Presenters
Kim Baker, Outreach Coordinator, Arc of Appalachia
Kim is a resident of Adams County and alongside her husband David, serve’s as caretaker for Quiverheart Gorge Preserve. In 2021, Kim was introduced to the Arc and developed a deep love and passion for the organization. She has been a 4-H Advisor for 19 years, manages the 4-H Horse Program, and is a member of the Advisory Committee. Kim and David started a 4-H SPIN Club called Explore the Outdoors. Kim enjoys working with young people and volunteering her time to help them. Horses have been a part of her life since childhood, and they have taught her an important lesson: “There is always something new to learn”. Additionally, she has been a member of the State Horse Committee for almost 14 years. When she is not working or volunteering, Kim loves to spend time in the woods, getting lost in the mesmerizing beauty of nature. Visit Arc of Appalachia.
Kristen Barker
Social entrepreneur and the President and Co-Founder of Co-op Cincy and is a Co-Founder of 1worker1vote. She designs and leads participatory education events with English- and Spanish-speaking co-op workers, and helps worker-owners make their businesses more successful. Kristen also helps determine the feasibility of potential co-op businesses, helps retiring business owners determine whether they can sell their business to their employees, and helps viable co-ops access the capital they need to leverage their ideas. Kristen has done groundbreaking work in adopting the Mondragon model to the U.S. context, and hosts delegations from around the country, including the participants in our biennial Union Co-op Symposium. Kristen is a 2016-2018 Business Alliance for Local and Living Economies (BALLE) Fellow.
Co-ops in Cincinnati: Our Harvest, Sustainergy, Renting Partnerships, Cincinnati Cleaning Co-op, Queen City Commons, Bhutanese Bari, Massage for the People, Touch of TLC Homecare, Shine Nurture Center (child care), Compcoop (computers), Radical Bean, Old Growth (landscaping), Rhizome (mental health),
Susie Beiersdorfer, Secretary, Ohio Community Rights Network
Susie lives in the Mahoning Watershed and is an environmental activist, retired college teacher of environmental geology, and a yoga student and instructor. In 2011, an injection well in the city triggered earthquakes with a 4.0 on Dec. 31st. By the Fall of 2012, local activists were working with The Community Environmental Legal Defence Fund (CELDF) to draft a charter amendment to protect the residents and the natural systems that sustain them. The Drinking Water Protection Bill of Rights ensured a right to clean water, air, and soil by banning harmful activities that pose a direct threat to public and environmental health – including fracking and injection wells and was on the ballot 8 times. In 2017 the group also proposed a Free and Fair Elections ballot initiative to address the influence of corporate money on local elections but both amendments were kept off the ballot by the Board of Elections and then the Ohio Supreme Court. Despite having enough signatures the local Board of Elections made every attempt to keep these initiatives off the ballot and impede local democracy. Susie is also board president of the National Community Rights Network. Contact Susie yogayoungstown at gmail.com.
Tony Bianco, DO
Tony is a native Cincinnatian who completed his undergraduate studies at the University of Cincinnati and medical school at Ohio University College of Osteopathic Medicine. He is board certified in Family Medicine, Neuromusculoskeletal Medicine, and Osteopathic Manipulative Treatment. He currently is the chair of Osteopathic Principles and Practice at the proposed Xavier University College of Osteopathic Medicine, and works clinically in Osteopathic Neuromusculoskeletal Medicine with St. Elizabeth.
Peter Block
Peter Block is an author, consultant and citizen of Cincinnati, Ohio.His work is about chosen accountability, and the reconciliation of community. Of his many founding organizations, he currently works with Common Good Collective. He has countless publications and is internationally regarded for leading community building for business, NGOs, community organizations. The third edition of his book, Community: the Structure of Belonging will soon be available.
Bill Cahalan, Ph.D.
Bill Cahalan is a psychologist and ecotherapist who has led nature immersion retreats since 1983. He does woodland restoration and other regenerative work on his family’s land, as well in a 3 acre woods in Avondale. He helped co-found Citizens for Rights of the Ohio River Watershed (CROW) in 2020.
