SDFSC TA Consultants

Consultants who work with SDFSC grantees have had extensive involvement alcohol, drug, and violence prevention, youth development, and data driven and outcome-based planning, implementation, and evaluation efforts. They work for the grantee's best interest and are in communication and coordination with the CARS and ADP TA teams in meeting the needs of the grantee.

To learn more about which of our consultants will work best for your current needs please scroll down to view a full listing or click on the consultant's name to view more detailed information.


Belinda Basca, Ed.M.

Belinda Bell Basca (Ed.M. Harvard University) is a K-5 curriculum writer of Science CompanionT, a hands-on learning program that takes advantage of children's extensive knowledge of--and curiosity about--how things work in the world. As a consultant for EMT and CARS, Belinda has assisted on a variety of mentoring projects and conducted site visits for Friday Night Live Mentoring and the Safe and Drug Free Schools and Community program.

Frederick Becker

Frederick Becker's experience includes development, coordination, and management of programs dealing with substance abuse and violence issues in schools, community-based organizations, and businesses. He specializes in life skills development programs for adults and youth. His career includes working with law enforcement officers, educators, business professionals, families, and community-based organizations. His current experience includes service on various state and national advisory committees, university instructor, and consultant/trainer.

Christina Borbely, Ph.D.

Christina Borbely is a research consultant at CARS providing technical assistance to California's Safe and Drug Free Schools & Communities grantees. Also a member of the EMT team, Dr. Borbely coordinates program evaluations for El Dorado County Office of Education and San Francisco Big Brother Big Sister. Prior to joining EMT/CARS, Dr. Borbely was a member of the research staff at Columbia University's National Center for Children and Families. Her work in the field of youth development and prevention programs has been presented at national conferences and published in academic journals. Specifically, Dr. Borbely has extensive knowledge and experience in program evaluation and improving service delivery by identifying factors that impact today's young people. She is also involved as a volunteer in providing mentoring and developmental support to youth in underserved populations. Christina received her doctoral degree in developmental psychology, with a focus on children and adolescents, from Columbia University (2004).

Nikki Buckstead-Pane

Nikki Buckstead-Pane is currently the Executive Director for the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence, Sacramento Region Affiliate. She has held various positions within the prevention and treatment community including both clinical and management positions. Nikki Buckstead-Pane holds a Bachelor's Degree in Psychology from California State University, Sacramento and is a Registered Addiction Specialist, as well as and Substance Abuse Prevention Specialist, and Training of Trainers for Substance Abuse Prevention Specialist, through the Center for Substance Abuse Prevention (CSAP). Mrs. Buckstead-Pane has been employed with the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence for over five years. Her expertise in program implementation and fiscal management, along with her experience in the recovery community makes her a leader in the treatment and prevention field.

Ralph Cantor

Ralph Cantor is a teacher, counselor, and administrator for the Alameda County Office of Education. He has been in education for 30 years with expertise in prevention of substance abuse and violence and tobacco with school age students. He has Masters Degrees in Teaching, Counseling and School Administration. He specializes and trains on the following areas: Marijuana awareness and drug prevention education for practitioners (teachers, counselors, community based organization personnel) working with youth in schools; marijuana and drug prevention education for middle, high school and high risk youth; parent presentations on drug and alcohol abuse prevention for their children and communities; and all aspects of Student Assistance Programs (organization, group and individual counseling, educational outreach)

Rocco Cheng, Ph.D.

Chien-hung (Rocco) Cheng, Ph.D. is currently the Program Director at the Pacific Clinics-Asian Pacific Family Center and additionally is a consultant with the Center for Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Agency Grant Review Committee. He has over 13 years of experience in providing prevention services for Asian and Pacific Islander communities and oversees local, state, and federally funded programs. Relevant presentations include "Strengthening Chinese American Families" addressed at the Multicultural Conference in March, 2004 and "From Challenges to Triumph in Engaging Parents, the CAFEN-East Experience". Dr. Cheng is a licensed clinical psychologist and is fluent in Mandarin and Taiwanese.

Angela Da Re

Angela Da Re, Community Development Director, People Reaching Out (PRO) has 11 years of experience in the field of substance use and youth violence prevention programs as well as community mobilization. She has worked with People Reaching Out for the past eight years and contracts with various other agencies and organizations to provide prevention planning and training services to other communities. Angela has been trained in multiple evidence-based programs and has worked extensively with schools and local agencies. In addition to working on community based prevention, Angela oversees PRO's various evaluation projects, both internal and external.

