Our Board of Directors are Health Poverty Action USA’s governing body. It delegates management of the organisation to the senior leadership, but the Board remains ultimately responsible for the affairs of the non-profit organization, ensuring that it is solvent, well-run, and delivering appropriate outcomes in terms of public benefit.
Health Poverty Action USA’s bylaws provide for a minimum of three Board members, who are responsible for the election of new members. All Board members have to stand for election each year at the annual meeting.
The Board of Directors
Cheri Dubiel (Chair)
Cheri is the Executive Director of Community Shares of Wisconsin (CSW), which brings the community together with 70 nonprofits, raising funds for, and awareness of, the local social and environmental justice movement. In addition to her work with CSW, she brings extensive experience with local advocacy movements through past leadership roles with the Dane County Rape Crisis Center, Planned Parenthood Advocates of Wisconsin, and Wisconsin Coalition Against Sexual Assault. Cheri grew up on a multi-generational dairy farm in the beautiful rolling hills of Trempealeau County in the drift less region of Wisconsin.
Oliver Kemp (Vice Chair/Treasurer)
Oliver is the CEO of Prostate Cancer Research Centre, which focuses on the advanced stage of the disease treatments are currently limited. Prior to this, he was the CEO of Build Africa. At Build Africa he directly supported over 400,000 people with an increase of over 500% in six years and was awarded the prize for the “Best International Charity in the UK” in 2012.
Birgitta Larson Gamez (Secretary)
Kathi Seiden-Thomas
Kathi Seiden-Thomas is a strategic partnership specialist with more than 20 years of experience co-creating with multi-sector partners in the areas of health, racial justice, education, women’s rights, and youth development in the U.S. and throughout the world, with a focus on sub-saharan Africa.
Her career began as a health educator with the Peace Corps in Mali and includes recent engagements with Africa based NGOs (CorpsAfrica, ACADES Malawi and T21 Families Support Organization-Kenya) and U.S. Department of State Exchange Programs (Mandela Washington Fellowship, International Visitors Leadership Program, Young African Leadership Initiative).
Kathi is the co-founder and editor of Whose Stories Will We Hear, a collaborative initiative created to provide a platform for Black Africans to tell their own stories and be at the forefront of how history views Africa and its people. Kathi has had the privilege of visiting 27 countries for immersive travel and professional collaboration and is conversant in French, Kiswahili and Bambara.
Marie Justice
Marie Justice is a television personality and entrepreneur residing in Madison, WI. When she is not in front of the camera she is working behind the scenes as a social strategist, dividing her time between her two companies: Community Cleaners, an ethically conscious commercial cleaning company that offers career pathways and fair wages—and Justice Media, a digital media company she co-founded which specializes in visual storytelling to help drive positive social
change.
