Staff

Staff

Jon Liss, Executive Director.

Jon has organized for racial and social justice in Virginia for the last 30 years. Between 1979-1981, he organized for the creation of an African American Studies department as a student at the University of Virginia. He graduated with a B.A. in History in 1981, and continued his organizing for US divestment in the South African Apartheid regime. From 1983-1984, he served as an elected leader of a taxi drivers association. In 1986, Jon co-founded Tenants and Workers United (TWU), a low-income racial and gender justice organization based in the Arlandria-Chirilagua neighborhood. Jon served as the Executive Director of TWU until 2011. In 2007 he co-founded Virginia New Majority and currently serves as both a board member and as the organization’s Executive Director. Jon and his wife Victoria have been married for 26 years. He is a father of two teenagers, and a part-time basketball coach.

Tram Nguyen, Associate Director.

Tram joined Virginia New Majority in 2008. Following the September 11th attacks on the World Trade Center, she helped fight for federal funding for a health treatment program to address the unmet physical and mental needs of rescue and recovery workers at Ground Zero. In 2005, Tram traveled to the Gulf Coast to organize the 30,000+ Vietnamese immigrants whose lives were devastated by Hurricane Katrina. For over 2 years, she directed a recovery program that assisted over 3,000 families by providing cultural and language-appropriate services, and she advocated for the sustainable redevelopment of immigrant communities and businesses in New Orleans, LA; Biloxi, MS; and Bayou La Batre, AL. Tram is an alumna of Barnard College, Columbia University and was a 2010 Lead the Way Fellow at the NYU Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service.

Rishi Awatramani, Communications Director.

Rishi began his work with VNM as Lead Organizer in winter of 2009. Prior to moving to the DC area, he was Leadership Development Director at Just Cause Oakland, an organization fighting for housing rights for Black and Latino communities in Oakland, CA. He’s worked as a community organizer with the Youth Media Council and as a union organizer for homecare providers and low-income women of color with both SEIU Local 1199 in New York and SEIU Local 715 in San Jose. Rishi is a long-time activist with several organizations. He served on the National Planning Committee of the US Social Forum, and worked with social movements in India and Southern Africa.

Phaedra Jackson, Project Director.

Phaedra started with VNM in 2009 as the Regional Field Director for the Commonwealth Civic Coalition project. Prior to joining VNM, she worked in Texas in 2008 organizing her community for the presidential primary election. Following the primary she moved on to staff a highly contested Congressional race in Louisiana. Phaedra gained grassroots lobbying and organizing experience with SEIU, PennEnvironment, Environment Florida, and the Strategic Consulting Group. She is a graduate of Southwestern University where she studied theatre and political science.Currently Phaedra works in our Richmond office as we expand our work in that metro area and on local college campuses in Norfolk and Richmond.

Sara Wallace-Keeshen, Northern Virginia Organizer.

Sara began work with VNM before the 2009 state legislative elections. In 2004, Sara worked as a field organizer in South Carolina, organizing her community to support Inez Tennenbaum, who was running to becoming South Carolina’s first woman Senator.  As a student at Georgetown, Sara organized alongside janitors and security officers to win a union and living wage on campus. After College, she worked with DC Jobs with Justice and SEIU Local 32BJ to organize security officers in Downtown DC. In 2009, Sara lived in El Salvador and worked with CISPES and the Salvadoran social movement to coordinate two delegations of international observers to support the people’s victory of president, Mauricio Funes. Currently, Sara works to build organizing committees and coordinate citizenship clinics in Northern Virginia.