we've already looked at the board of directors, but what of the c-suite?
trevor, unlike many charities, opts not to list their executive team anywhere on their website. it's very missing from their "Meet Team Trevor" page. pretty much every charity watchdog site i could check for further detail either has provably dated information or a paywall, so i'm reliant on the only public list of higher-ups trevor legally must disclose: their taxes
propublica has the most up-to-date archive i can find, being trevor's recent refiling of their FY2022 taxes. so, from july 2021 to july 2022:
staff is dropping left right and centre from trevor, as you'll be seeing today. i'll obviously mention as much, but since i'm operating on old info and new research, anyone i list as 'active' could be gone any day now.
amit paley was, of course, the most noteworthy departure, but he was by no means alone. reminder, he "stepped down" in early november 2022, though the taxes reveal he was still on payroll until janurary 2023. i'm assuming they just waited for the end of the calendar year for some logistics reason? who knows!
amit was still paid a little south of half a million dollars for his final year of effort, so good for him, the bastard. his replacement will get her own writeup in the coming weeks, so in the words of anyone trying to get anything done with trevor: let's work around peggy
let's meet our c-suitehearts!
Carrie Davis | Former Chief Community Officer
there aren't a ton of pictures of carrie; in her words, she doesn't much care for the spotlight. fair enough!
this woman has been a somewhat lowkey force for trans rights, especially in new york, for decades. the above pic is from a 20 minute crash-course on gender identity and transitioning, released to YouTube by the LGBTQ Community Center of New York in 2009.
'ahead of the times' would be underselling it: carrie davis was a big part of that movement, she herself is part of 'the times'
she'd pin her start in this field as reaching out to support trans sex workers on the streets of new york in the 90s. she has since served on an AIDS epidemic advisory counsel, been a human rights commissioner, and, of course, served as an executive at The Trevor Project
at least, until september 2023.
I am both excited and sad to share that I am retiring
from The Trevor Project as Chief Community Officer,
effective tomorrow, September 1, 2023. I’m stepping
away now knowing that I have put my heart and soul
into serving others in my LGBTQ community.
her wording reads as though this was a somewhat rushed decision, but that could just be me. she says she doesn't have a "clear road ahead", but is relieved to even get the chance to retire at all:
I never imagined I would live to my 60’s when I began
this work at the apex of the HIV epidemic in the mid 1990’s.
So many colleagues and members of my community, especially
my trans sisters, have passed away since then - long before
they might begin to consider what retirement might look like.
As a trans elder, I am truly fortunate to have this almost unique
opportunity to model what it’s like to retire from this taxing but
rewarding work after decades in service to our communities.
I am confident that I am leaving Trevor in the hands of
experienced and extremely capable leaders.
can't say i agree with you on that last bit, but i'm glad you were at least in the room, carrie. although what you were tasked with handling was... a bit impossible, really:
The Chief Community Officer leads the strategic
direction and overall management of Trevor's prevention
efforts comprising advocacy, research, public training,
and the organization's peer-to-peer support platform,
TrevorSpace.
My responsibilities in this role included oversight of a
multidisciplinary team of over 40 staff. The Chief
Community Officer is a member of Trevor’s executive
leadership team that manages Trevor’s over 500 staff,
as well as its nearly 2000 volunteers.
2,500+ people is too many for one person to be tasked with handling. much less a woman in her 60s who, as she said, prefers to keep to herself.
trevor is bleeding staff faster than it can rehire, so i can't tell who if anyone has taken her position yet- but i doubt the union would be too happy with anyone put in the position to have to tell them "i hear you, but peggy said no".
this is an impossible job to do right, trevor's corporate structure means any decisions made by the CCO are filtered through business-speak and chat-disabled video calls
carrie seems like a good woman tasked with an impossible job, who is getting out while the getting is good. maybe i'm giving her too much credit, but her record speaks for itself.
so far the most qualified person trevor has is no longer working there. good start??
