David Holland

David is Deputy Director at Western States Arts Federation (WESTAF), and a long-time partner of Scansion where he is Strategic Associate. He has worked for UNESCO, Salzburg Global Seminar, and the Inter-American Development Bank to United States Artists and Think of Us, a research and design lab on child welfare. At WESTAF, David guides its advocacy and public policy programs; leads external relations; and spearheads consulting services to organizations throughout a region of 16 states and jurisdictions and nationally. He has co-designed WESTAF’s Arts and the Rural West gathering; co-directed the development of the state of Washington's Creative Economy Strategic Plan; launched the Creative Vitality™ Summit, a global conference on the creative economy; authored the Creative Economies and Economic Recovery report in partnership with NASAA; established the Western Arts Advocacy Network; developed relief, resilience, and other special grantmaking programs for artists and organizations in the West and the Pacific; and secured multi-million dollar private and public investment for WESTAF’s programs. David also serves as the Co-Chair of the Creative States Coalition, a national coalition of citizen advocacy groups and their partners.

Mitchel Anzivino

An expert in strategic planning for tourism, Mitchel Anzivino is Vice President, Global Tourism & Destination Advisory, JLL Consulting. JLL is leading Visit California’s Regional Tourism Strategic Plan for Gold Country, and with Visit California midway through new strategic tourism plans for each of California’s twelve tourism regions, JLL Consulting is helping tourism stakeholders, residents and civic partners prepare for the future in their destinations.

Randy Cohen

Randy Cohen is Vice President of Research and Policy at Americans for the Arts—the national advocacy organization for the arts—where he has been empowering arts advocates since 1991. Cohen is known for balancing rigorous research methods with accessible and actionable results. His work at Americans for the Arts has provided new perspectives on the nonprofit arts. He recently published Arts & Economic Prosperity 6: The Economic Impact of Nonprofit Arts & Culture Organizations and their Audiences and Americans Speak Out About the Arts in 2023, a national public opinion study about the arts.

Randy has been a policy specialist for the National Endowment for the Arts, founded the San Diego Theatre for Young Audiences, and worked in medical research for Stanford University and Scripps Clinic and Research Foundation. His board work includes the League of Historic American Theaters. Randy is a past Chair of the Takoma Park Arts & Humanities Commission, during which time the Commission completed a cultural plan, established the city’s Poet Laureate and public art programs, and led the development of a million-dollar conversion of the city council chambers into a performing arts space.

Julie Baker

Julie has been CEO of California for the Arts and California Arts Advocates, California’s statewide arts advocacy organizations, since 2018, Julie Baker has worked to increase the legislative clout and visibility of the arts and culture communities by building coalition across the for- and non-profit sectors of California’s creative industries, producing a month-long arts awareness and advocacy campaign every April, and fighting for resources and legislation to serve and protect artists and cultural workers. She serves as the California State Captain to Americans for the Arts' National Arts Action Summit and on the State Arts Action Network Council and as the co-chair of the Western Arts Advocacy network for WESTAF. She is on the board of California Heritage: Indigenous Research Project, a founding member of the Nevada County Relief Fund advisory council and was elected to the Nevada County School Board in November of 2020.

Mo Harper-Desir

Mo Harper-Desir is Executive Director at Mo HD Creates. As an arts activist working across the United States, she connects communities of all backgrounds to each other, offering arts-based services and education, racial equity workshops and facilitation, and performance arts and dance classes to enrich those around her. Mo’s ideas were birthed out of a love of mixed medias, social justice and implementing change into the world. As a media worker, Mo, actively works to create safe spaces for radical media creation and sharing, while addressing the issues and structures of inequalities surrounding  race, gender, class, poverty and more. Through art creation, services/techniques, social justice based education and community involvement, Mo creates accessible safe spaces for conversations and learning with full representation. Mo is a co-founder of Black Humboldt.

Silvi Alcivar

Since 2007, Silvi Alcivar, best known as the Poetry Store, has written some 100k poems for twice as many people. Her work lives in the moment two strangers meet over her red royal typewriter—the anonymity an invitation to speak, the typewriter keys a willing listener. In addition to being a visiting classroom artist and creating gallery installations, she’s worked for Google, Hermes, and Apple, been artist in residence for TedX SanDiego, Bioneers, and St. Supery Winery, featured in the SF Chronicle and KQED, and exhibited at the DeYoung Museum. Alongside The Watershed Research and Training Center, Silvi has been working on the Fire and Music Project. Fire and Music is funded by Upstate California Creative Corps, via Nevada County Arts Council as an administering organization for the California Arts Council.

