About Us

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Who We Are

When we started Farming Hope in 2016, we began working alongside folks still unhoused, and those who had made it out. The common theme was that everyone who “got out” had responsibility and ownership at the support organizations they worked with. We called this universal principle the “need to be needed.” We mean it when we say: You are needed to build this change. Over the years we’ve hired back seven graduates to permanent staff, and continue to build a team with deeper empathy and relatable experience. Thank you to the broader Farming Hope community for supporting our team and our Apprentices.

2016

Founded at Stanford FEED Collaborative

2017

Started farmers market popup

2018

Opened restaurant at Manny’s

2019

Three graduates hired to staff

2020

Served over 50,000 community meals

2021

Opened Refettorio San Francisco

Our Team

Jamie Stark
Executive Director,
Co-founder

Andie Sobrepeña
Operations Director

Allie Schaffer
Refettorio SF General Manager

Anselmo Gonzalez
Refettorio SF
Kitchen Manager

Kerry Rodgers
Deputy Director

Haley Nielsen
Development Manager

Phil Saneski
Culinary Manager

Manolo Pizarro Briceño
Manny’s Kitchen Manager

Lisa Frare
Manny’s Front of House Manager

Vianney Trujillo
Program Manager

Jeremiah Daniel
Garden Co-Manager

Jacey Jeffrey
Garden Co-Manager

Kevin Madrigal
Co-founder, Advisor

See our careers page

Board of Directors

Shelley Dyer
Board Chair

Lyndsey Boucherle
Vice Chair

Ilana Lipset
Secretary

Michael Fu

Lucia Gaia Pohlman

Xochitl Hernandez

Sheena Jain

Savannah Schoelen

Salim Zymet

Join us in the fight

Farming Hope is different — we pay Apprentices while they learn in our program.
Paying people makes sense, but costs dollars.

Jamie Stark

Executive Director, Co-founder

Jamie Stark (Executive Director, Co-founder) worked with farmers and church workers in El Salvador from 2013-15, where he was first inspired by the model of transitional employment through farming and cooking. During graduate school in journalism at Stanford University, Jamie began researching similar programs in the San Francisco Bay Area. Farming Hope grew out of this research and partnership with neighbors experiencing homelessness and service providers. A native of Green Bay, Wisconsin, Jamie was raised next to the dairy air of big farms. He began as the gardener for Farming Hope, alongside co-founder and Bay Area native Kevin Madrigal, who was the nonprofit's first chef. Early program Apprentices described growing and cooking food as therapeutic, as tools that helped them give back and belong. This universal "need to be needed" continues to be Farming Hope's central theory of change.

Andie Sobrepeña

Operations Director

Prior to joining the Farming Hope team, Andie opened and ran her family's multi-unit restaurant and catering business, Foundation Cafe, starting in 2012. She brings with her a deep understanding of operational management and is passionate about making real change in our broken food systems. Having grown up in San Francisco, she is energized by the impact Farming Hope has on the lives of our vulnerable neighbors and the community that we will build to support them.

Allie Schaffer

Refettorio Assistant General Manager

After spending 5 years in bar and restaurant management, Allie is thrilled to bring her restaurant operations experience to serve the community. The COVID-19 pandemic reminded her of the unique opportunity restaurants have to impact all aspects of society. As a San Francisco native she is passionate about engaging the hospitality industry in community service, reducing food insecurity, and providing elevated food experiences to everyone.

Anselmo Gonzelez

Refettorio SF Kitchen Manager

Anselmo Gonzalez moved from Guerrero, Mexico to New York City to begin his career in the restaurant industry. He started as a prep cook at acclaimed seafood restaurant Esca and later moved into their pastry department. Anselmo uses his 15 years of experience from creative kitchens like Esca and San Francisco’s Coqueta and Boulevard to lead the ideation and execution of Farming Hope’s Community Meal production efforts. He finds joy in adapting recipes to use the wide variety of donated food received at the kitchen on any given day.

Kerry Rodgers

Deputy Director

For more than 20 years Kerry has worked as an educator, artist, activist, and entrepreneur. After graduating from Stanford, she began her career as an art and photography teacher and spearheaded a summer arts educational program. Kerry volunteered as an art teacher at San Quentin, and inspired by the intersection of social justice and creativity she earned an MFA in studio art where she received multiple grants to work in Haiti. After grad school Kerry co-founded the nonprofit Give A Day Global, then worked in corporate philanthropy launching new social impact initiatives at Airbnb and Salesforce. Growing up on a former lemon farm in Santa Barbara, Kerry counted chickens and compost worms as her childhood playmates. She is passionate about food justice, mentoring others, and helping everyone find ways to give back and belong.

