who we are
Equitable Giving Circle (EGC) was founded by Black women and femmes with the perspective that true equity exists in intersectional leadership that centers Black women.
EGC Team + Staff
aj mccreary, co-founder + Executive Director
AJ McCreary, a lifelong Portlander, historian, and a community activist who has been working locally on and off her entire life. She specializes in marketing strategies and fundraising through an Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion lens. AJ is unapologetic in her advocacy and focus especially when we are discussing resources and the economic impact of systemic oppression.
Equitable Giving Circle was born out of a desire to create a model of resource distribution that is not rooted in white supremacy and transactional giving. AJ is deeply passionate about mutual aid and giving with no strings attached; she also knows that to be truly successful, an organization must be led by the people who are in community with the people being served. AJ’s bachelor in African American history and, equally as important, her lived experience coming from a working class, interracial family in North Portland has informed the full range of her work. AJ is a visionary and champion of leaning in locally for big change and immediate impact.
Lillian green, co-founder & Community Wellness Director
Lillian M. Green is co-founder and Community Wellness Director for the Equitable Giving Circle. She has worked as a teacher, school district leader, professor, and state agency director. She led the integration of equity and inclusion work into the early learning system for the state of Oregon as the Equity Director of the Early Learning Division.
Lillian has 10+ years of experience in the field of education and equitable policy development. Ms. Green is working towards her EdD in Education Leadership EdD, interested in exploring how critical consciousness is developed and cultivated in agencies as a tool to create equitable practices, policies, and procedures. Ms. Green views her life’s mission as one in the service of children and families. She believes that every child has the right to access high-quality education. To make this possible, she believes that we all have to critically analyze the systems that we operate in and interrupt institutional racism and oppression that cause and perpetuate disparate educational and health outcomes.
As Lillian expands her areas for support and focus, she has returned to her roots in supporting our youngest members of our community through her culturally specific and gender expansive birthwork and lactation education through the development of EGC’s Healthy Families, Healthy Births program. This program works with pre and postpartum Black mothers and Black birthing individuals.
Lillian was born and raised in Portland, OR, on N. Williams Ave, in a historically Black community. She is a board member of the Oregon Black Pioneers, loves hiking, and is fascinated by both history and social systems.
Tamar green, csa director
Tamar Green has a Bachelor of Science in Human Development and a Master's in Business Administration. Tamar has worked in multiple fields, from human and business systems director to a Certified Nursing Assistant. She has experience with company budgets, financial planning, and writing grants. As a seasoned medical professional, she has worked with all ages and in different facilities. From assisted living, nursing homes, and Alzheimer's units to acute hospitals in California and Oregon for 14+ years.
She is versed in human growth and development and understands physical, behavioral, cognitive, and emotional growth and change. Add that to her strengths based on ethics, responsibility, communication, and empathy. This allows her to stay people and community-centered while giving the families she works with the support they need in a respectful and dignified way. While her love for helping others has always been near and dear to her heart, it grew when she took on volunteer opportunities with Hillsboro UCC, Doernbecher Children's Hospital, Soldiers Angels, youth basketball coach, and more.
After years of experience working with and supporting multiple communities in different ways, Tamar feels honored to focus everything she learned on the BIPOC community in Portland, Oregon. A community that she grew up in and loves. She feels her work allows her to interrupt racism and help create better opportunities for a community riddled with discriminatory policies, lack of resources, and bias.
Ivan Gutierrez, Delivery Driver
Ivan Gutierrez comes from a first generation, immigrant family from Mexico. Raised in Oregon since the age of 5 years old, with his mother and brothers, he has been working locally in Portland since 2020.
When Ivan isn’t out delivering joy by way of organic produce boxes to our community, he enjoys playing basketball, hiking with his children, working with his hands at fixing things, and being creative and bringing his unique spark of joy to all spaces.
In the past Ivan’s bilingual/bicultural, Spanish/English upbringing connected him to projects like helping first time homebuyers, providing financial education support, and navigating financial literacy. Proud immigrant roots give him a solid work ethic at EGC, and he loves being part of a team that gives with dignity to the Portland Community.
Madison Ellsworth, Program Assistant
Madison Ellsworth (she/her/hers) is a born and raised Oregonian. She has spent her young adult life earning a degree in Business Management from Oregon State University and her Masters in Pan-African Studies while attending University of Louisville, in Kentucky.
Madison is the co-founder of DAM-Change, a student-led organization on the campus of Oregon State University, that moved to educate the campus on systemic issues and be in community with the students and faculty of color. She wrote and defended her thesis titled,The Utilization of Grassroots Organizing by Black Women Pioneers to Achieve Reproductive Justice.
Creating and executing programming that the BIPOC community wants and needs rather than what people think we need is exactly what excites Madison about Equitable Giving Circle. Madison is inspired by her mom, sister, dad, and other family members who embody a communal mindset.
EGC BOARD
Rashae Burns, Board Member (Founding Member)
Rashae Lawson brings a wealth of experience working with underserved and underrepresented community members across various sectors. She is passionate about community wellness, bringing sustainable and nurturing food, and gardening opportunities to Black, Indigenous, and communities of color in the Portland area. She continues to be instrumental in uplifting urban gardening and healing through cultivating food and plants.
