Hello Community Members and Partners, 

We are immensely grateful to each of you – our partners, community members, and dedicated employees – for your unwavering support during the recent months of transition, uncertainty, and as we’ve reached out for support.  It’s been quite a rollercoaster ride but your unwavering belief in Global to Local’s work around food access and health equity has been the driving force for our resilience and determination to get back on course. 

Through this journey, we’ve been intentional about viewing setbacks as invaluable learning opportunities. These experiences have allowed us to identify areas of weakness and realign our organization’s focus. While there is still much work to be done, we are optimistic that our immediate actions will pave the way for a brighter future. 

In response to the challenges we’ve faced, we’ve taken decisive action. We’ve reignited our efforts in grant writing, ensuring that our vital programs receive the support they need to thrive. Additionally, we’ve enlisted the expertise of a finance agency to strengthen our financial foundation, laying the groundwork for a sustainable future. 

As we move forward, we are ready to transition from a state of alarm and reactiveness. Instead, we are opening ourselves up to stronger relationships and new aligned partnerships that will help us grow as an organization, ensuring our continued ability to serve the SeaTac, Tukwila and South King County communities.   

Looking Ahead, Capacity Building and Board Development 

We’re filled with optimism and renewed purpose. While there are still challenges ahead, we take comfort in the signs of hope that surround us. Our new leadership team and incredible staff have been tirelessly pursuing opportunities to propel us forward, and we’re excited to explore new partnerships and collaborations that will shape the future of Global to Local. 

Our goal moving forward is to diversify our funding channels to create a more balanced and sustainable sourcing for our impactful programs. This will help ensure the longevity of our mission. We are now in a place of re-envisioning our path forward, focusing on replenishing our strategic framework and capacity building. 

Additionally, we are excited to welcome new board members who are dedicated to supporting immigrant and refugee communities. We seek individuals who are well-connected in areas of food access, food justice, health equity, diversity, and fundraising. Our Treasurer position is open and we welcome those with a finance background to explore this opportunity as well. We invite those interested in contributing their skills, connections, and relationships to join us in this endeavor. Please email me directly at sandra@globaltolocal.org if you’re interested in joining our board as we create a new, exciting future together for Global to Local and for our community in the South King County area. 

Join Us at Our Upcoming Art Night on Friday, May 3  

Where: Spice Bridge – 14200 Tukwila International Blvd Suite 141, Tukwila, WA 98168 

When: Visit our Facebook page for more information the week prior to the event 

Help us raise $75,000 for our Spice Bridge Kitchen Fund  

Funds directly support Spice Bridge operating costs that ensure BIPOC and immigrant owned businesses can become stable businesses and feed our community. Your support helps BIPOC and immigrant chefs thrive today and tomorrow! Click here to donate. 

Thank you from the bottom of our hearts for being an essential part of our community and for your steadfast commitment to our mission. We’re incredibly grateful for your support and partnership as we navigate this journey together.  

With gratitude, 

Sandra Largaespada 

Interim Executive Director 

Global to Local 

Hello Global To Local Community!

It’s been a time of significant change and growth at our organization and we are thrilled to share some exciting updates with you. 

Staff Restructure for a Brighter Future: 

Over the past few months, our team has been hard at work restructuring to better support our day-to-day operations, meet program needs, and plan for an even brighter future. We are committed to ensuring that Global To Local remains a beacon of support and empowerment in our community. 

Celebrating New Promotions: 

In the spirit of growth and progress, we are delighted to announce three well-deserved promotions within our team: 

1. Faizah Shukru – Food Access Manager:  

Faizah has been promoted to the role of Food Access Manager. Her dedication to our food access work has been outstanding, and we look forward to seeing her bring new energy and ideas to this vital role. Faizah’s dedication to our food access work is evident to anyone who has worked with her. Her expanded role now encompasses partnership and food access development, leading grant reporting, along with finding innovative ways to incorporate food access efforts into the FIN program through our network of market vendors, local food organizations, and other food access resources.  

2. Thao Pham – Interim Director of Operations:  

We are excited to welcome Thao Pham into the role of Interim Director of Operations. Thao’s leadership skills and commitment to our mission make him an excellent addition to our leadership team. Thao will be overseeing essential operational tasks to keep our organization running at its best. This includes assisting with program supervision, monitoring operations and budgets, overseeing daily activity programs, and analyzing performance metrics to provide both individual and team evaluations. 

