Leadership

Officers

Josh Steirman, Board Chair, is the Director of Government Relations at Maine Bankers Association. Prior to that, Josh was Vice President, Senior Credit Officer with Gorham Savings Bank, where he leads a team analyzing credit risk across the bank’s growing commercial portfolio.  Previously he worked in bank supervision with the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston and has served various nonprofits including as board chair of the DREAM Program, a multi-state youth mentoring organization.  Josh is an officer in the US Navy Reserve and an Afghanistan veteran.

Elizabeth Conrad, Vice Board Chair, is the lead advisor for Conrad HR Advisors, providing specialized HR support to healthcare organizations experiencing the challenges and opportunities that financial stress, mergers, and acquisitions create. Elizabeth has held increasingly responsible leadership positions for healthcare organizations over her nearly 30 plus year career. Most recently she served as system level Chief Human Resources Officer for Lahey Health for 5 years until September 2018.  Lahey Health was a $2B integrated healthcare system in Greater Boston with six hospitals, 950 beds, and approximately 15,000 employees including over 900 physician providers. Previously, Elizabeth served as the top HR executive for Saint Raphael Healthcare System in New Haven, CT, for ten years, from 2002 until 2012. Her background also includes leadership in community hospital settings, integrated delivery systems, and consulting.  She has worked with healthcare leaders in a wide variety of settings including acute care, physician practices, ambulatory clinics, nursing homes, home care and hospice, and both inpatient and outpatient behavioral health. 

Erin Diekema, Board Treasurer, is a transactional law attorney, with a practice in commercial real estate financings, acquisitions, divestitures, and leasing. Prior to practicing as an attorney, Erin was a Series 7 registered financial representative and a growth strategy consultant. Erin received her JD and MBA from UConn, where she began volunteering her legal expertise for asylum and refugee clients, which continues to be her focus in pro-bono work to this day.

 Kris Sahonchik, Board Secretary, is the Director of the Cutler Institute for Health and Social Policy and the Director of Research at the University of Southern Maine. She has more than 20 years of experience working with state and national government leaders and communities to develop long-term solutions for complex social challenges. She has authored publications on strategic planning, public agency management, and child welfare. Earlier in her career she served as Principal Investigator on two multi-year projects funded by the Children’s Bureau of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services – the National Child Welfare Resource Center for Organizational Improvement and the Northeast and Caribbean Child Welfare Implementation Center. Kris attended the London School of Economics and holds a Juris Doctorate from the University of the District of Columbia and a Bachelor of Arts degree from New York University. She currently serves as a Thrive 2027 Council Member.

Board Members

Abusana Micky Bondo was born in DRC and educated in Belgium where she holds an advanced degree in Biochemistry with research in sickle cell and also two associated degrees in Business Administration and Education.

Ms.Bondo is a business consultant and runs a non-profit, In her Presence, an organization she co-founded that is focused on empowering immigrant women to navigate the system without losing their identity and to advocate for their rights. Ms. Bondo is public elected and serves as Vice chair on the Portland Board of Education and District 1 Rep.

Sarah Emily Colby is the CEO of Colby Company LLC, which she created in 2008 with her husband Calen Colby. Colby Co. is a consulting firm in Portland, ME that offers mechanical, plumbing, fire protection, electrical, structural and civil engineering and architecture. Colby Co. has grown to 65 employees and has been named as one of the “Best Places to Work in Maine” from 2018 to 2023.

Sarah Emily has placed an emphasis on creating a corporate culture of respect, kindness and community involvement. Since its inception, Colby Co. has offered two paid volunteer days to each employee on an annual basis, representing thousands of volunteer hours in the community. Sarah Emily has organized, led and/or supported Colby Co.’s corporate volunteer initiatives benefitting an array of local nonprofits. In 2023, Colby Co. celebrated its 15-year anniversary by setting a goal to perform 1,500 paid volunteer hours in a 7-month period with its 60 employees. Colby Co. exceed its goal by performing over 1,700 hours at 30 local nonprofits with a 100% participation from employees.

Anneliese Gerland is the Senior Vice President of Consulting Operations with Chartis, a national healthcare advisory firm. Anneliese leads practice operations, business development, and strategic sales enablement, supporting execution against the firm’s growth agenda and driving improvements to the firm’s operational effectiveness and efficiency. She also oversees the firm’s research, analytics, and rural health teams. Anneliese's consulting experience includes strategic planning, merger and acquisition assessment, organizational and physician alignment, value-based care preparedness, and ambulatory operations work for leading health systems and academic medical centers nationwide. Her other experience includes conducting research on the US healthcare system at a non-partisan health policy think tank in Washington, D.C. and completion of a year- long fellowship at an international non-governmental organization in Kigali, Rwanda. Anneliese also serves on the Board of Directors for Onpoint Health Data, a nonprofit company focused on delivering independent, reliable and insightful health data solutions to clients nationwide. She holds a Master of Business Administration from the J.L. Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University and an A.B. from the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University.

Meghan Henry is a senior social policy researcher at Abt Associates in the area of poverty and homelessness. She leads studies related to family and youth homelessness, as well as evaluations of programs designed to serve people experiencing homelessness. She currently directs HUD’s Annual Homeless Assessment Report (AHAR), the nation’s census on homelessness. She is a doctoral candidate in education policy.

