Practitioner-led.
Community-rooted.
Mission-driven.

Sandra Chavez spent 25 years in the United States Army — serving in Bosnia and Iraq, earning the Bronze Star, and building a career defined by service to the people around her and the communities she returned to. She holds a Master of Public Administration from the University of Colorado Colorado Springs, which is where she put down roots and where she intends to stay.

Sandra joined RHSH because she spent a career watching what happens to military families when command structures end and civilian support structures don't begin — and because she knows from personal experience how isolating that gap can be. As Board Chair, she brings the moral authority of a decorated combat veteran, the policy knowledge of an MPA, and the community grounding of someone who chose Colorado Springs not as a posting but as a home.

School psychologist with 14 years of practice in Colorado Springs and Pueblo school districts. Dr. Reyes grew up in a military family — her father served two decades in the Army — and watched firsthand how a parent's invisible wounds can reshape a teenager's entire development. She pursued school psychology specifically to work with the population she grew up alongside: military-adjacent kids who carry things they have no language for.

Dr. Reyes oversees RHSH's teen resilience curriculum and program design. She is fully bilingual in English and Spanish and brings deep knowledge of the Latino military family community — one of Colorado Springs' largest and most underserved populations.

Jim Kowalski served 22 years in the United States Marine Corps and has spent the decade since building bridges between Colorado Springs' military and civilian communities. He runs a peer support network for veterans in El Paso County and knows the gaps in Colorado's veteran support infrastructure better than almost anyone — not from research, but from personally navigating them alongside hundreds of veterans.

He met Garrett Robinson through a peer support group in 2022 and quietly became a steadying presence in Garrett's recovery. When Amanda asked him to join the board, he said yes immediately. His network opens doors in the veteran community that no outside hire could touch.

Denver-based nonprofit accountant with nearly a decade of experience in organizational finance, grant compliance, and restricted fund stewardship — most of it spent at The Denver Foundation, one of Colorado's largest and most rigorous philanthropic institutions. Priya joined the board after hearing Amanda speak at a women's leadership event in Denver — and stayed because she believes that good missions fail when financial infrastructure fails first.

As Treasurer, Priya manages dual authorization controls, monthly reconciliation, and restricted fund tracking. She is the reason every major funder who reviews RHSH's governance walks away satisfied.

Licensed psychologist with more than seventeen years of clinical experience in trauma, PTSD, and child and adolescent mental health — practicing out of Pueblo, forty-five minutes south of Colorado Springs. Dr. Cappa-Meléndez leads Pueblo Pioneer Psychology and has spent his career treating the military-adjacent populations that most clinical practices are not equipped to serve. He is bilingual in English and Spanish, and brings deep cultural fluency to the Latino military family community that makes up a significant share of RHSH's families.

He joined RHSH's board because he was tired of referring military families to organizations that weren't equipped for the complexity of their situations. He oversees clinical quality, ensures RHSH's programming is trauma-informed, and provides the clinical backbone that larger funders require before committing significant grants.

Diana Tsosie is a community organizer and family advocate rooted in Colorado Springs with deep connections to the Indigenous military community — one of the most overlooked veteran populations in America. Native Americans serve in the U.S. military at a higher rate per capita than any other demographic, yet receive among the lowest levels of culturally appropriate support upon return.

Diana spent eight years working with the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless before pivoting to military family advocacy after her nephew, a Navajo Nation veteran, returned from Iraq with no culturally competent support available to him. She joined RHSH because it was the first organization she had encountered that understood the intersection of military trauma, family systems, and cultural identity.

Cole Whitfield served six years in the U.S. Navy before building a career in corporate development and philanthropy in Colorado Springs. He currently serves as Director of Community Partnerships at a leading Colorado healthcare system and sits on the CSR committees of two regional corporations — which means he has direct access to the budgets that fund organizations like RHSH.

Cole bridges two worlds that most nonprofits treat as separate: veteran credibility and corporate access. He joined RHSH because he knows what it feels like to come home and realize the civilian world has no framework for what you've been through — and he is committed to ensuring every organization he supports has the resources to change that.