3. Jill Kong – Interim Director of Development:  

Join us in congratulating Jill Kong on her promotion to Interim Director of Development. Jill’s experience as a community organizer and her passion for our mission will undoubtedly contribute to the success of our development strategies. In this capacity, Jill will be spearheading our development and fundraising strategies, overseeing Global To Local’s grant contracts, and acting as the primary point of contact for our grant writing efforts. 

Thank You to Our Partners 

We want to express our gratitude to our partners who have stood by us during this time of transition. Your support enables us to continue providing essential services to our community in South King County. 

As we move forward, we are excited about the possibilities that lie ahead. Our commitment to making a positive impact in the community remains steadfast, and with our newly structured team, we are confident in our ability to serve you better. 

Thank you for your ongoing support, trust, and commitment to Global To Local. Together, we can build a stronger and more resilient community. 

Seeking a Strategic Partner  

We are actively seeking a strategic partner, an organization whose mission resonates with ours, and one that is ready to assume a leadership role as our primary sponsor. In our vibrant city full of innovative businesses, leaders, and foundations, our leadership team and interim Executive Director, Sandra Largaespada (sandra@globaltolocal.org), welcome conversations with an open heart.  

This is not only a time of transition for staff but also an opportunity for our organization to restructure in a way that is more impactful. With our incredible team and programs, we are eager to find the right partners to help us continue reorganizing and creating a larger impact in Washington. To support our work, you can donate directly to Global To Local. 

Upcoming Spice Bridge Event

– Global To Local Team

Dear Valued Partners, Funders, Donors, Vendors, and Clients,

Happy New Year!

We are excited to share an important update from our team at Global To Local. After a period of transition, which admittedly had its challenges, we are turning a new page in our journey. It’s with great enthusiasm that we announce Sandra Largaespada is stepping into the role of Interim Executive Director at Global To Local.

Sandra brings to the table an impressive repertoire of organizational leadership skills, strategic vision and operational skills. Her experience and insights are invaluable, especially as we navigate through our most pressing issues.

Her immediate focus is to reinforce the foundations of our organization, ensuring that every team member is empowered and every process is optimized for efficiency. Sandra’s approach is holistic – she understands that the strength of Global To Local lies in the collaboration between our partners, funders, vendors, and clients.

We want to extend our heartfelt thanks to each one of you for your patience and continued support during this phase. Your belief in our mission fuels our efforts, and we are eager to move forward with renewed focus under Sandra’s leadership.

In the coming weeks, Sandra plans to engage directly with many of you, understanding your perspectives and discussing the way forward. We are confident that her leadership will not only guide Global To Local back on track but also propel us towards greater achievements.

We are enthusiastic about this new chapter and are certain that with Sandra’s leadership, our journey ahead will be impactful and inspiring.

Thank you for being a part of our story. Let’s continue to make a difference together!

Warm regards,

The Team at Global To Local

The Digital Marketing Manager is responsible for creating and publishing a wide variety of digital media content to promote G2L’s programs and presence in the community. While this position will be involved in raising the profile of all of our programs and services, the main focus of the role is supporting our Food Innovation Network program, with an emphasis on promoting Spice Bridge and providing branding and marketing support for the food businesses participating in the program. Learn more and apply here.

FIN is excited to find their next Market Relations Manager!

The Market Relations Manager is responsible for cultivating partnerships and development of market and sales channels for businesses in the nonprofit Food Business Incubator. This position manages the development and coordination of off-site sales (outside of Spice Bridge) such as farmers markets, pop-ups, and new satellite vending locations under development and anticipated to open in 2022. FIN is looking for someone with food industry and marketing experience to support women of color and immigrant entrepreneurs to start and grow thriving businesses. Learn more and apply here.

The last year and a half has had a profound impact on everyone around the world and reshaped every aspect of our daily lives: our social connection, our family and personal life, our work life, and the vibrancy and health of our communities. At Global to Local, like many organizations big and small, we have adapted, shifted, and innovated to do our best to respond to our community’s needs. It is in times of disruption and uncertainty that we must focus on our sense of purpose and regain clarity about what we want to achieve. We worked hard to strike a balance between serving our community while also rebuilding a team that can navigate us through the pandemic and thrive in a world forever changed by COVID-19. So far in 2021, our staff have helped distribute the COVID-19 vaccine to 238 people, while continuing to educate communities about the vaccine, how to stay safe, and offer support for other needs such as housing, child care, mental health, and access to food. The entrepreneurs in our food business incubator at Spice Bridge continue to supply hot meals for individuals and families hit especially hard by the pandemic. Our team will stay ready and responsive until we get through this together. And fortunately, our team is growing! Over the last few months, we filled two positions and created two new positions to better align with our health equity goals. We are also making progress in transforming G2L’s Board of Directors to elevate new leaders who share members’ experiences in our communities in South King County.