Sophia Dellecave
Hello! My name is Sophia Dellecave. I am a homemaker, daughter, wife, friend, food enthusiast, functional nutrition adherent, and co-chapter leader of the WAPF Cincinnati Chapter. I grew up in northern Kentucky and hold a special place in my heart for this local community. Currently, I have 12 chickens, 5 ducks, 1 bunny and 1 barn cat! My passions include, ancestral knowledge in foods/healing practices, high quality foods (and what that truly means), holistic medicine, homemaking, non-toxic living, farming, gardening, soil restoration, native plants & herbal medicine, community groups, supporting local farms, service to others, organization, and sharing helpful info/resources with our community. Please connect with me! 🙂 wholisticsophia at protonmail dot com
(Bakhtavar) Becca Desai, President, Zoroastrian Association of Kentucky, Ohio, and Indiana (ZAKOI)
Becca Desai is a pillar of the Zoroastrian community in the tri-state of OH/KY/IN where she serves as the President of the Zoroastrian Association of KY, OH, and IN. She is also a dedicated interfaith advocate for Climate Action/Care for Creation, and for social justice and equity, joining hands with all other faith communities locally to make Cincinnati a Beloved Community.
Locally, Becca devotes her time to Faith Communities Go Green, Cincinnati, in which she leads the Education/Lifestyles Working Group, inspiring community members to change their lifestyle, one step at a time, and live in harmony with nature. She volunteers with EquaSion and The Interfaith Center, both in Ohio, through which she works with youth and other community members from various faith traditions to build a Beloved Community. Her passion for Ending Hunger in the world and lifting the poorest communities out of poverty drives her to devote her time to Shared Harvest Foodbank in her community in Cincinnati, Ohio, and to Restore Hope Liberia, an international NGO.
She has represented the Zoroastrian faith at the Parliament of the World’s Religions, focusing on inclusive societies and interreligious education. As a member of the Executive Council of Religions for Peace-USA, she embodies the Zoroastrian tenets of Humata, Hukhata, Hvarshta (Good Thoughts, Good Words, Good Deeds).
Her life’s work is defined by the belief that peace is only achievable when humankind learns to live in harmony with one another, and with all of Nature’s creation.
Mackenzie Doyle
Mackenzie Doyle (she/her) is the Justice Promoter for the Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati. She has a Master’s degree in Pastoral Ministry from the University of Dayton where her final project was creating an eco-spirituality faith-sharing group for college students. Mackenzie is Catholic and lives in Cincinnati with her husband. Mackenzie is passionate about adopting a sustainable lifestyle and how we can change our lifestyles communally in order to care for our common home and our neighbors.
Sherry Fleming
Sherry Fleming lives in rural northwest Ohio and is part of a grassroots coalition, the Williams County Alliance, that has worked tirelessly to protect their community from harms posed by industrial scale livestock and poultry production (CAFOs), as well as threats to their only source of water, the Michindoh Aquifer. Privatization of water, center pivot irrigation systems, a solid waste landfill and a proposed land-based genetically engineered salmon facility are some of the issues posing risk to the aquifer. The Alliance’s county home rule charter initiative to recognize the Michindoh aquifer’s right to exist, flourish and evolve was kept off the ballot in 2019 by unconstitutional state legislation. Contact Sherry wmscoa at gmail dot com.
Deborah Jordan
Deborah Jordan is an Earth lover who is rooted with her family in the Enright Ridge Urban Eco-Community. She is a member of Community Friends Meeting (Quaker), a co-founder of CROW, a producer of the Central Ohio River Valley (CORV) Guide for 19 years, and a mediator. She believes humans must re-member our place in nature for a livable future.
Bill Lyons, President, Ohio Community Rights Network
Bill works in Columbus for the Columbus Community Bill of Rights which has circulated city charter amendments and ordinances to assert a right to clean water, air, and soil and prohibit fossil fuel extraction and related activities, especially the deposit and transportation of frack waste, and the siting of frack infrastructure in Columbus. The group’s current local initiative is challenging the notion of state preemption which has prevented local self-governance on many issues including minimum wage, rent control, fracking, plastic bag bans, sensible gun restrictions, rights of nature, etc., even though the right of home rule has been part of the Ohio Constitution since 1912.
Vicki Mansoor
Vicki Mansoor is an artist and co-steward at Homeadow Song Farm, a 4.5 acre urban homestead land project in Cincinnati, Ohio.
She believes that the crisis of our day is mass disconnect from ourselves, one another and the More Than Human World. She is especially committed to an expanded definition of art as necessary medium of transformation and healing for these relationships.In addition, she works with a group educators, artists, gardeners and land stewards who offer in-depth place-based, arts-enriched, regenerative community programming for people of all ages.
Vicki is a student of Anthroposophy, has a Masters in Fine Arts, from the University of Cincinnati. She was recently included in a published work, “Soils Turn” by Eco-Art. She has provided in-depth artistic experiences for children since 1979, starting with the Contemporary Arts Center in Cincinnati, then the Ohio Arts Council. She hosts programming for WWOOFers (World Workers on Organic Farms), art students in regional Arts Institutions and the Cincinnati Permaculture Institute. She worked in Waldorf Education in administration and community development for 10 years.