Becky Barton

Becky is Chief Executive Officer at People415. Her HR background includes staffing, recruiting, and organizational development. She is recognized as a thought leader on optimizing performance for start-ups and companies on the move and aligning talent with strategy. She started her HR career in 1997 in staffing and has since led HR Strategy in non-profit, start-up, professional services and creative agency organizations. 

Kellie Cutler

Kellie Cutler is Program Manager for Truckee Cultural District, a partnership between Nevada County Arts Council, Truckee Arts Alliance, the Town of Truckee, Truckee Chamber, and Truckee Downtown Merchants Association. Kellie has served the Reno/Tahoe region non-profit sector for 23 years. Non-profit administration is her passion with a focus in strategic planning, community collaboration and creative fundraising. She has helped achieve benchmark goals for Nevada Arts Council, Parasol Tahoe Community Foundation, KidZone Museum, North Tahoe Arts and Contractors Association of Truckee Tahoe. With a Masters in Arts Administration from Golden Gate University, San Francisco, she is committed to community leadership and engagement through her work serving on the board of the Truckee Chamber of Commerce and on committees for Tahoe Truckee Community Foundation and Tahoe Truckee Unified School District.

Colleen Dalton

Colleen is CEO at Visit Truckee Tahoe. She landed in Truckee in 1994 and spent the next 30 years of her career in tourism, from adventure travel to places like Tibet and Patagonia to brand executive roles in the ski industry (Sugar Bowl, Northstar California, Mammoth Mountain). Along the way, she earned an MBA in emerging technology, a personal passion. Post ski industry years, Colleen was the Director of Tourism & Economic Development for Truckee Chamber from 2015-2020 and then led the formation of Truckee’s first official tourism authority, Visit Truckee-Tahoe. Just published is the organization’s Two Year Strategic Plan for sustainable, balanced tourism that leans heavily on partnership and collaboration.

Daniela Fernández

Daniela Fernández, Mayor of Nevada City, is a dynamic and skillful applied theatre practitioner. With a Bachelors’s degree in Acting & Directing and a Masters’s Degree in Drama Therapy, she uses theater as a tool not only for storytelling but also for exploration, examination, change, and healing. Her theatre work spans myriad populations, including play formation and performance with LGBTQ+ youth, seniors, and adults with disabilities; drama therapy with incarcerated women and their families; Playback Theatre and Theatre of the Oppressed with adults and youth of color. Daniela knows firsthand the transformative powers of theatre and finds joy in engaging folks who want to explore the magic.

Brandon "GR8" Greathouse

Brandon "GR8" Greathouse Is a Musician, Dj, Emcee, Dancer, Community builder and all around music lover. His love for music gave him the ability to travel the US as the official host for World of Dance, not only as the man with the mic, but as a headliner and DJ. All while running two dance studios that have brought culture and life to the cities of Sacramento and Truckee. His charismatic way of teaching empowered his students with confidence, self worth, and the ability to work as a team.

With six years of festival performances overseas, the stage is his comfort zone, from rocking mics with his lyrical abilities, to making the crowds jump from the energy he brings on the turntables. One thing is for sure, he knows how to get the crowd moving! He's not just good, he's GR8!

Heather Heckler

Heather Heckler is Program Manager for Grass Valley Nevada City Cultural District administered by Nevada County Arts Council in partnership with the Cities of Grass Valley and Nevada City, and Grass Valley and Nevada City Chambers. Heckler developed a love of the visual and performing arts while growing up in Nevada County. She was involved in local theater through Foothill Theatre Company’s apprenticeship program and worked as a stage manager for Foothill Theatre Company and Community Asian Theatre of the Sierra. Heather holds a bachelor’s degree in Chinese history and a masters degree in public history. She received a California Humanities grant for her Documenting Disability History project, an oral history of the disability rights movement in Nevada County. Before coming to Nevada County Arts Council, she served as the communications manager for Connecting Point and recently worked on the communications team in the County Executive Office.

