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Staff
Libby Kyles,
Executive Director/Director of Organizational Strategy & Practice
Libby Kyles is the former CEO of the YWCA of Asheville and the founder of Changing LENS Consulting, which focuses on racial and educational equity, professional and personal coaching. A graduate of Western Carolina University, Libby spent 20 years in North Carolina classrooms while also earning her National Board Certification and completing her Masters Degree in Educational Leadership from East Tennessee State University.
While teaching, Libby co-founded Youth Transformed for Life (YTL) in 2014 and served as the Executive Director until June of 2019. Under her leadership, YTL developed two summer and after school programs, GRACE for Teens and ROSES and MOSS for elementary school students and an advocacy program to improve the communication between participants, teachers, and parents.
Libby continues to work in the community as the Chair of the Board for Asheville-Buncombe Community Land Trust and Vice Chair of the Board for Asheville PEAK Academy Charter School which opens in August 2021. She is also the Chair of The Buncombe County Women’s Commission and contributes to local social justice movements aimed at the liberation of Black people.
Jennifer Langton,
Director of Organizational Grantmaking & Philanthropic Partnerships
Raised in the upper coastal corner of Washington State, Jennifer’s passion led her to work initially in marine biology and on environmental issues, and later on affordable green building practices. She has volunteered her time over the years in grassroots organizing efforts and on various social justice issues including LGBTQ advocacy, voter access, civil rights abuses, and environmental health and preservation. Jennifer applies principles of trust-based philanthropy to her management of grant processes, in her relationships with grantee partners and other funders, and in how she advocates for more transformational systems within philanthropy. She loves researching issues and collaborating with diverse voices in order to build stronger movements of justice. Having spent much of her adult life in the South, she was engaged early in efforts to leverage and expand funding for LGBTQ equality work in the Southeastern U.S. Jennifer’s collaborative work includes Astraea’s LGBTQ Racial Justice Fund and Funders For LGBTQ Issues’ Out in the South Fund. She is a board member of community choir Womansong, and of the Movement Advancement Project, the national LGBTQ think-tank and advocacy organization. Jennifer finds inspiration from her long-time partner, her sisters, her other fabulous family members, friends, and her dogs. She loves creating and listening to music, cooking, hiking, boats and the outdoors. She lives in the mountains of Asheville, North Carolina.
Michael Hoeben,
Director of Communications
Miami-born Michael Hoeben is a queer trans man, husband, father, and human rights advocate committed to community welfare optimization by shifting how we engage and interact with human beings on all sides of this shared experience. After graduating from Boston University with a BS in Communications, Michael carved out a career as a freelance researcher/writer, which both informed and strengthened his understanding of systemic oppression strategies and impacts. This learning deepened his desire to be an active part of dismantling these forces. In 2019, Michael took the career-change leap and landed in community health where he focused on transgender health and HIV prevention/care services, education, outreach, and development. In 2020, Michael and his wife, Myela, launched OUTthINK Studio, a queer-centric digital arts studio, believing in the power of seeing and celebrating the “Other” as critical in breaking down the biases and barriers that continue to divide the human family. Michael is also the former Vice President of the Board and Community Partner Fund Director at Blue Ridge Pride. Michael’s passion is intersectional social justice work, knowing that a values-based lens is critical to correcting the systemic wrongs that continue to impede meaningful representation and inclusion for all people.
Tera Coffey,
Director of Community-Led Grantmaking
Tera Coffey kickstarted her career as an organizer focused on creating impactful messaging and building strong community-driven outreach while leading Get Out The Vote (GOTV) campaign operations during the 2016 Presidential election in Florida and the 2020 election in Detroit. Her government experience includes legislative policy analysis and strategy, communication development, and constituent and organizational relationship building in Texas at both state and county levels. She brings her passion for racial equity and relationship cultivation to her philanthropic service, consulting with Western North Carolina-based funders as a facilitator and thought partner in building grant systems and accountability measures necessary to drive deep, systemic change. As the founder of Tera Coffey Consulting, Tera offers strategic guidance in community engagement, communication, marketing, and fundraising for political and non-profit organizations. Tera holds a Bachelor of Arts in International Economics from Franklin University Switzerland. She moved to Asheville from Houston, Texas, her hometown, in search of community with her husband, Nathan, their dog, Karl Barx, and two cats, Pistacchio and Cassie. She has a passion for all things fine arts, political activism, travel, and cooking.
