Houston Advisory and Learning Operation
Building on grants made across Texas since 2020, the Hive Fund is deepening our place-based grant-making in the Houston metro region—an iconic area poised for a just transition toward a cleaner, more resilient, and more equitable economy. To support our grantmaking strategy, we convened a group of deeply rooted Houston leaders whose organizations are playing a leading role in Houston’s transformation. This group, which we call the Houston Advisory and Learning Operation (HALO), provides us insight on strategy, local context, opportunity, and potential grantee partners, and supports our continuous learning.
Photo by Jorge Sanhueza-Lyon
Doris Brown, Co-Director of Community Research, West Street Recovery/Northeast Action Collective
Doris Brown is West Street Recovery's Co-Director of Community Research, Organizing, and Special Events. She is also a co-founder of the Northeast Action Collective. She graduated from Houston Community College with a degree in Human Service Technology and Certification in Mental Health. In 2016 she graduated from University of Houston with a Bachelor of Science in Interdisciplinary Studies. She joined staff at West Street in June of 2020.
Stephen Brown, Founder and Board President, Clean Energy Fund of Texas
Steve Brown is the Founder and Chair of the Clean Energy Fund of Texas Inc (TxCEF), a Green Bank focused on making the emerging green economy affordable and just for all Texans. Steve is also president of Capital Assets Energy LLC, a successful clean energy development consulting firm, and his career spans over 20 years of government relations, public affairs and energy sustainability experience.
Gabe Cazares, Executive Director, LINK Houston
Gabe Cazares is Executive Director of LINK Houston, a non-profit organization that that advocates for transportation equity. Since launching in 2017, LINK Houston has successfully shaped a $7-billion transit plan; compelled the Houston Mayor to fix Houston’s dangerous intersections and launch a zero-fatality safety campaign; influenced an alignment between affordable housing and transportation; and supported advocacy that led to the Federal Highway Administration halting a major highway expansion project and Harris County filing a lawsuit over inequities in the project.
Tiffany Jin, Co-founder, Houston Climate Justice Museum
Tiffany Jin is the co-founder of the Houston Climate Justice Museum which exists at the intersection of environmental justice and decolonial museum practice. Jin works with artists, activists, and scholars who help us reimagine our worlds and lead the way in upholding values and traditions that are more representative of our collective lived experiences. She received her Bachelor of Science from the University of Texas and studied at Cornell University in the Master of Architecture program.
Ayanna Jolivet Mccloud, Executive Director, Bayou City Waterkeeper
Ayanna Jolivet Mccloud is Executive Director of Bayou City Waterkeeper where she supports community efforts to improve water quality, wetland protection, and flood mitigation/recovery. A native Houstonian and fourth-generation artist, she develops frameworks for new ways of imagining and advocating for water, ecology, justice, and people in greater Houston.
Dr. Denae King, Associate Director, Bullard Center for Environmental and Climate Justice at Texas Southern University
Dr. Denae King is an Associate Director in The Bullard Center for Environmental and Climate Justice housed in the Barbara Jordan-Mickey Leland School of Public Affairs at Texas Southern University (TSU). Her work focuses on interdisciplinary projects designed to address community-identified environmental health and climate justice concerns in underserved people of color communities in Houston, Texas and in the Gulf Coast region. Dr. King’s additional interests include the role of neighborhood effects in the onset of disease in underserved areas and organizational community capacity.
Elaine Morales, Director of Partnerships and Policy, Connective
Elaine Morales-Díaz is the Director of Partnerships and Policy at Connective where she leads collective policy and programmatic initiatives that promote community resiliency and the continuous improvement of Disaster Recovery and Social Services. With a background in architecture, community design and international cooperation, Elaine has worked on diverse projects and programs that increase access to affordable housing, advance just disaster recovery, and address community development issues through participatory design and planning.
Stefania Tomaskovic, Coalition Director, Coalition for Environment, Equity, and Resilience (CEER)
Stefania Tomaskovic, Ph.D. serves as Coalition Director for CEER. She believes that a strong, resilient Texas is possible: one where every person can access safe, affordable housing, where every neighborhood has healthy air, water, and soil, and where our economy is strengthened by meaningful work opportunities that support healthy livelihoods without doing harm to each other or the environment. Prior to joining CEER, Stefania worked with Public Citizen, a national nonprofit group dedicated to representing the people’s voice in the halls of power. Stefania has also worked as a chaplain and a geologist.
Frances Valdez, Executive Director, Houston in Action
Frances Valdez is a queer Chicana mom with roots in what is now West Texas. In 2017, she helped found Houston in Action, a collective of over 100 non-profit, grassroots, service, governmental, and health organizations working with women, youth, low-income residents, Black, Latinx, AAPI, and other historically excluded communities. Previously, Valdez served for over a decade as an immigration attorney, advocacy and policy advisor, director, and civic engagement coordinator within the immigrant rights movement.