(Maggie) Rebecca Escobedo-Steele

Rebecca Escobedo-Steele specializes in youth and parent leadership training and victims' resource training, as well as, community mobilization projects to deal with alcohol, substance abuse, and domestic violence and healing. She also currently coordinates a statewide youth advisory board dealing with gun violence and firearm policy. She is a certified mediator with experience in a multiplicity of fields and population groups including rural residents, Native American youth and families. She has particular expertise in working with youth around conflict resolution through a variety of venues.

Kevin Gogin

Has worked within the School Health Programs Department of San Francisco Unified School District. A licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, he has worked in a number of programs addressing the safety and wellness of students. He is District Liaison with City agencies on he High School Wellness Program, the point person for District Crisis Response, and Coordinator of Support Services for LGBT Youth. In addition, he provides training on a variety of counseling and intervention strategies for district level staff and school based teams.

Vivian M. Linderman

Vivian M. Linderman is Principal of Blue Lotus Consulting & Training, a consulting agency specializing in building organizational capacity for nonprofit corporations. Vivian brings strategic thinking to any agency seeking innovation, growth or transformation. Through her expertise agencies are able to develop and grow diverse revenue streams, strengthen organizational infrastructure and investigate opportunities for organizational mergers and partnerships. In addition to strong creative tendencies, a master's in public administration and more than 30 years in the nonprofit field, Vivian has honed her consulting skills through training in Appreciative Inquiry and the Peter F. Drucker Self-Assessment Tool for Nonprofits as strategic planning tools, Strategic Solutions/LaPiana approach to facilitating and implementing organizational alliances and the Raising More Money model of building a sustainable funding base.

Melinda Moore

Ms. Moore is the Sole Proprietor of M. K. Associates, and formerly a Senior Associate at Polaris Research and Development, Inc. She has over twenty-five years of consulting experience in San Francisco, CA and Washington, D.C. She is skilled in survey research, program development and design, quantitative and qualitative data analyses, evaluation, organizational analysis, and training and technical assistance to public and private agencies. Ms. Moore is experienced in the design and conduct of program evaluation and public policy research. She has served as Principal Investigator and Project Director for a variety of state, local and national contracts in such diverse fields as tobacco prevention, alcohol and drug treatment and prevention, HIV/AIDS, juvenile justice, education, museum management, aging, and child welfare.

Paul Nolfo

Paul Nolfo has over 20 years experience as an executive administrator. He has held the Executive Director position with Catholic Social Services and People Reaching Out. Mr. Nolfo provides financial analysis, strategic planning and coalition building for nonprofits and government agencies. This includes workshops and technical assistance in these service areas in addition to development of capacity building and sustainability plans. A partial list of clients include: Solano County Health and Social Services; Napa County Prevention and Youth Treatment Services Unit; Child Abuse Prevention Council of Placer County; Shakti Rising (a recovery program for adolescent girls and young women); Yolo County Court Appointed Special Advocates. He was the Chief Financial Officer for the California Academy of Sciences, Asian Art Museum, American Diabetes Association in California and Girls and Boys Town of New York. Mr. Nolfo also held the position of Director of Management Information Systems for the National Office of the American Diabetes Association. He has a Bachelor's degree in Business Administration from Pace University in New York City.

Tamu Nolfo, Ph.D.

Tamu Nolfo is a certified substance abuse prevention specialist with over 10 years of experience working in grassroots coalitions and non-profit organizations. Her degree is in sociology, with an emphasis on social inequality, from the University of California, Santa Cruz. Ms. Nolfo is a nationally recognized fellow in the Robert Wood Johnson Foundations Developing Leadership in Reducing Substance Abuse Program; Graduate Research Mentor Fellowship, University of California, Davis; recipient of the Harold Cole Memorial Award for exemplary leadership in the field of substance abuse in Sacramento County; member of the Prevention Advisory Task Force for the California ADP and Chair/Technical Assistance Workgroup as well as mobilizing eleven agencies providing prevention services through a four year Technical Assistance Coalition that has ensured comprehensive, research-based programming with measurable outcomes throughout Sacramento and has served as a model for strengthening prevention nationwide.

Dustianne North

Dustianne North has provided training and technical assistance since 1997 through CARS/EMT Associates. She specializes in assisting prevention programs and large-scale collaborative efforts which serve youth in distressed situations, as well as community-driven and grassroots efforts. Ms. North has completed her M.S.W., and is now a doctoral candidate in Social Welfare (UCLA). She draws upon her diverse experience and training to work with direct practice issues such as communicating with youth, as well as macro-level issues, program design, and interagency partnerships.

