Colibrí Sanfiorenzo Barnhard
Executive Director
Colibrí Sanfiorenzo-Barnhard has a background in ecology and administration. For the past 13 years, she has worked in the nonprofit sector with community groups that develop education, conservation, and cultural grassroots actions in Puerto Rico. She is co-founder of HASER. Her background in action-based field ecology research, and her experience with diverse community groups have shaped her vision for social change in Puerto Rico, which focuses on understanding that just and equitable actions done at neighborhood level can cause meaningful global change.
K. Paola González Sánchez
Co-Director | Accounting
Paola has a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras campus and a master’s degree in Agricultural Economics, also from the University of Puerto Rico, Mayagüez campus. She has experience in the administration of agricultural projects and non-profit organizations. For Paola, it is of great value to put her knowledge at the service of justice and social equality.
Anahí Lazarte Morales
Co-Director | Communications, Strategy & Development
Anahí has 15 years of experience in Development and Communications for non-profit organizations. She holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of Puerto Rico and a master’s in communication from the University of Illinois in Chicago. Anahí has held roles such as News Director at Radio Universidad de Puerto Rico, Director of Development and Marketing at Our Lady of Grace School in Chicago, and Communications Manager at the Center for Puerto Rico. She has worked with various organizations, including the National Environmental Law Association, Latino Public Radio Consortium, the Kinesis Foundation, and Beta-Local. She has been collaborating with HASER since 2017.
Ury Natalia Vega
Human Resources and Accounting Officer
Natalia holds a bachelor’s degree in Communications at the University of Puerto Rico. She also has a Certification in Administration, Human Resources and Labor Relations. She joins our team after having worked for several years in administration and project management areas: creating, coordinating and directing various initiatives, many of them focused on the field of education.
Natalia Purcell Servera
Grants & Impact Manager
Natalia has experience in action-research projects in the community sector, and evaluation design and documentation. In the nonprofit sector, she has worked on research, managing impact metrics and proposal reporting, writing organizational content, and coordinating educational programs and projects.
Cynthia González Belén
Communications & Development Manager
Cynthia holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras Campus, and has completed master’s level studies in Media Research and Theory from the same institution. She studied at the International Film and TV School of San Antonio de los Baños in Cuba and took accounting courses at the University of the Sacred Heart.
After more than 20 years in Puerto Rico’s film industry, she decided to join HASER. She made this transition to contribute to a better Puerto Rico by fostering solidarity and collaboration toward more equity and social justice.
Beatriz Lizardi Casiano
Administrative Assistant
Beatriz has a bachelor’s degree from the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras campus. She is Trama’s Co-Manager and a self-taught spinner. Beatriz has been working on different disciplines with textiles since she was 11 years old. She offers spinning workshops with drop spindles using local wool and cotton grown by Trama. During that period, she created the brand Hilandera Tropical (Tropical Spinner), playing with the fact that the tropics provide fiber to spin into strong and beautiful yarns, both soft cotton and coarse wool.
Nilda Pérez Rivera
Accounting Manager
Nilda graduated with a degree in Communications from the University of Puerto Rico, Arecibo Campus. She holds a public relations certification from the same institution and a marketing certification from the University of the Sacred Heart. She joins our team with several years of experience in Puerto Rico’s advertising and film industries, excelling as a producer, coordinator, and accounting assistant.
For Nilda, working at HASER is a great opportunity to contribute her experience and dynamism to our organization, making a small but meaningful impact on the well-being and development of community groups in Puerto Rico.
Lale Namerrow Pastor
Facilities and Community Services Manager | Shared Building
Lale Namerrow Pastor is a transfeminist person. Born in Río Piedras and raised in Puerto Nuevo, with a Dominican mother and an absent father. They completed their undergraduate studies at the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras campus, in Photography and Contemporary Art History. They continued their academic training in film directing and production in New York City at the New York Film Academy. Currently, they reside in Puerto Rico, where they stand out as a musical curator in the cuir-subversive scene, an archive researcher, cultural manager, and audiovisual producer. They co-create a community network for trans and non-binary people whose gender identity or expression is masculine, La Red Transmasc de Puerto Rico. Among many other things, they are a Caribbean, activist, videographer, editor, advisor, compañere, maricónx, patx, turba, and possibly everything that fits under a quotation mark.
Collaborators
Josué Oquendo
Design Consultant
Josué was born in Utuado, Puerto Rico, in 1984. He has been a design director for different companies and firms for more than 15 years. He was a professor of Escuela Internacional de Diseño y Arquitectura of the Ana G. Mendez University, Gurabo campus. Since 2015, he is co-creator of “Letra Criolla”, a vernacular labeling documentation and cultural research project. He has been an illustrator for musical artists, the Puerto Rican film industry and for the publishers Norma, Panamericana, Editorial de la Universidad de Puerto Rico, and the book series “Barco de Vapor” by Grupo SM. He studied at Escuela de Artes Plásticas y Diseño of Puerto Rico, located in old San Juan.
Board of Directors
Melissa Armstrong
Board of Directors, President
Melissa is the Director of Interdisciplinary Global Programs (IGP) at Northern Arizona University, supporting undergraduate students to add a comprehensive international dimension to their careers through language and culture immersion. Melissa’s own background is in Ecology and Spanish. Under Melissa’s leadership the IGP programs have expanded to over 20 principle disciplines and six languages and has led to numerous partners and projects around the world. With a heart for social justice, diplomacy, and diversity in leadership positions, Melissa has always been drawn to grassroots efforts that affect positive social change.
Jonathan Frye
Board of Directors, Secretary
Jonathan has been teaching environmental stewardship and biology curricula at McPherson College since 1993. He served for 16 years as a director and secretary/treasurer of a local, non-profit utility company in McPherson, KS, and is passionate about supporting grassroots initiatives, environmental education, and outreach.
Tania Rosario-Méndez
Board of Directors
Tania is an organizer, public health professional, and human rights advocate born and raised in Puerto Rico. She combines her master’s degree in public health from the University of Puerto Rico with more than 18 years of experience in the nonprofit sector. Since 2016, she has led the historic Puerto Rican feminist organization Taller Salud, focused on reducing health inequalities, achieving gender equity, and eradicating violence in historically marginalized communities. Her goal is for health, peace, development, and wellbeing to become social guarantees for everyone in Puerto Rico. She serves on the board of directors of Puerto Rican and international organizations. Tania is also a member of the Environmental Justice Resource Mobilization Collective at the Kataly Foundation, and part of the strategy team of the Organizing Resilience coalition. She is part of the faculty of the Master’s in Cultural Management department of the Interdisciplinary Studies Program at the University of Puerto Rico. She is a theater director and teacher, a cultural and community organizer, a full-spectrum doula and a prenatal educator.
