Meet our board.
Dalila Adofo
Chair
Dalila was born and raised in East Palo Alto, California and started organizing at the age of 12 when she joined YUCA. Dalila was active in the campaigns that closed the Romic hazardous waste plant and in developing the community plan for future use of that site. She has worked with the California Fund for Youth Organizing (CFYO) and helped coordinate and strategize a way for the California Student and Youth Bill of Rights to be passed. She was a member of Greenaction for Health and Environmental Justice’s Board of Directors for several years and is now the lead coordinator for the Bayview Hunters Point Community Air Monitoring Project.
She is also the Southeast Community Council Coordinator for Bayview Hunters Point Community Advocates working on various environmental and social justice issues within the Bayview Hunters Point neighborhood of San Francisco, CA. She continues to support environmental and social justice efforts in East Palo Alto in any way she can. She is grateful for the opportunity to continue to support and contribute to YUCA by serving on its board.
Dalila holds a B.A. in Chemistry and minor in Geography (Environmental Studies) from San Francisco State University.
Heleine joined YUCA as a core member back in 2017 with a strong conviction to defend the work of her community elders stemming back to the 1980s. Focusing her fight on gentrification and housing displacement, Heleine worked for two years, with other core members to run campaigns on housing affordability, water equality, transportation equality, sea level rise and measure HH here in East Palo Alto. As she developed through the pipeline to become a youth organizer, Heleine dedicated numerous hours to lead campaigns in restorative justice and build solidarity within the police and community.
At just the age of 17, Heleine is now the youngest board member of YUCA, continuing to break down barriers as a young BIPOC woman actively engaging in making decisions for the growth and future of YUCA. With the skills that she was able to discover within herself at YUCA, she is now furthering her work in environmental justice as a staff at Nuestra Casa, a nonprofit here in East Palo Alto focused on building leaders who can transform our community into one where every resident thrives. She is also a part of the LEARN commission (Leading Engagement for AntiRacism, Now!) working on a year-long project to recommend new policy changes that would address and move towards a more welcome environment for BIPOC in Mid-Peninsula schools.
Heleine is attending Menlo College and studying Business.
Heleine Grewe
Treasurer
Thomas Williams
Secretary
Thomas has been an East Palo Alto resident since the age of 8 and is now a 27-year-old graduate student and Mental Health Therapist.
Thomas began as a Member at YUCA in 2007, and over the course of 4 years became a Senior Youth Organizer of the company, which worked to mentor his fellow youth through numer campaigns and social justice work. One of the most memorable moments of his time at YUCA was traveling across the country to do social justice on a larger scale than my community as a youth learning that all voices have the power to be heard and to make action occur.
He currently is working to address the social injust and interesectionality of race, mental health, and sexuality. He hopes to address the stigma associated with both the LGBTQ+ community, as well as to receiving Mental Health Services for Commnities of color. For too long systems of oppression have worked to keep people down and equality alive. This extends to the reality that horizontal oppression is a key tool of the oppressor. We must learn to love and accept our neighbor, regardless of their circumstances, in order to rise as a people. He plans to one day establish his own foundation to address these and other social justic concerns through the course of his professional career
Thomas holds a B.A in Psychology from Ithaca College and is currently completing his M.A. in Marriage and Family Therapy from Northcentral University.