Chuck Ries

Chuck Ries has been exploring the nature of the relationship between drugs, the individual, and society for the last 40 years. In that time he has created effective cutting edge programs in residential drug treatment, with street youth in housing and drop in centers, with adults and families in shelters and transitional housing, and for the last 11 years worked in schools around the San Francisco Bay Area. In that time, he has taken what the youth have taught him and created trainings and programs based on this respectful student centered, low threshold service delivery model. He is currently involved with various schools and in a number of projects that further move the discussion about how to engage young people in fruitful discussions about rugs/alcohol to a national scale.

Jim Rothblatt

Jim Rothblatt, MFT, retired from public education after more than 30 years experience. 29 of those years were as a School Counselor and as a Student Assistance Program (SAP) Specialist. He was recognized as the Student Assistance Professional of the Year in 2006. Jim also has 25 years experience of clinical counseling experience, much of it working with Vietnam veterans, working a family systems approach with special emphasis on the issues of education, employment, depression and Post Traumatic Stress. As a consultant, his experience includes, but is not limited to: field colleague for the California Department of Education (Title IV); trainer of Prevention Specialists for County Substance Abuse Prevention; consultant for a County Office of Education, Safe Schools Unit; technical assistance to county prevention providers and school districts on the Brief Risk Reduction, Interview and Intervention Model (BRRIIM). Jim has also developed innovative school and community-based education and prevention programs, some using already existing resources with no additional funding needed. He is currently Executive Director of the non-profit, Incight (www.incight.org) Palm Desert, California and is owner of Redleaf Resources (www.redleafresources) a certified Disabled Veteran Business Enterprise.

Janis Ryan

Jan Ryan is a consultant coming from the field of education but with experience in multiple systems, she has become a "translator" between systems. Although employed by one school district for 29 years, only the first four were in a traditional teaching job. Every year after 1981 has resulted in jobs never done before either in structure or in content. Jan has been consulting locally, regionally, statewide, nationally, and internationally due to the flexibility and generosity of the Desert Sands Unified School District which contracted out her services. Her first language was public education at the site, district, county, and state levels. In Micronesia as a consultant for the Attorney General, she learned more about cultural competency, community engagement, and developing services for the whole community, those at risk, and for individuals in need. Working side by side with a countywide School Resource Officer, she learned some of the basic language law enforcement. Currently Jan is consulting with the Riverside County Department of Mental Health department and Substance Abuse Programs, to assist with the Strategic Prevention Framework and the re engineering of the continuum of care. In every setting, the teamwork and programs Jan facilitated are sustaining. Thanks to mentors and experience, Jan sees opportunity where others see scarcity.

Ira Sachnoff

Ira Sachnoff is an experienced trainer and administrator. He has worked as an executive director, and program manager. His work as an administrator and consultant has revolved around the issue of developing peer resources programs. He has provided training and consultation on HIV/AIDS, safe schools, tobacco, alcohol and other drugs prevention as it relates to the development of peer resources. He has extensive experience in program development, supervision, management, inter-agency collaboration, etc.

Stacey Savelle

Stacey Savelle is currently a Commissioner with the Los Angeles County Commission for Children and Families. Ms. Savelle retired from the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services in March 2004, after almost 35 years of providing social work and holding management positions for a variety of programs administered by that Department. She earned a BA/BS degree from UCLA and did graduate work at the University of California, Los Angeles School of Social Work. She has made presentations nationwide on issues affecting child safety, humor in the workplace, health care, mentoring system-involved youth and transitional issues. Her passion and expertise is transition aged youth, mentoring and youth empowerment.

Kerrilyn Scott-Nakai

Kerrilyn Scott-Nakai is currently the Director of Operations for the Center for Applied Research Solutions and Project Director for the Safe and Drug-Free Schools and Communities Technical Assistance Project. She has over 12 years of progressive experience conducting research and evaluation projects focusing on ATOD and violence prevention services for youth and their families-with an emphasis on school-based programs. Ms. Scott-Nakai has worked at the local, state, and federal levels. She has overseen several local and statewide evaluation projects (including the California Friday Night Live Mentoring Project, the California Youth Council, and the Orange County On Track Tobacco Free Communities Project) and has substantially contributed to the management and design of large-scale multi-site federally funded prevention studies (including Project Youth Connect and the Mentoring and Family Strengthening initiative). Before joining CARS, Ms. Scott-Nakai conducted school safety research as a consultant for the Florida Safe and Drug-Free Schools Program and the Florida Safe Learning Environment Data Project (a three-year longitudinal study). During this time, she provided technical assistance and support to SDFSC Coordinators regarding evaluation and measurement issues. Additionally, Ms. Scott-Nakai taught a Theory of Measurement course at the University of Florida for two years.