For the last 23 years, Homeadow Song has served as catalyst for Mansoor’s life-long artistic exploration of questions about what it means to be an evolving human within the mysteries of time/space, inner/outer reality, self/other, order/chaos, freedom/responsibility. For her, the boundaries between art and life are fluid. She sees the Land as laboratory, library, garden, classroom, studio, sanctuary and collaborator.
Colleen McSwiggin
Colleen McSwiggin is Coordinator for Sustainability Central. She is also a board member and volunteer for Cincinnati Computer Reuse, which works to create digital equity by having affordable refurbished computers available for anyone who needs one. She has also been a member of the Hamilton County Solid Waste Policy Committee since 2023 and a member of Impact 100 since 2024. She graduated from Miami University with a B.A. in microbiology and previously worked as the Chemistry Lab Manager at Mount St. Joseph University. In that role and as chairperson of the University’s Sustainability Committee, she organized Community Electronics Recycling Days and Beyond-the-Bin Recycling for “hard-to-recycle” materials. Those experiences led her to co-found the Cincinnati Recycling & Reuse Hub, and she served as the Hub’s first Executive Director from 2020-2024.
Tish O’Dell, Consulting Director for CELDF (Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund)
Tish has been engaged in rights based organizing since 2011. She started this journey in her own community of Broadview Heights, Ohio over the issue of urban drilling and fracking. She helped organize and get passed the first rights of nature law passed by the people in Ohio. CELDF as an organization spent many years trying to work with existing environmental laws to protect communities from harm, only to realize that the entire legal system is set up to legalize the harms in order to protect property rights and profits above all else. More recently, in addition to being pioneers in the Rights of Nature movement, CELDF has focused on the cultural shift that needs to happen before the laws can change. They are developing a model process of Truth, Reckoning and Right Relationship and Community Resistance & Resilience program area to help individuals bring together our fractured communities in order to build collaborative connections focused on common values of health and justice for both the human and non-human life in the place based communities and ecosystems we share.
Jim Schenk
Jim has been a co-founder and resident of Enright Ridge Urban Ecovillage since its founding in 2004. He published a book called “Creating an Urban Ecovillage, a Model for Revitalizing Our Cities”.
Nancy Stranahan, Executive Director, Arc of Appalachia
Nancy is the Director of the Arc and was one of the non-profit’s founders in 1995. She has guided the organization through nearly three decades of its phenomenal growth. She focused the organization’s early efforts in building its first preserve, the Highlands Nature Sanctuary, which is now the largest in a system of nearly 30 preserves. Prior to Nancy’s long engagement with the Arc, she co-managed Benevolence Bakery and Cafe in the Columbus’ North Market, and served as Chief Naturalist for Ohio State Parks. Visit Arc of Appalachia.
Braden Trauth
Braden has studied and practiced the Hindu Dattatreya Lineage for 22 years, first through the teachings of Ram Dass and his Avadhuta Guru, Neem Karoli Baba at his Ashram in Taos, NM followed by studying with Sri Sai Kaleshwar Swami and his senior students starting in 2007. Kaleshwar’s mission was to teach India’s hidden lineage and practices of Dattatreya to the West to create spiritual masters who can serve humanity and the planet. This tradition employs mantras and yantras that results in tantra to work with the Mother and her creation, all from the ancient palm leaf manuscripts of India, some of which have been carbon dated to 5000 years ago.
Barbara Utendorf
Barbara Utendorf is an author, speaker, and retired college professor of holistic & natural health and nutrition. As an enduring educator and speaker, an ecological grower, and a certified permaculture design consultant additionally trained in agroforestry, Barbara is an advocate and guide for gentle and natural healing methods and for ecological conservation, restoration, and cultivation. As one of many ambassadors for the Earth, for Nature, and for peace, Barbara is dedicated to understanding and sharing the multi-level entirety of how to restore optimal well-being to All. For more information, see BackyardNourishment.com.
Mary Vietmeier, LPCC, RN, M.Div., Certified Life Coach
Mary brings a wealth of experience in guiding individuals to develop strategies tailored to their unique life challenges. This program specifically addresses the current environmental, political, and social turmoil. Designed as an uplifting and empowering 50-minute session, it offers interactive opportunities to share, inform, enlighten, and help you regain your footing amidst a world in flux.