Board of Directors

Rachel Berkson

Rachel is the Associate Director of Washington Community Action Network.  Prior to joining Washington CAN!, she was the Executive Director of the SEIU Washington State Council where her primary focus was coordinating the union’s joint political and legislative programs. From 2000 - 2006 Rachel was a lead organizer with the Working Families Party, a labor and community-based grassroots political party in New York State.

Michael Brown

Michael Brown is the Vice President of Community Leadership at The Seattle Foundation. Prior to joining the Foundation, Michael served as a legislative aide to City of Seattle Councilmember Richard McIver from 1997-2000. He received his Master of Public Administration from the University of Washington. Michael is an American Marshall Memorial Fellow, a graduate of Leadership Tomorrow, is past Chair of the Board of the Crisis Clinic and currently serves on the boards of AIDS Housing of Washington, Impact Capital and the Advisory Board for United Way's Seattle Community Council.

Greg Devereux

Greg Devereux is Executive Director of the Washington Federation of State Employees, AFSCME Council 28, and International Vice President of AFSCME, He began his labor relations career as a Labor Relations Field Examiner with the State of Illinois Office of Collective Bargaining, and later joined AFSCME's Public Policy Department as Coordinator of Health Policy. Greg became Deputy Director of WFSE in 1993, and Executive Director in 1994.

Jon Gould

Jon Gould is the Deputy Director of the Children's Alliance.  Prior to becoming Deputy Director, Jon served as the organization's Community Action Director. Jon has a long history of community involvement in housing, human service, children and other issues. He has held board leadership positions in several housing, human service, and political action organizations in Washington. Jon has a bachelor degree from Cornell University and earned a Masters in Public Administration from the University of Washington's Evans School.

Erica Hallock

Erica serves as the President and CEO for the United Ways of Washington. She also is a Public Member on the Washington State Nursing Commission, appointed by Governor Christine Gregoire in 2006. Erica sits on the board of the Children's Campaign Fund. Previously she worked at the California State Association of Counties, focusing on health and human services. She has a BA in Political Science from the University of California at Riverside and a Master of Public Policy and Administration from California State University Sacramento.

Nathan James

Nathan is a vice president at GMMB where he works to advance education initiatives with clients including the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the SMARTER Balanced Assessment Consortium. For the last decade,  Nathan has served as a communications consultant and spokesperson for nonprofits, political candidates, and issue advocacy campaigns. At the political consulting firm SCN Public Relations in San Francisco and as an independent consultant, Nathan has advised statewide, congressional, and local campaigns on earned media and research. Nathan holds a bachelor’s degree in environmental studies from Brown University.

Aaron Katz

Aaron is a senior lecturer in the Department of Health Services, University of Washington School of Public Health and Community Medicine, and director of the Packard-Gates Population Leadership Program. He was director of the UW Health Policy Analysis Program from 1988 until 2003. Aaron teaches several graduate level courses in health policy, and edits the School's biannual journal, Northwest Public Health.

Treasure Mackley

Treasure Mackley began her career in politics as a volunteer for women’s reproductive rights. She has worked on a variety of political campaigns as a political director, field organizer, and campaign manager. From 2009- 2010, Treasure served as the State Director for Organizing for America, a project of the Democratic National Committee. Currently, Treasure serves as the Executive Director of the SEIU Washington State Council where her primary focus is on coordinating the union’s political and legislative programs. Raised in Salt Lake City Utah, Treasure moved to Oregon to attend the University of Portland, where she received a degree in philosophy.

Mike Ragan

Mike is the vice president of the Washington Education Association. Mike graduated with a degree in engineering and physics then worked all over the country as an engineer. While accompanying his wife who was teaching overseas, Mike studied psychology and education. He received his teaching certificate at Heritage College in Toppenish then completed his student teaching while earning his Masters in Counseling Psychology from Washington State University. Mike became active in his association soon after he began as a science teacher in Kennewick 13 years ago.

Liz Schott

Liz is a Senior Fellow with the Welfare Reform and Income Support Division of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities in Washington, DC. She has also worked as an Adjunct Professor of Law at Seattle University Law School, a public policy consultant focusing on policies affecting low-income persons, and a staff attorney and statewide coordinator for Columbia Legal Services and its predecessor organization, Evergreen Legal Services. She received her law degree from Boston University School of Law.

Dave Sieminski

Dave Sieminski is the managing director of Express Advantage, the non profit affiliate of Express Credit Union, the new low income credit union in King County. Dave most recently spent 9 years with United Way of King County where he helped create and subsequently managed a large scale individual development account program and a countywide free tax and earned income tax credit campaign.  He has participated in several local and national asset building initiatives and was a founding member of the United Way of America Financial Stability Partnership.  He is member of the Washington State Asset Building Coalition Steering Committee, the Seattle / King County Asset Building Coalition Steering Committee and the National Community Tax Coalition Steering Committee.  Dave currently serves as President of the Board of Directors of Community Voice Mail.  

Hugh Spitzer

Hugh Spitzer is a public finance lawyer at Foster Pepper PLLC and is an Affiliate Professor of Law at the University of Washington, where he teaches local government law and state constitutional law. He has published widely on public finance, taxation, public contracting and related topics. He served as vice-chair of the Washington State Tax Structure Study Committee (the "Gates Commission") in 2001-2002, and since 2000 has chaired the Washington State Affordable Housing Advisory Board. He received his BA from Yale University in 1970, his JD from the University of Washington Law School in 1974, and an LLM from the University of California Law School at Berkeley in 1982.

Tiffany Turner

Tiffany is a Washington native.  She and her husband Brady own and operate Inn at Discovery Coast and Adrift Hotel in Long Beach Washington.  Before her career as an entrepreneur, Tiffany was an elementary school teacher.  She has a passion for people and has been active in politics at the local and state level. Currently Tiffany serves on the steering committee for Main Street Alliance of Washington.  She is also a founding and active board member for the Boys and Girls Club of the Long Beach Peninsula. Tiffany is a Seattle Pacific University graduate.

Mark Usdane

Mark is an Advocacy Representative for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. He previously was the Executive Director of the League of Education Voters, and also worked at the Children’s Alliance, the Department of Social and Health Services, and for over a decade was the Chief Operating Officer of the Vera Institute of Justice in New York City. Mark is a native of Seattle.  He earned his Bachelors degree from Brown University and a Masters in Public Health from Columbia University.

 Organizational affiliations are for identification purposes only.