Jerry Sherk

Jerry Sherk M.A., is President and founder of Mentor Management Systems, of Encinitas, California. Jerry has a masters in counseling psychology, and he brings much experience gained from providing technical assistance and training to both adult and youth-based prevention and mentoring programs. Over the past 15 years, Jerry has assisted approximately 350 youth-serving programs. He has also authored or co-authored a number of workbooks on subjects such as youth and adult mentoring, and youth employment training. In 2007, Jerry worked under the direction of Public/Private Ventures as the Technical Assistance Project Director for the Prisoner Reentry Initiative. Jerry's duties included facilitating web-based trainings, writing training manuals for staff and for mentors and visiting 20 programs around the U.S. In addition, Jerry is the Past Executive Director of the Mentoring Coalition of San Diego County, as well as Past President of the NFL Retired Players Association, San Diego. From 1970-1981, Jerry was an All Pro defensive lineman for the Cleveland Browns. Jerry is currently working with several NFL greats to create the NFL Hall of Fame Mentoring Program, an effort will pair Hall of Fame inductees with high school football players.

Patrick A. Talbot

Patrick A. Talbot, MS, CE Coordinator and Ropes Course Director for The Ojai Foundation, and is also the founder of Celebrate Life Retreats. Since1989 Patrick has been a pioneer in developing seminars and workshops utilizing nature as a therapeutic tool, integrating experiential activities with counseling to enhance participants' physical and emotional wellbeing. His programs connect clients with the oneness of all life through wilderness experiences that challenge automatic thoughts and behavior patterns to bring about personal growth and mutual respect.

Judy Taylor

Judy Taylor, presently Project Director for the US Dept. of Ed. OSDFS, Mentoring Resource Center, is a specialist in the fields of youth development, Alcohol, Drug Abuse and delinquency prevention, juvenile justice, mentoring, and alternative health care. With more than 40 years experience, her career has ranged from providing direct service at the community level to policy development as a clinical analyst with the White House, Special Action Office for Drug Abuse Prevention. She has directed technical assistance initiatives for federal agencies including the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, the Bureau of Prisons and the Agency for International Development. Her special area of expertise is training and curriculum development. Ms Taylor also served as Executive Vice President of the National Office for Social Responsibility, a youth advocacy organization, and senior trainer for the Southwest Regional Office of Communities In Schools, the nations largest stay in school network. Judy authored the manual "Training New Mentees", Co-authored the California Community Colleges curriculum "Mentoring Foster Care Youth", and is the creator of the Two By Two Mentoring Model. Judy helped mentoring programs throughout the country as a consultant with Northwest Regional Education Lab's, National Mentoring Center, which supported the U.S. Department of Justice mentoring initiative, and in California, through the Center for Applied Research solutions.

Emily Zuckerberg

Emily Zukerberg has more than 10 years experience performing prospect research, grant writing, and program development for local and regional public agencies and nonprofit organizations. While working as a grant writer and research analyst for Goodwill Industries of San Francisco, San Mateo & Marin Counties, Emily was one of the original grant writers for an innovative collaboration with the SF District Attorney's office called Street to Work. The nation's first deferred entry workforce development alternative for first-time, low-level narcotic sales offenders, Street to Work has since become Back on Track, and is being touted as an exciting and effective restorative justice model. Emily holds a J.D. from UC Hastings and an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from Bowling Green State University. While at Hastings, she was a research assistant at the Public Law Research Institute, and a member of the Civil Justice Clinic (providing mediation services for Special Education clients). She also served as the Associate Director of the Survival Exchange Network, a grassroots nonprofit organization serving homeless African American men in the Tenderloin community, and co-founder of T.R.A.S.H., a recycling as economic development project aiming to assist the central city's homeless shopping cart recyclers to become micro-entrepreneurs.
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The SDFSC TA Project is funded by the California Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs (ADP) and managed by the Center for Applied Research Solutions (CARS).
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