Dr. Tia Dole | Former Chief Clinical Operations Officer
dr. tia dole has multiple degrees in clinical psychology, has been practicing for over a decade, spent 3 years at the trevor project and realized "hey i think i can do better elsewhere".
she left to become the executive director of the steve fund, which at first blush seems promising but who knows anymore! i also used to think trevor was promising!!
then, she left steve to become the chief crisis lifeline officer at vibrant emotional health, the company SAMHSA gave a grant to so they could get the modern 988 Lifeline up and afloat (see my last piece for more info on that).
Dr. Dole oversaw all of The Trevor Project’s crisis services
programs as well as their volunteer community and increased
their impact by a factor of four.
wait, i thought that was carrie's job? she's a clinical psychologist not a staff organizer. personnel management is always gonna be a part of any job where you have subordinates, but... i'm starting to worry a lot of people's jobs were to 'oversee' trevor's overreaching missteps, beyond their qualification or control.
not to speak ill of Dr. Tia, of course, she seems great! but it's no wonder she left.
who wants to be pinned for overseeing labor abuses?
Dr. Dole is a leader in the mental health field and brings a
wealth of experience to Vibrant and to the 988 Lifeline as we
continue to expand and deliver lifesaving services to those
who contact the line.
The transition to 988 Lifeline has underscored the importance
of mental health equity and access for all, and especially those
in historically and persistently excluded or harmed communities.
This is a critical time in the effort to strengthen and expand the
entire mental health continuum of care in our country, and we
are delighted to have Dr. Dole’s leadership.
-Kimberly Williams, President & CEO of Vibrant Emotional Health
i'll remind you that vibrant did partner with trevor to have them administrate the pilot of 988+3, but then minimized their role by bringing in six other companies for the full launch. that was what the "sudden loss of funding" was about. we've been over that bullshit
point being, dr. dole seems excellent! she jumped ship from the trevor project when she had a chance to help more directly, and has only gotten more and more involved in directly assisting the mental health of queer and bipoc folks. good stuff!
all of trevor's best folks aren't there anymore, as it turns out. i just find that interesting! next!
Calvin Stowell | Former Chief Growth Officer
i apologize in advance, as a fellow online gay, but... this guy seems real fuckin' irritating
he's done some good work! he's done volunteering as a crisis counselor for crisis text line, has a bachelors in media and comm studies he's good at using socmede to promote activism. he raked up 70k followers on twitter, but X's wake has left his account locked. probably innocent enough.
During my time at Trevor, a key focus area was the number
of young people served by the organization annually;
in the beginning, Trevor was serving around 40,000 young
people a year with its direct services, and by the time I
wrapped up my role we were serving over 500,000 young
people a year, an increase of over 1000%.
(I) managed and developed a Growth team of 35 people,
up from 3 when I joined the organization. Overall helped
the organization strategically to go from a headcount of
around 50 full-time employees to over 500
i don't think the social media guy should be the one in charge of that. if your job is to grow to scale and reach more children in crisis, your main qualification should be in the latter.
calvin did the media, socially for DoSomething, another nonprofit that encourages community activism and that's imploding internally with its own slew of accusations. calvin left 3 years before any of that started going down, but it was to join trevor project as their chief growth officer, so that's... not much better, honestly
Oversaw [The Trevor Project's] first rebrand in over a decade,
including a brand new website based on the needs of today's
young people and potential donors and volunteers.
This included the management of the RFP process and
day-to-day management of the agency, as well as the
management of all internal stakeholders to get them
aligned and onboard with any changes.
"get them aligned on changes" could just as easily be "the guy who explains new procedure to stakeholders" as well as "the poor sap who has to break the bad news to stakeholders". maybe do a funny shitpost about it on instagram
wait, this is just personnel management again!
augh. i feel bad, cuz calvin doesn't seem, like, a bad dude or anything. he's just a very specific kind of Always Online Gay, who uses that to strategically promote businesses and activism. which i think is somewhat... incompatible with trevor's supposed main goal, no?
helping suicidal children shouldn't be marketed the same way as Be A Cool Member Of Your Community And Help Pick Up Trash, the language doesn't translate. trevor's strange, stilted PR speak is proof enough of that.
i don't think calvin was qualified for the role he was given. but if he was good at his job despite, that might actually be worse, considering where we're at now.
maybe that's why he left in feburary 2023? counting amit we're 4 executives in and not a single one is actually still working for trevor
hey, who the fuck is flying this plane?
