Meet the People of At The Crossroads
The ATC Family Staff
Ivan Alomar
Ivan joined ATC in May 2005 as an Outreach Counselor, and is now our Community Resource Coordinator. Ivan has dedicated his career to working with young people. He has spent the past fifteen years working with at-risk youth in a variety of capacities. For Ivan, working at ATC is somewhat of a homecoming, as he grew up in the Mission, and he is excited to be making an impact in his home community. As a friend of President Clinton and Angie Stone, Ivan also serves as our resident celebrity hook-up.
Corey Brown
Corey joined ATC in 2010 as an AmeriCorps VISTA, taking over the role of Community Resource Organizer. Hailing from Florida, Corey can break out in salsa, bachata, and merengue dancing in a moment’s notice. Corey is learning to cook and so far has succeeded with staff lunches – good thing for us! Also, he loves office supplies!
Kris Chance
Kris joined ATC in 2008 as an Outreach Counselor, and regales in her status as staff over-achiever. In addition to auditioning for American Idol and singing the National Anthem at a Giants game, Kris loves extreme things like skydiving, surfing, and rock climbing. Kris hopes one day to move to another state and become Dr. Chance! She’s also a 2nd degree black belt in Kenpo Karate, so don’t piss her off!
Brenda Covarrubias
Brenda joined ATC’s staff in 2007 as an Outreach Counselor, bringing her bilingual skills and commitment to fashion to the streets of San Francisco. Brenda likes to sleep, eat barbeque, and talk about all of her best friends. In her spare time Brenda is a decorator at heart and eats at chain restaurants. Her future goal is to be a glampire and attend grad school, preferably both at the same time.
Alison Dagenais
Alison joined ATC as an AmeriCorps VISTA in 2010, becoming a Campaign Coordinator. Alison recently moved to SF from Kansas City, Missouri, the home of real Barbecue. Don’t ask her if she’s from Kansas unless you want to hear about why KCMO is superior (hint: “it is the true home of the Royals – the best team in the history of baseball”). Clearly, she is a dreamer.
Shawn Garety
Shawn joined ATC’s staff in 2004 as an Outreach Counselor, and is now our Program Manager, and is otherwise known as the Staff Mom. Shawn may have a fondness for European pharmacies, but if you ask her about “football”, she’s all about her Niners, being a life-long San Franciscan. She’s also got the best decorated desk in the office, although the competition is not exactly fierce.
Ally Gibely
Ally joined ATC as an AmeriCorps VISTA Campaign Coordinator in 2010. Ally is from Boston, and it’s the first thing we all learned about her. She loves anything that looks smooshed (combination of smashed and mashed and squished) – dogs, babies – doesn’t matter. Her biggest accomplishment this year was finally overcoming her serious fear of roller coasters.
Rob Gitin
As co-founder and Executive Director, Rob has been with ATC from its inception. He’s got the gray hairs to prove it. Don’t let his “right-on”s and “for sure”s fool you – this guy is straight out of Brooklyn, though after 18 years on the West Coast, it is getting harder and harder for him to claim New York. You can find him at Starbucks, the Farmers Market, hanging with his niece and nephew, or hiking in the Headlands when not at our office.
Naomi Irvine
Naomi Irvine, who began volunteering for ATC in 2006 and joined our staff as an Outreach Counselor in 2007, is also our coordinator of weekly volunteers. Despite her wisdom and maturity, Naomi can get an overwhelming and incapacitating attack of the giggles at any time. Food, bad TV, Subway sandwiches, and her niece Renee are a few of Naomi’s favorite things.
Jon Sege
When Jon joined ATC’s staff in 2010 as our Development Coordinator, it was a homecoming, as he was born in Mountain View, CA. He spent most of his life in Boston, where he enjoyed numerous Red Sox, Patriots, and Celtics championships, becoming somewhat insufferable. None of those, however, brought a tear to his eye as fast as the movies “Up”, “Finding Nemo”, or, especially, “Homeward Bound.” When he’s 65, Jon will spend most of his time tending his vegetable garden and feeding his goats.
Hannah Yaritz
Hannah joined ATC as an AmeriCorps VISTA Campaign Coordinator in 2010. A true Midwesterner, Hannah loves cheese, warm summers, and autumn leaves – but above all, pickles are her favorite thing. Hannah is sometimes seen cross-stitching, baking, drinking wine, and playing cards – bringing out all of her best grandmotherly qualities.
The ATC Family Board
Alan D’Souza (Secretary)
Alan has been a librarian at City College of San Francisco since 2008. Prior to taking this position, he worked fourteen years at San Francisco Public Library. A ‘”naturalized” San Franciscan, Alan has made the city his home and muse since moving from Hanford, CA in 1990. Still a small-town boy at heart, he finds great joy in building community through volunteering, public service and creating art.
Mary Gregory (Board Chair)
Mary is vice-president and a senior program officer at Pacific Foundation Services, which provides administrative, program, accounting, and record-keeping services to family foundations. She has been a volunteer, board member, board president, staff member and/or fundraising consultant for approximately twenty different non-profit organizations. In 1997, she founded Mary’s List (www.maryslist.net), a web-based matching service for non-profit organizations that are seeking consultants. Mary lives in San Francisco with her husband Dan and her Labrador, Sazerac.
Avner Lapovsky
Avner is currently co-principal of the wholesale interior design showroom, Sloan Miyasato, which has been a fixture in San Francisco for the past two decades. He has been involved with ATC for several years, and in 2003 organized a birthday fundraising party that raised over $20,000. He has also connected ATC with several other supporters. In addition to his work for ATC, Avner volunteered for a year with SF Aids Foundation on the aids hot line, and volunteered with the SF library to deliver books to the AIDS ward at Laguna Honda Hospital.
Frank Petkovich
Frank Petkovich is currently a market research contractor with Cisco Systems. Frank has over 25 years’ marketing experience, and has held senior-level marketing positions at numerous technology start-up companies. Frank’s work has taken him around the world, and he loves food, wine, road cycling, and travel. A native San Franciscan, Frank holds a Management and Marketing degree from U.S.F. and a Finance MBA from Golden Gate University.
Lateefah Simon (On sabbatical)
Lateefah is the Executive Director of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights. She was the Director of Reentry Programs for the San Francisco District Attorney’s Office from 2005-2008. Prior to that, she was the executive director of the Center for Young Women’s Development, a leadership and employment program for low-income women in San Francisco. In 2004, she was a recipient of a MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship, and in 2005 was recognized as a “California Woman of the Year” by the California State Assembly.
Marc Vogl
Marc is a program officer at the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation managing grants to Bay Area performing arts organizations and developing strategies to promote next generation leadership in the nonprofit sector. Marc served on the San Francisco Arts Task Force and Barack Obama’s National Arts Policy Committee and was a founder and former Executive Director of Killing My Lobster, a San Francisco comedy, theater, and film company.
Zeb Young (Treasurer)
Zeb recently opened a law practice based in Berkeley, with the goal of serving the legal and organizational needs of non-profits and small businesses. He was motivated to open his own practice by a desire to cast off the constraints of traditional practice and to pursue his interests and curiosities as they evolve. Zeb lives in Berkeley with his partner, Reena, and two cats, Charlie and Chico.
The ATC Family Volunteers
Volunteers are the fuel that powers ATC. We can’t possibly profile all 300 of them, so you’ll have to take our word on the fact that they are the most attractive crew you’ll ever find.