Pamela Hurt-Hobday

Pamela is the President/CEO of Pamela Hurt Associates (PHA). She is a consultant specializing in marrying culture to strategy using  innovative organizational development techniques. PHA develops and designs  specialized training for Fortune 500/400 companies, government organizations, and non-profits emphasizing an innovative leadership development model based on Emotional Intelligence. A unique specialty of Pamela Hurt Associates is corporate, non-profit and multi-generational family held business succession planning.

Lindsey Jones

Lindsey Jones is a GIS Analyst with the County of Nevada. From Baltimore, Maryland, she earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in geography and environmental science. As a post-graduate, she received an EPA fellowship to work at the Chesapeake Bay Program, where she cultivated a love for all things cartography. She moved to Nevada County with her husband in 2018, where she now works as one of the principal mapmakers for the Nevada County government. She is responsible for providing mapping-support during wildfire emergencies, mapping the results of Nevada County elections, and most recently is partnering with Nevada County Arts Council to enhance their cultural assets web application.

Jullianne Nubla

Jullianne is a Design Strategist at Scansion. Blending her academic foundation with practical application, Jullianne has become a seasoned strategist with over eight years of diverse experience in community-focused design strategy. Her technical expertise in graphic design, web design, UI/UX, interior design and architecture is grounded in her Design degree from UC Davis. Starting out her career with freelance projects for small businesses in the Bay Area, Jullianne further honed her skills in brand strategy, content marketing, lead generation, public communications, copywriting, and social media strategy. Her focus later turned towards museums as she completed her Masters in Museum Studies at the University of San Francisco, discovering her passion for informal education and interpretation. Transitioning into larger, educational roles within the nonprofit and museum sphere, her versatile skill set in design and depth of experience in museum education reflects her dedication to crafting compelling designs and strategic solutions that leave a lasting impression.

Throughout her journey in design, interpretation, and nonprofits, Jullianne has contributed to various organizations, from the YoloArts Center in Woodland to the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, championing communication methodologies and DEIA initiatives. As she evolves professionally, Jullianne’s steadfast aspiration is to empower and uplift communities through resonating, meaningful experiences.

Ross Travis

Ross Travis is an award-winning Bouffon, Physical Comedian and Circus Performer, who has studied with world renowned master pedagogues, including Dodi DiSanto, Giovanni Fusetti, Ronlin Foreman, Stephen Buescher, and Master Lu Yi. Ross’ lineage of training and experience allows him to create provocative performances combining circus and bouffon to develop extreme characters and tell stories from the fringes, igniting dialogue and change around ignored or taboo social issues. Ross has developed three shows focusing on the climate crisis, including his most recent Tempting Fate, a satirical sideshow entertainment reflecting the house of mirrors called climate change. It premiered at Little Boxes Theater in 2019. The show was featured in the San Francisco Chronicle by Lily Janiak and was nominated for seven Theatre Bay Area Awards, winning for Outstanding Creative Specialties in Mask Design. Tempting Fate is currently on a West Coast tour with stops in Point Arena, San Francisco and Arcata.

Eliza Tudor

Eliza is Executive Director at Nevada County Arts Council. Her experience as an arts leader spans three continents, from producing film and theatre in Australia, to opera, Ancient Greek theatre and ballet in the Sierra, She’s worked across sectors in the arts, as a Senior Commissioner for the UK's National Health Service, and as Senior Development Executive & International Strategist—Arts & Humanities at the University of Oxford. She has served the Board of Trustees of Magdalen Road Studios in Oxford and Rosetta Life – working nationally through the arts with people suffering life limiting illnesses, before accepting the role of Executive Director with Nevada County Arts Council in 2016. She is a board member for California Arts Advocates and California for the Arts, and serves the Leadership Council for CA Jobs First for the Capital Region. Eliza serves on the national Research Advisory Cohort for the Future of Arts Service Organizations, funded by the Mellon Foundation, and the Regional Advisory Committee for Visit California’s Tourism Strategic Plan for Gold Country.

Jen Rhi Winders

Rhi has created and worked within many grant funded non-profit programs, developing and administering evaluation tools in the human service field. She is Assistant Director of a county wide suicide prevention program in all high schools, and is familiar with outreach and reporting. She is both a poet and performance artist, a documentary filmmaker and taught digital storytelling with high schools for over 10 years.