Haley Nielsen

Development Manager

Haley Nielsen has raised nearly $8M over her decade of experience in nonprofit development, most recently in national environmental organizations. Haley grew up in kitchens and understands the power of food to create and sustain communities, learning from her father who is a chef. She is deeply inspired by Farming Hope’s vision of a more sustainable and equitable food system and looks forward to telling Farming Hope’s story to inspire more public and private funding.

Philip Saneski

Culinary Manager

Phil Saneski has worked in Michelin-Star kitchens and served on the board of the Research Chefs Association. His curiosity about ingredients considered “waste” and his passion for formulating delicious products at every scale led him to be VP of Product for ReGrained, an upcycled food start-up; then led product development for CCD Innovation, a food & bev consultancy in the Bay Area. He is an evangelist about upcycled foods and how chefs can extend their "shelf-life." Phil is a Bay Area native who has always believed in a more equitable food system and looks for any reason to host a collaborative pop up.

Manolo Pizarro Briceño

Manny's Kitchen Manager

Manolo Pizarro Briceño, Restaurant Kitchen Manager, immigrated from Chile and in the decades since has owned his own restaurant, managed production at local business Juice Shop, served as a medical interpreter, and worked as an educator and program manager for the AIDS Housing Alliance. Manolo’s unique skill set combines both culinary education and direct client services, helping ensure both high quality food and training alongside trauma-informed programming and support for Farming Hope Apprentices.

Lisa Frare

Front of House Manager

Lisa Frare, Front of House Manager: Lisa began working in restaurants as a teenager in upstate New York, and loved the opportunity to connect with people in a creative and social way. She has an enduring passion for people and food that led her career working in the hospitality industry. The pandemic changed her perspective and she wanted to be a part of something that was giving back to the community, which led her to work at Farming Hope. As a child, Lisa learned how to use a camera from her dad, and today she uses these skills today as a professional photographer. She loves taking pictures as a way to help others preserve their most important memories, and see how beautiful they really are.

Vianney Trujillo

Program Manager

Vianney comes with a background in sustainability, food, and human resources. Through this work she developed a deep interest in food equity work, the people that feed us, and the challenges often faced by those who work to bring the essentials to our lives. Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, she started a food recovery and donation program through her previous employer, Earl's Organic, distributing nearly 600 tons of produce in two years to organizations doing relief work in communities most heavily impacted by the pandemic. Establishing this program began her search for roles which would bring her closer to food equity and the people who work to expand it. She's found this in her current role as Program Director at Farming Hope. Outside the office, you can find Vianney baking, climbing, powering through complicated recipes, and doing just about anything that gets her moving and laughing (preferably both).

Kevin Madrigal

Co-founder, Advisor

Kevin Madrigal (Co-founder, Advisor) is a food justice advocate that is reimagining health with ancestral Mexican cooking. He studied public health through the lens of food at Stanford with a B.A. in Human Biology. He has staged at Michelin-starred Californios and Chez Panisse and developed plant-based menus for Schwab Executive Catering Services. Kevin believes that cooking is one of the most political and meaningful traditions we practice today, and that we all deserve the right to decide how, what, and why we eat. Kevin learned to cook the flavors of Guadalajara, Jalisco from his mother and abuela (both fans of Farming Hope dinners) in his two hometowns: South San Francisco and Zapopan. Kevin was Farming Hope’s very first chef, and continues to serve as a trusted advisor on Farming Hope’s programming and strategic vision.

Shelley Dyer

Shelley Dyer is passionate about serving people, and excited to join Farming Hope’s Board as Board Chair. She holds a B.A. in Anthropology & Sociology from Spelman College and a Masters in Education from Georgia State University. Shelley is also the Quality Assurance Manager for the Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corporation, where she previously served as Program Manager for TNDC’s Healthy Corner Store Coalition. Shelley is an ancestrally guided cook, yoga teacher and fierce food justice advocate.

Lyndsey Boucherle

Lyndsey is a Principal at Better Ventures, a pre-seed to seed stage venture capital firm based in Oakland, California. She invests in mission-driven founders leveraging science and technology to solve challenges across environmental sustainability, healthcare, and access to opportunity (education and workforce development). In addition to her role at Better Ventures, she is committed to supporting female and diverse founders and is an active volunteer and mentor to founders through All Raise. Prior to Better Ventures, Lyndsey spent over a decade in finance with UBS in Switzerland, Hong Kong, and the US. She helped launch initiatives bringing together the bank’s sustainable investing and social impact offerings, and co-led a global program sourcing financial solutions to support the UN Sustainable Development Goals. From corporates to early-stage startups, she is passionate about the role companies can play in catalyzing significant and scalable positive impact in the world.