I am thrilled to announce six new additions to our G2L family. We are excited to have two new board members and four new staff members join our team that will help lead G2L into our next decade of service to the community. Our staff additions will increase our capacity to enhance our community programs, advocacy and leadership efforts, communications, and internal operations.

Collectively, these six amazing individuals bring a strong sense of community and share our unwavering commitment to advance health equity by dismantling the conditions that perpetuate structural racism.

Please join me in welcoming Arni, Jalissa, Demmelash, Michael, Wadii’ah, and Jill.

A.J. McClure

Executive Director

New Staff Members

Michael Moore

Operations Manager

Michael (He/Him) comes to Global to Local having worked in nonprofit administration in Seattle for the past nine years. He served as part of the Development team at Seattle Opera for five years and as Operations Manager and Operations Director at Puget Sound Sage for three years. He loves the challenge of setting up and maintaining systems that help his colleagues feel taken care of while also furthering operational efficiency. He believes that respect for people’s lived experience and personal agency is the key to building relationship in work and in life. Michael is Vietnamese American but considers his status as a transracial adoptee to be the stronger part of his identity. For fun, he likes to play the guitar and the piano, play video games, read about the history of grassroots social movements, and watch YouTube videos of unlikely animal friends.

Demmelash Adera

Senior Program Manager

Demmelash Adera (He/Him) joined G2L on May 17th as a Senior Program Manager. Demmelash lived in Ethiopia before he moved to the United States in late 2013. He holds a Master of Science degree from Strathclyde University, United Kingdom and a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics from Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia. Demmelash has over 20 years of non-profit experience from around the globe. He worked in several countries in Africa and Asia in an advisory and management role.

Demmelash brings his extensive experience to the G2L team to support G2L’s community partners and empower our diverse communities to advance health equity the South King County.

Wadii’ah Boughdir

Communications Manager

Wadii’ah (He/Him) is born and raised in Tunisia, and moved to Seattle in late 2015. Wadii’ah worked on different visual storytelling projects including filming and producing stories for the UW’s Center for Human Rights that exposed ICE deportation machinery; developed stories about salmon recovery and other environmental initiatives in King County. Wadii’ah comes with an experience with non-profit work in Seattle and North Africa. He helped IRC in Seattle expand its educational outreach; and co-founded a nonprofit in his home country Tunisia, to spread debating culture and boost civic engagement in the MENA region. In 2020, Wadii’ah obtained a master’s degree in communication in communities and networks from the University of Washington. He’s fluent in Arabic and French language and culture. Wadiiah’s hobbies revolve around soccer, running and biking, and exploring the outdoors.

Jill Kong

Healthy Communities Organizer

Jill Kong (She/Her) is an immigrant trans-woman, who moved to the Puget Sound area from Nanjing, China in 2013. She started her Community Organizing career in 2018, and has since been a part of various social justice campaigns including responsible gun law reform, affordable healthcare, housing justice, and mass liberation. She has also led two successful voter outreach programs for the 2020 WA Democrats Coordinated Campaign, including one that focused on AAPI civic engagement and voter outreach.

During her off time, she enjoys reading, traveling, hiking, and backpacking.

New Board Members

Jalissa Horton

A native of the greater Seattle area, Jalissa (She/Her) fell in love with Culinary Art when she was only a teenager. She pursued her passion and graduated from Johnson & Wales University and Florence University of the Arts in Italy. Jalissa currently resides in the city of Tukwila. In 2019, Jalissa decided to launch her own catering company Chef Jalissa Culinary Co. That same year she became a member of the Food Innovation Network program.

As an entrepreneur, Jalissa brings her passion for serving the community and advocating for food equity and access for the low-income and communities of color. She looks forward to sharing her experience and knowledge with the Global to Local nonprofit organization.

Arni Villanueva Carullo

Arni (She/Her) is a Business Director at HealthPoint SeaTac with over a decade of experience in managing healthcare professionals and working with community partners and leaders. She is a certified lean process improvement trainer and has traveled across the country to coach other healthcare organizations to improve quality and access to care. Prior to joining HealthPoint, Arni served as an ambassador at the Federal Way Chamber of Commerce. She also worked at Virginia Mason Medical Center for 14 years and led multiple initiatives to improve patient care.

She immigrated from the Philippines 23 years ago. As an immigrant, understanding and addressing the social determinants of health became her top priority. Her two years working in a community health center opened her eyes about the barriers to access care that many in the underserved communities face every day.