Jeanne A. Hulit is President and CEO of Maine Community Bank. Hulit has more than three decades of banking experience, and she also led a Maine-based manufacturer. Hulit has several years of economic development experience at the state and federal level. Her prior banking experience includes serving as President of Community Banking for Northeast Bank, Senior Vice President for Commercial Lending at Citizen’s Bank, and Vice President of International Banking and then Commercial Lending at Key Bank. Hulit worked for the Small Business Administration from 2009-2014, serving as New England Regional Administrator, Associate Administrator for the Office of Capital Access, and concluded her tenure as Acting Administrator under President Obama. She currently serves on the Board of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston and is on the board of directors at the Maine Bankers Association, The Opportunity Alliance, and Employers Mutual Insurance Company.

Frances Hutchinson is a finance and investment management professional with 30 years of experience across global technology, insurance, investment banking and investment management in the US and the UK. Prior to moving to London in 1999 where she held investment research and senior management roles at HSBC and ECM Asset Management, she held investment research and treasury positions at UNUM in Portland. She began her career in finance at Data General Corporation.  She earned an MBA from Columbia University Graduate School of Business and an AB from Bowdoin College. She is a CFA charterholder.

 In addition to The Opportunity Alliance, Fran is a trustee for the Maine Women’s Fund and serves as an Olympia’s Leader Advisor for the Olympia Snowe Women’s Leadership Institute. She previously served as a volunteer and Trustee for Dress for Success Greater London. Fran, an Aroostook County native, returned to Maine in 2020.

Bernard Kavanagh spent 22 years at WEX and prior to that spent 6 years with Enterprise Holdings. He received a Bachelor’s degree in political science from The College of New Jersey and serves on several industry related boards.

Anne LaFond spent her professional career in the cable television and executive search industry, most recently as Vice President of Candidate Development for Carlsen Resources, Inc. Anne is retired, but an active volunteer, serving on the board of In Her Presence (an organization led by immigrant women to navigate the integration and social justice process), the IHP Governance Committee, and was a lead teacher for IHP at the Portland Public Library. Since 2012, Anne has been a citizenship tutor at Portland Adult Education and she services on the Outreach Committee at St. Mary’s in Falmouth, where she is co-founder of the  "Welcome, New Mainers" program and chair of the annual Multicultural Fair. 

Ghomri Rostampour is a Kurdish American, the mother of two children, and President of Transform Education Network, working with international students obtaining student visas to study in US universities. She has two BA’s in education and computer technology from The University of Maine, as well as a BA from Tabriz University in Iran. Ghomri has held various roles within the school system as a teacher and principal.

Ghomri’s past job was as a tech leader responsible for management, maintenance, and troubleshooting for all students and staff district-wide for Portland Public Schools, Maine. During that time she was also a multilingual translator, for a total of 16 years. Ghomri worked as a multicultural childcare specialist at Child Care Connections, focusing on community outreach, referrals, training, and consumer education.

As a director of Empower Immigrant Women, Ghomri has extensive experience helping New Mainers settle in Maine. She is a Member of the Kurdish National Congress and is working on her Master’s Degree in International Relations at Harvard University.

Rebecca (Becky) Smith, through her extraordinary dedication to the mission and programs of the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), has achieved a Gold Level recognition in the NAMI Education Department’s Hall of Fame.  She has contributed enormous time and energy to a cause she believes in.  Investing in her greater Bridgton community this way has helped people build their skills, bond with others, and advocate for themselves and those they’re close to. By sharing her life experiences and guiding others, she leads by example, making an immeasurable difference in her community and ensuring people with mental illness and their caregivers have hope, a voice, and know they are not alone.

Betsy Tod and her family live in Falmouth. She and her husband own Allagash Brewing Company. Betsy is a longtime community volunteer currently serving on the Board of Trustees of North Yarmouth Academy, as a shift lead at Maine Needs, a driver for the Falmouth food pantry and works on the Philanthropy committee at Allagash. Her professional background is in sales and development.

Nina Trowbridge MD, MPH is a physician who has practiced primary care medicine in San Francisco and Portland, Maine for over twenty-five years. She majored in English at Harvard College, attended medical school at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, and completed her residency in Internal Medicine at Stanford University Hospital in California. She also holds a Masters of Public Health degree with a focus in Epidemiology from the University of California Berkeley School of Public Health.

Penelope Wheeler - Abbott is a consultant at the law firm of Drummond Woodsum where her practice focuses on education and human resource issues for the firm's school clients.  Prior to joining Drummond Woodsum, Penny spent 17 years working in a Portland-area school district, first as a middle school teacher then as an administrator, also at the middle school level.  Penny received her BA in history and environmental studies from Macalester College and holds master’s degrees from the University of Montana and the University of Southern Maine in environmental studies and education, respectively.  She enjoys spending time with her family, reading, knitting, and coaching high school ultimate.  Penny also serves on the board of a small land trust in the southern White Mountains of New Hampshire.

Please contact Lily Lynch, VP of Development & Communications - 207.523.5030, if you are interested in exploring opportunities to join TOA’s Board of Directors or a Board Committee.