Ilana Lipsett

Ilana Lipsett is a community design strategist and Senior Program Manager at the Institute for the Future. Her work uses participatory design and community engagement to inform future-focused policy, economic, and international development. Ilana works to create public engagement opportunities for cities, developers, NGO’s, and creative communities around the globe to help imagine and design what the future of their cities could look like. She has facilitated civic imagination processes and activated spaces to catalyze community development; she was recognized by the Obama White House as a “Champion of Change in Civic Innovation" for her work co-founding freespace, an initiative to temporarily transform vacant spaces into community, cultural and arts hubs. Ilana has led diverse initiatives on the future of work and is a skilled facilitator, leading workshops to develop long-term strategies for civic projects. She holds an MBA in Sustainable Management from the Presidio Graduate School, and is an active member of the Urban Land Institute.

Michael Fu

Michael (MD, MBA) is National Director of Behavioral Health at Hazel Health. He is a first generation immigrant, former middle school teacher, non-profit founder, and former board member of Success Centers San Francisco. He is passionate about building services, products, and partnerships that support wholistic health of marginalized adolescents and communities.

Lucia Gaia Pohlman

Lucia Gaia Pohlman is an artist, farmer, and climate justice activist. In her work consulting on climate change, she synergizes the financial, nonprofit, corporate, and public sectors to drive systemic change. Lucia has led several grassroots initiatives, including: the Rise to Resilience Challenge—a bi-state (NY & NJ) campaign that influenced climate policy on the federal and state levels; the Sunrise Movement NYC Hub—where Lucia led the political strategy and endorsements team leading up to the 2020 general election cycle, contributing to the election of 14 of the Hub’s 16 endorsed candidates into federal and state offices; and The Greenhouse Project—a community-led effort to reactivate a city block of abandoned greenhouses as a educational farm space in the Portola District of San Francisco. She's currently launching a collective farm and art center in San Luis Obispo, California with her partner, friends, and her sweet puppy Willow.

Xochitl Hernandez

Xochi is the Sustainability Program Manager at the Alameda County Community Food Bank (ACCFB), and oversees a growing Food Recovery Program that works with hundreds of local donors to ensure that healthy food does not go to waste. Prior to her work at ACCFB, Xochi worked at Fair Trade USA, ensuring the livelihoods and labor rights of agricultural farmers and workers around the globe. In collaboration with People's Programs Oakland, Xochi founded a community garden in West Oakland to serve as a sustainable food source for low-income and houseless folks in the area. She is passionate about working collaboratively to build a better food system that serves the needs of the community at every point along the supply chain and is thrilled to join the Farming Hope Board to support the amazing work done by Apprentices and staff.

Savannah Schoelen

Savannah Schoelen is proud to join the Farming Hope Board to help further their mission. Savannah graduated from University of California, Berkeley with a degree in Sociology, and minor in City and Regional Planning. She has been working at Downtown Streets Team for three years, and is now a Project Manager for their San Francisco branch. She oversees a volunteer work-experience program that supports and empowers the unhoused and at-risk population to become self-sufficient, while building a community they can call their own. She began as an Employment Specialist with DST in 2018, and cultivated a close partnership with Farming Hope during that time. Although she moved out of direct service work in her organization, she is passionate about Farming Hope’s mission and is thrilled to continue supporting their work.

Salim Zymet

Salim Zymet is a digital strategist with over a decade of experience who has helped manage multi-million dollar ad buys and raised millions of dollars online for progressive causes and candidates. Salim serves as the Vice President of Digital for Made to Save, an initiative of Civic Nation that is focused on vaccine equity and access in the communities hardest hit by the pandemic. Prior to that, Salim served as the VP of Digital for 50+1 Strategies, a bay-area based consulting firm focused on helping campaigns and causes win change in their communities. In 2016, as Digital Director for Hillary Clinton in Ohio, he managed a team of 9 staff and 5 full-time fellows that amassed millions of social media views, nearly 100,000 social media followers, 52,000 online volunteer shifts and 175,000 online event RSVPs within the 6 months of the coordinated campaign. Salim got his start in politics on the Obama 2012 campaign, where he served as a digital organizer in Southern California and Chicago in 2011. In 2012, he served as the deputy digital director in Ohio.