local activism. In their free time, Dee loves watching movies, going to concerts, and cooking meals that they can share with loved ones.

Angela Daniels
Pronouns: She/Her

Board Member

Angela Daniels was part of the Spring 2019 cohort of The Giving Project where she fell in love with Chinook Fund and learned she could do that scary thing called “fundraising”. She became a member of the board in October of 2019. She has a B.A. in Theatre Arts from the University of Arizona and an M.A. in Emergent Digital Practices from the University of Denver.

Angela runs the Product team at a tech company in Denver. Inspired by the work she was doing with The Giving Project, Angela co-founded Women of Color in Tech – a community by and for women of color working in the tech industry to network and grow professionally.

Angela’s favorite book of all time is An Unkindness of Ghosts by Rivers Solomon. It is a science fiction book that explores the intersections of racism, classism, and the oppression of binary social constructs. She is also inspired by The Body is Not an Apology by Sonya Renee Taylor, which lays the foundation for radical self-love as a way to produce systemic change. Angela hopes she can take the lessons learned from both of these incredible works to honor and support the people in Colorado who are using grassroots community organizing to create real change.

Matt Karkut
Pronouns: He/Him

Board Member

Originally from Salt Lake City, Utah, Matt’s experience growing up as a mixed-race Asian-American in the intermountain west informed his world views and motivations to advocate for positive social change and racial equity. Matt holds a B.A. in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics from Pomona College in California, and is currently the Executive Director of “Compañeros: Four Corners Immigrant Resource Center,” a grassroots nonprofit in Durango, CO. He has previously worked in English-Spanish interpretation and translation in the U.S. and South America, English as a second language (ESL) instruction in Europe, outdoor guiding in Central America, and international money transfer technology. Matt is also an avid musician, enjoys learning new recipes to cook, and loves spending time with family and friends.

Melia Polynice
Pronouns: She/Her

Board Member

Melia participated in the Fall 2022 Giving Project to bring together her passion for community engagement and equitable philanthropy. In the program, she broadened her expertise beyond direct service volunteering to include fundraising and democratic grantmaking. Melia holds a Master’s in Public Administration with a concentration in organizational assessments and fiscal policy. She has extensive experience in project management, having spearheaded cross-functional projects at the New York City Department of Education and led an agile software development consulting team. Currently, she is leading software transformation projects at a global financial services company.

Originally from New York City, Melia is actively building connections in Denver through her interests in community gardening, composting, and the outdoors.

Chinook Fund seeds community-led, systemic change by mobilizing resources for and trusting in grassroots social justice organizations across Colorado.

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