Cristina Ciprian-Matthews | Active Chief of Staff
oh, oh! cristina takes the wheel! surely relying on one person to handle this entire crisis will be the best way out of things!
cristina is a teacher and recruiter, with a bachelor's in comparative ethnic studies and active history of volunteering, who worked for Success Academy Charter Schools as an instructive recruiter and eventual "associate director of talent".
i have, uh, strong opinions on charter schools. especially in new york. but irritatingly, all of the problems i've read about this specific school are just... intensified versions of problems public schools already have?
beating students, teachers being graded based on their class' test scores, not letting kids go to the bathroom during class. this is terrible, but it's... public school terrible, now featuring a return to segregation the long way around
cristina was promoted to manager of recruitment later that same year the NYT piece dropped, 2015, and eventually jumped to trevor as an advisor to the CEO in 2017
so, a recently purdue-pilled amit paley.
Project managed and created an asynchronous training for
volunteers on digital crisis services with a focus on building
a more efficient and effective training to support substantial
growth in the volunteer pool.
Built more streamlined and formal recruitment and onboarding
process and led recruitment efforts across some key roles in
the organization.
Advised on matters related to personnel, staff engagement,
employee relations and volunteer strategy.
damn! seems like she should be chief of staff. which is why she was promoted to "chief people officer" whatever the FUCK the difference is! sorta implies you see staff as, you know, not people.
Develop overall human capital strategy.
Oversee recruitment, professional development,
employee engagement and HR functions.
Lead the development and execution of Trevor’s
volunteer recruitment and engagement strategy.
Serve as a core spokesperson for the organization
and opportunities to join as an employee or volunteer.
all of these are bad things to have been doing. trevor's volunteers are overworked and haunted by what they hear, and 'human capital' is another matter al-to-fucking-gether. she was finally promoted to chief of staff in 2022, where as far as i can tell, she remains today.
cristina! has been on one wild ride!
once again, we have someone whose flags are as red as they are green. either they're trying very hard to make a difference in a system that is fighting back, or they're the very problem itself. cristina doesn't have any social media presence that i can find, and her last post to linkedin was years ago.
there simply isn't enough for me to go off of, so... i hope she's cool!
dear god, i hope someone still at trevor is cool!!
Amanda Ryan-Smith | Active Chief Development Officer
TWO EMPLOYEES STILL STANDING! LET'S GO LESBIANS!
i don't actually know about cristina, but amanda here has talked about her experience being closeted in the 90s pretty candidly.
bachelors in psychology, masters in social work, amanda's passion for fundraising non-profits started with an internship and has led her all around for over 20 years.
austin humane society, planned parenthood, the NCLR, and in feburary 2021, finally, the trevor project, where she still works today.
As Chief Development Officer, Amanda serves as a key member
of the executive team and leads the outstanding Development
team of 40+ remote staff.
Through the generosity of dedicated supporters, partners, and
new government funding, the Development team has tripled
total fundraising revenue in 3 years.
oh so SHE'S THE ONE HANDLING THE GRANTS? wuhoh.
again, if you haven't already do read part 1 of this article, because if you did you'll understand why this is a catastrophe.
if she was doing her job correctly, then someone else in trevor's upper management must have fucked up massively.
that said... amanda was successfully collecting grants at pretty much every job she's worked at, her linkedin goes into detail. i find it hard to believe she didn't understand what was happening with SAMHSA's subgranting, which sooner suggests a lack of communication or care internally
maybe it's on her, or somebody else in the pipeline? but either way, amanda handles fundraising for trevor, and failures in that are the excuse peggy used for mass layoffs.
she's actively recruiting for trevor on linkedin still, but it's hard to stop scooping water and just admit the ship is sinking, no? harder still if you sprung the leak yourself.
i'm not saying she's responsible for this disaster, but there are vanishingly few people left in trevor's management. lying about how grants work to contractors is a peggy move, for sure, but whose work was she citing when she lied?
consider working elsewhere, amanda! and cristina, too! i'm less and less convinced by the day you even have coworkers!
