Sharon is thrilled to join the High Desert Food and Farm Alliance June 2023 in this leadership role where she can use her career-long talents of community engagement, building partnerships, and creating communications to amplify the HDFFA message that “Everyone Deserves Good Food.”

Sharon grew up on Long Island in New York and has a BA from Binghamton University. She began her career in Human Resources, in high tech (in both Melville, New York and Hillsboro, Oregon) and healthcare (in Butte, Montana), focusing on recruiting, employee relations, and communications. She entered the nonprofit world nearly 20 years ago, and for more than a decade served as the Executive Director of a community center in Port Washington, New York that operated a 425-seat theater. She significantly grew the organization’s performing arts series and community-based programming through deepening partnerships with schools and other nonprofit organizations in the region. Sharon’s interest in building partnerships and communications continued in other nonprofit arts positions she held in New York and included finding ways that arts-based organizations could elevate artists’ voices, become an integral part of the community, and be a platform to make a difference in the world.

After moving with her family to Bend in September 2019, Sharon worked at the Tower Theatre Foundation from March 2020-May 2023. There she helped spearhead the Stage the Change Conference in 2022 and 2023. This event’s mission is to empower high school students to use the performing arts to find their social voice and be catalysts for change.

Sharon is excited to share HDFFA’s important work supporting Central Oregon’s food and farm network and to create and foster community partnerships. She looks forward to meeting you at the Farmers Markets, community events, or hiking (anywhere and everywhere) around beautiful Central Oregon.