Funder Panel - Taos

CJ Grace, CEO brings more than 15 years of experience leading in public education and serving on nonprofit boards. Areas of focus have included strategic planning, fundraising, grant writing, plus fiscal and change management. Her objectives are to nurture the evolution of the Taos Community Foundation as it connects donors with the causes that they care about while advancing place and trust-based philanthropy to support the well-being of the Taos community. CJ is a long-time resident of Taos with a history of public facing roles and understands the many diverse perspectives and needs across the community.

Linda Candelaria-Dodd brings extensive experience innonprofit leadership, fundraising, and community impact across New Mexico. She previously served as Executive Director/CEO of United Way of Eddy County, Resource Development Manager at Carlsbad Lifehouse, and Program Director of the Carlsbad Literacy Program, where she led fundraising, grant writing, and strategic partnerships. Raised in rural northern New Mexico, Linda has dedicated her career to strengthening rural communities and improving opportunities for vulnerable populations. Her experience working with nonprofits and community organizations throughout New Mexico gives her a practical understanding of the funding landscape and the realities organizations face in pursuing sustainable support.

Erika Dávila is the grants director at New Mexico Community Foundation, where she oversees all scholarship and grant initiatives. Born in the Mexican state of Zacatecas, Erika is a former journalist who grew up in Colorado and moved to New Mexico to write for the Santa Fe New Mexican.

As a journalist, she covered education, immigration, and other issues. She began her second career in the nonprofit world 20 years ago, working in philanthropy. Erika has a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of Colorado at Boulder. In her free time, she enjoys spending time with family, hiking, watching baseball and taking walks at dusk. She is committed to doing her part to strengthen New Mexico communities.

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Mary Nell is the Executive Director of the Brindle Foundation, a small private foundation based in Santa Fe that focuses on prenatal to three within New Mexico. The foundation has two funding streams: one for direct services in seven northern counties and all tribal lands, and one for systems strengthening statewide. The counties in which Brindle funds direct services work are: Colfax, Mora, Rio Arriba, San Miguel, Sandoval, Santa Fe, Taos. The Early Childhood systems strengthening work is divided into support for four tracks: advocacy and policy; innovation; coordination/organization support; and higher education.

Before taking on this role with the Brindle Foundation, MaryNell served as the Executive Director of the Maternal Health Task Force at the Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health in Boston. Mary Nell has a special interest in maternal/infant health and work that centers the needs of those prenatal to three.

Her undergraduate work was in anthropology (BA,Yale) and she holds graduate degrees in international education (EdM, Harvard)and public health (MPH, UCLA).

With more than 30 years of experience in international public health, Mary Nell has worked directly for donors such as the Rockefeller Foundation, UNFPA, and the EmPower Foundation—as well as in community-based and nonprofit organizations at both local and global levels such as Jubilee Refugee Camp in Hong Kong, White Mountain Apache Tribal Health Authority in Arizona,Women’s Dignity Project in Tanzania, Planned Parenthood of CT and of the Rocky Mountains, and Engender Health’s New York, Nairobi, Bogota and Delhi offices.

She is originally from South Dakota and loves living in Santa Fe and hiking with her husband, Josiah Child, and their dogs. They have two adult children; their son is currently working in Maine and their daughter in San Francisco.

Mary Nell is very good at driving a tractor and her tango could use some work.

Mona Nozhackum is the Community Relations Manager at Taos Ski Valley, where she leads the resort's Community Pledge and oversees the Uplift Youth Fund, charitable giving, sponsorships, volunteerism, community engagement, and signature community events. She developed a community-informed philanthropic framework that centers equity, trust-based philanthropy, and shared decision-making, guiding investments in youth-serving organizations across Taos County and Northern New Mexico. A citizen of the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation with family roots in Taos Pueblo and Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate, Mona holds a Master of Education in Educational Leadership from Northern Arizona University. She brings a relationship-centered, Indigenous-informed approach to charitable giving, community engagement, and cross-sector partnerships, working to build meaningful collaborations that strengthen communities and expand opportunities for local youth.