Meet The Team

Executive Director, Ave Lambert (ze/zir/they/them)

Ave is a food systems changemaker with a culinary and farming background. As a seventh generation Californian, Ave has dedicated themselves to local food justice, serving as an elected member of the San Francisco Food Security task force, on several boards including the Hawai’i Food Policy Council and Slow Food San Francisco, advisory councils and committees including ShapeUp San Francisco’s Steering Committee & Equity Action Team, and organizing for grassroots campaigns like labeling GMOs, the Women’s March and the San Francisco Dyke March. In their previous roles at organizations including Farming Hope and Center for Urban Education about Sustainable Agriculture (CUESA), Ave incorporated food as medicine and sovereignty into curriculum and developed programming and funding models for eliminating food insecurity that dismantled systems of oppression like institutionalized racism, poverty, disease and mental illness.

Ave has an undergraduate degree in International Studies and Business from the University of Washington and a Master’s in Global Leadership and Sustainable Development from Hawaii Pacific University. Their Master’s thesis featured MA’O organic farm as an innovative solution to removing barriers to access in the food apartheid area of Wai’anae, Oahu.

Supportive practices for Ave include breathwork, healing and grief ceremony in community with other teachers, as well as facilitation and storytelling with groups like Real Food Real Stories, for radical self-acceptance, interconnectedness, care and real change.

Family and Community Partnerships Manager, Ana Guzman (she/her)

Ana Guzman brings years of community leadership experience to FEAST’s organizational team. Her leadership roles have included chairperson for the English Learners Advisory Committee, and chairperson for the School Site Council. Additionally, she has served as a translator, LAUSD district meetings representative, and parent board member for the Alliance Board of Directors. A graduate of the second FEAST group, Ana immediately established new partnerships with local schools and community centers, helping to spread FEAST’s programs to additional neighborhoods in South LA. She has served as a FEAST group leader, organizer and recruiter, assisted with translating FEAST's program into Spanish, and now manages the FEAST’s Community Center, broadening our programing and deepening relationships with current Group members and alumni.

Managing Director, Lauren Rejvani (she/her)

Lauren Rejvani is a Colorado native with a MA in International Development from the University of Denver and a BA in Political Science and International Affairs from the University of Colorado Boulder. She is an experienced communications campaign manager who has worked on dozens of projects for nonprofit, environmental and progressive organizations with Portland, Oregon based communications firm, Winning Mark. While completing her Master’s, Lauren worked for Namlo, an international nonprofit organization serving rural populations in Nepal and Nicaragua. While with Namlo, Lauren focused on fundraising and donor outreach as well as developing the digital infrastructure of the organization and tracking various health and development projects in Nepal and Nicaragua. In her free time, Lauren enjoys hiking in Griffith Park, doing yoga, and cooking Persian food at home.

Director of Programs, Amy Vu (she/her)

Communications and Development Manager, Shannon McDermott (she/her)

Maria Thalia Carmona, Community Health Promoter - Esperanza Community Housing