Zeke Christopoulos,
Director of Mindful Operations & Finance
Ezekiel Christopoulos, affectionately known as “Zeke,” has thirty years of experience spanning operations, corporate finance, nonprofit management, and Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging. In 2001, Zeke founded Tranzmission, an Asheville-based nonprofit serving the Southeast’s nonbinary and transgender community through education, advocacy, and support programs, with fierce anti-racist, social justice, and for-us-by-us tenets at the heart of the organization. He was also instrumental in launching the Asheville Jewish Community Center’s LGBTQ Jew program in 2014.
Zeke began a career in corporate finance in 2008, initially as a branch manager and then as an area manager, leading offices across Western North Carolina, Upstate South Carolina, and Eastern Tennessee. He received multiple awards for client service and community involvement. In addition to these roles, he led the Asian American, Disability, and Pride Employee Resource Groups at local and enterprise levels. Most recently, Zeke served as Vice President of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion during his last five years at a top ten US financial institution.
Zeke’s lived experience as a Middle Eastern, Jewish, queer, and transgender person has informed his passion for social justice. His work has spanned local, state, and national efforts, focusing on historically underserved and underfunded communities in the southeast. Zeke enjoys being in beloved community, traveling, biking, hiking, growing vegetables, and having culinary experiences with his spouse, Caroline, and their child, Cosima.
Board of Directors
Tuesday Feral,
Board Chair
Mx. Tuesday Feral is a neurodivergent nonbinary transgender educator, coach, counselor, and consultant who has spent the last fifteen years giving direct support to gender-diverse people in Western North Carolina. Shortly after arriving in the area in 2008, they began working with Tranzmission, an organization supporting nonbinary and transgender people, eventually founding the support programs in 2010 and serving as the director of the program for a decade, creating and facilitating support meetings, overseeing the Talya Mazuz food pantry, and connecting individuals with the resources they needed to the best of their ability.
Tuesday has also been teaching workshops and training on a local, state, and national level since 2009 and offers a unique, trauma-informed perspective to their counseling, coaching, consulting, and teaching. In their current counseling practice, they primarily support transgender, nonbinary, and gender-expansive youth, and as a supportive coach, they work with adults who are navigating transition as well as working with family members or loved ones of trans and/or nonbinary people. As a consultant, they support individuals and groups of helping professionals who want to offer more comprehensive, appropriate care to the trans and nonbinary folx they serve. With a passionate dedication to creating and nurturing supportive connections and networks for nonbinary and trans people and their families, Tuesday finds great fulfillment in working within and alongside these communities and organizations. They live with their beloved feline companion in a small cabin surrounded by delightfully overgrown gardens in Western North Carolina, and in their free time, Tuesday can be found spending time in nature, tending their gardens and plants, singing silly songs to their aquatic snail, engaging in creative endeavors, dancing with abandon, nerding out about trauma and attachment or other topics of interest, and connecting with loved ones.
Keaton Hill
Keaton Hill (she/her/hers) lives with her family in Asheville. A native of Florida, she has a Master of Divinity from Princeton Theological Seminary and, over the last dozen years, has worked with various religious, nonprofit, and educational organizations in WNC. Now at Southern Dharma, a Buddhist Retreat Center in Spring Creek, NC, she collaborates with her human, flora, and fauna peers to practice verbal and somatic communication, connective conflict, and creative power-sharing for the sake collective well-being. Keaton delights in mindful movement practices, experiential-learning in community, and conversations that surprise.
Keyla Estrada
Keyla Estrada is originally from Cuernavaca, Morelos, Mexico. She migrated to Asheville 10 years ago and is now a preschool teacher and a tutor in an after-school program in her community. Keyla’s mission with this program is to encourage kids to speak Spanish so they don’t forget their native language and part of their roots. She also volunteers with various grassroots groups in her Emma community, like CIMA, El telar, PODER Emma, and Raíces. Since arriving in Asheville, Keyla has been involved in community work, supporting children, youth, and community members.