Lena Ballantine | Former Chief Operating Officer
my point! exactly!
Under her leadership, Trevor continue[d] to grow its
crisis services and transform its delivery model —
all in service of supporting the 1.8M LGBTQ youth
estimated to seriously consider suicide every year.
i won't be spending long on lena, as she's been gone almost as long as she was there. she left in october 2021, a full two years ago at this point, to work for venture-capital backed trans healthcare """provider""" FOLX.
look, do what y'all gotta to get your E & T, folks. including, but not limited to, working around a system designed to profit off your suffering to get pills directly. don't ask me how, my ketamine dealer has "a guy" and i know better than to ask questions*
she was apparently still volunteering at trevor as a crisis counselor until june 2023, so, take from that what you will, but her replacement as an executive is the one who's still cashing the checks, so let's focus on him.
*legally this is a joke
Carlos Carrazana | Interim Chief Operating Officer
in september 2021, this guy stepped up until a new COO was appointed. and has been 'interim' for over 2 years since, where he remains today.
Results-oriented leader and senior executive with over
thirty years of global management experience in private
and nonprofit organizations.
Extensive background in organizational efficiency;
change management, board governance and measuring
effectiveness. Expertise in several functional areas
including integrating and optimizing operational systems,
strategic planning, financial management, human resources,
resource mobilization, and information technology.
once upon a time, carlos was a corporate officer for international banking across several legacy banks. chase, walls fargo- this all happened before the 90s were out
around the late 00s, his focus shifted to managing nonprofits, starting with being COO of the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation, then Save The Children International, League of Conservation Voters, and finally as a guiding hand for Trevor.
he was also on the board several orgs like greenpeace, as well as for trevor's project's expansion into mexico, but there's not a date listed here, so i can't tell which was first, or if they were at the same time.
Overseeing Mexico/ LatAm expansion, Finance,
Operations and Administration, Technology, Legal,
Strategy and Organizational Performance.
WELL CHRIST between the last sentence and now i have made the mistake of checking carlos' linkedin social page. his credentials sound great, sound, but his mentality...
are you a mentally strong person? how many boxes do you tick, your company's culture depends on it!
this is terrifying, and if this was the mentality he brought to management it explains a lot about the trevor project. just lay off the non mentally strong and the incompetent nice guys, and we'll be in good shape! damn if those offices aren't operated.
"human capital" shit was supposed to be cristina's job, i thought!
he seems to be an expert at bringing capitalism into nonprofits, even if his intentions are good. i wouldn't be able to stand working for this guy i don't think, but damn if his resume doesn't look squeaky fuckin' clean
he's good at doing activism in a way i think is fundamentally flawed, and trevor has focused so much on this that it's become actively harmful at its main objective.
this guy, almost assuredly, had a hand in recent events. he's not technically supposed to be the full COO, just like how peggy absolutely should not be CEO, but anyone who could take his place has their hands tied, or already cut themselves free of trevor
Gina Muñoz | Former Chair of The Board & Former Advisor to The Interim CEO
gina left unceremoniously at the end of 2022 after working to advise peggy for no more than a couple months. trevor's taxes still list them as present, but aside from trevor press releases their presence is pretty much scrubbed from the internet.
i have no idea what is going on there, nor the resources to really find out without talking to people at trevor directly. (they won't return my calls </3)
And that's it. No really, that's it.
well, depends on how trevor classified "execs" internally (they claim 12??).
But Trevor claims it prizes diversity among its executive team
and that the team is composed of “experienced leaders, including:
eight women (seven who are cisgender, one who is transgender);
four men (three who are cisgender, one who is transgender);
in addition, seven are BIPOC.”
-The Trevor Project Source for Washington Blade, 2023
their count may also consist of julian j moore, and amy e taylor? you'll remember though, we talked about them last time- they're board members who answer to the actual executives.
the ones trevor "prizes" the "diversity" of. a team made up of, as far as i can tell... three people. and one peggy.
for now let's put our hope into these three mentally strong people to keep this plane in flight, or perhaps just land it, while peggy screams at them from first class
she gets her own post. stay tuned.