Rashae currently serves as the CHW Collaborative Network Program Manager for the Oregon Community Health Workers Association and is creating avenues to advocate for and fund the work of community health workers. Rashae’s deep commitment to strengthening community wellness and thriving communities in Portland drives her to address the enduring challenges of food deserts, health disparities, economic stability, and access to essential resources.
Rashae has worked with the Multnomah County Health Department and Kaiser Permanente and Growing Gardens. When not hard at work opening doors for her community, she loves creating space for her community to practice self care, self love and joy through the lens of community wellness.
Kayin Talton Davis, Board Member (Founding Member)
Creator and innovator Kayin Talton Davis’s work centers around her passion for fusing art grounded in Black heritage and culture with graphic design, mechanical engineering, community building and education. Known for her vibrant color palettes and a unique aesthetic, Talton Davis founded Soapbox Theory™ in 2001, with the mission of “Cultivating Black Joy™.”
Kayin is a current City of Portland Archives Artist in Residence, and co-artist of the Historic Black Williams Art Project and the Black Heritage Markers on NE Alberta. Her most recent permanent public installation, “We’ve Been Here” - highlighting Oregon Black women in the early 1900s, is located in the Portland Building.
Rashelle chase-Miller, Board Member (Founding Member)
Rashelle Chase-Miller is an activist and early childhood educator from Portland, Oregon. She comes from a lineage of activist educators and is passionate about changing the world by transforming the systems that impact children and families in service of an equitable, just, and peaceful future.
Rashelle is the statewide Program Director at SMART Reading and is committed to helping children across Oregon build their own home libraries and develop a lifelong love of reading. She has a BA in Political Studies and Black Studies from Pitzer College and an MS in Curriculum and Instruction with a specialization in Early Childhood Education from Portland State University.
Alice price, Board Member
Alice Price is a dynamic visual artist who explores the intersection of femininity and the Black experience through various mediums, including painting, sketching, fashion, and graffiti. Drawing inspiration from music genres like hip hop, R&B, jazz, and classical, her work encourages viewers to reconsider societal norms. Price’s art has been featured in group exhibitions across Portland, including the Portland Art Museum in 2022, and she actively participates in community events in Portland and other cities around the country.
A native of Portland, Alice has been creatively inclined since childhood, with early signs of her artistic talent found on her bedroom walls. Influenced by her grandmother, Gloria Taylor, a skilled visual artist, Alice continues to grow in her practice. After 20 years of dreaming, Alice is also a practicing doula, fulfilling a lifelong passion for supporting families through birth.
Elan Hagens, Board Member
Elan Hagens was born in Portland Oregon and a lover of all things outdoors. Especially if it has to do with wild mushrooms and animals.
She is passionate in many areas but has spent the past 13+ years sharing her love of the outdoors, art and food justice through her business Temptress Truffles. By connecting with local farmers and community members through farmers markets and events, she has been able to deepen her work in public health education, outdoor accessibility and healthy foods.
Mental health advocacy and access to healing through plant based medicines is an area that closely ties into her previous work in mycology and public health education.
In 2020 she founded a plant medicine/psychedelic collective called Fruiting Bodies Collective. Fruiting Bodies Collective was created in response to the legalization of indigenous medicines with the lack of access to the groups who steward the medicine. Fruiting Bodies Collective participates in educating the community about plant based medicine in addition to participating in state and federal policy health equity initiatives.
In addition to her love of all things outdoors she is a lover of animals and a professional fiber artist. Hiking with her dog brings her joy. She is a hand spinner who loves to knit, weave and create textiles of all kinds. She is able to tie in her love for the outdoors through botanical dyeing and foraging for materials to be used in her art. Elan loves sharing her passion for fiber arts and dyeing by teaching at retreats and hosting workshops throughout the Pacific Northwest.
Dedication to ms. v Rená allen
This Equitable Giving Circle was an idea that came out of a desperate want for immediate solutions, community engagement, and change in a radical way. From the conception of this idea, Mrs. V. Rená Allen was my biggest cheerleader and continuously asked me how it was going, how she could help and told me countless times not only could I make this happen but that it would be amazing and because of her here we are making waves of hope. It’s an honor to dedicate this project to her memory and legacy.
Mrs. Rená was a leader, community advocate, activist, caretaker, and educator to thousands. Everywhere she went, she spread love and joy. She had a way of engaging and asking questions that encouraged and supported without judgement. She could take a moment and makes it feel like hours filled with love and hope. Her smile lit up the room, her laugh melted woes, and her loving hug could make anyone feel whole. She inspired everyone to be their best selves and loved us all for who we are without pause.
Mrs. Renà leaves behind her husband, children, grandchildren, and the Portland Community.
As we mourn this phenomenal woman, let us carry her passion and work for the community and continue to spread joy and love. This work is in honor of you, Ms. Rena. Thank you for inspiring so many to be our best selves.
With love always,
AJ McCreary
EGC Co-founder and
2003 Les Femmes Debutante