Kit Molina-Nauert
Kit Molina-Nauert is active in local movement and community work, with a particular focus on racial justice and affordable housing. Most recently, Kit has worked at the Asheville Buncombe Community Land Trust and the Racial Justice Coalition. She has volunteered with CoThinkk, Code with Asheville, WNC AAPI, the Keep it Moving Coalition, Just Economics Affordable Housing Strategy Team, the Montford & Stumptown Fund, Arms Around ASD, and other local social justice-driven organizations. A resident of Western North Carolina for 25 years, Kit feels rooted and committed to this land and people. When not in community, Kit spends most of her time dancing bachata, salsa, and cumbia.
Mike Holmes
Mike Holmes (they/theirs) is a dynamic and dedicated multidisciplinary artist from Asheville, NC. Growing up in the area, Mike witnessed the resilience of Appalachian communities firsthand; these experiences inform their community work practices and philosophy. Mike’s advocacy focuses on inclusivity, drawing from their diverse background to support and amplify marginalized voices. At Tzedek, Mike continues challenging white supremacy by centering systematically marginalized communities, believing in the power of creative vision to foster meaningful change.
Robert Kline
Born in Columbia, South Carolina, Robert Stuart Kline, MD, carved a life out of a passion for community health and wellbeing. After earning degrees in naturopathic and allopathic medicine and completing his family practice residency, he worked in Madison County for 3 years. Then, following an obstetrical fellowship at Mountain Area Health Education Center, he co-founded Community Family Practice in Asheville.
Over the last 30+ years, his service has taken many forms, including as the Vice Chief of Staff and then Board member at Mission Hospitals, a board member and active participant of the Social Action Committee at Congregation Beth Israel, as well as a dedicated volunteer with Asheville Buncombe Community Christian Ministry, Western Carolina Rescue Mission, Habitat for Humanity, and Asheville GreenWorks. He devoted countless hours to door-to-door canvassing throughout Western North Carolina as well as leading phone bank trainings for the Buncombe County Democratic Party.
Breathing faith to life through social action, Robert champions environmental and social justice efforts by energizing precincts through voter engagement, education, and activism. When he’s not turning wooden bowls, nurturing his garden/orchard, or hiking the WNC mountains, Robert is reveling in adventures with his four grandkids disguised as childcare or playing a quick game of Rummikub with his beloved wife, Kathie.
Ron Katz
Ron Katz’s background is in community organizing and nonprofits. His last paid position was as Community Fund Director for the United Way of Asheville and Buncombe County; he retired in the summer of 2016 after 17 years. Ron currently focuses much of his time on issues of social justice.
He created and administers the WNC Social Justice Advocacy Guide website which connects those interested in social justice public policy with nonpartisan organizations working on eighteen social justice issues in the mountains of NC. Ron has edited several e-newsletters addressing various issues with a focus on voting. He currently edits a Social Justice e-newsletter for WNC. Ron’s affiliations include being a member of the Common Cause NC state advisory board and the lead for the Carolina Jews for Justice West chapter for Democracy Rights.
Ron moved to Asheville in the summer of 1996 from Buffalo, NY, and is grateful to live in such an inspiring and caring community. He is married to his wife Sharon and has two stepdaughters and one grandson. When not involved in social justice work, he enjoys the outdoors, including playing tennis, gardening, and hiking.
Founder and Funder
Amy Mandel
Amy was born into a Jewish family in Cleveland, Ohio in the early 1950s. She moved to the Boston area to attend Brandeis University and stayed in the area for 32 years. Her first exposure to social justice activism came through reading about the resistance to the Holocaust in the fifth grade. Throughout Amy’s college years she was involved in anti-Vietnam protests. She participated in the second wave of the U.S. women’s movement and the growing post-Stonewall LGBT movement. In her philanthropic work, Amy has become increasingly focused on efforts to build bridges and alliances between and among communities that have traditionally been at odds. This focus includes following the lead of grassroots organizers and supporting efforts that amplify voices and issues of those most harmed by unjust systems. Amy moved to North Carolina to pursue medical treatment in 2001, has never regretted it and feels firmly planted. These days Amy enjoys spending time with her friends and family, enjoying better health that is enabling her to be more present in the community, and singing with her beloved women’s chorus, Womansong of Asheville.