Staff
stone circles Staff
Claudia Horwitz, Director Claudia works at the intersection of practice, community experience, and social change. She founded stone circles in 1995. Her previous work includes developing youth leadership, supporting struggles for economic justice, and strengthening social change organizations. Claudia practices a yogic path of awareness, on and off the mat. She lives on the land at The Stone House with her dog, Zak.
Cristina Rivera Chapman, Land-based Program Coordinator Cristina has been working in rural and urban communities around land and food for the past 9 years. She comes to the Stone House from NYC where she has been teaching farming and working with young people to build more just food systems. Cristina believes in collaborative work to address systems of oppression by creating supportive spaces for reflection, healing, and self-determination. She is driven by both a deep need and a sense of responsibility to nurture connections to the land and people around her.
Margie Hattori, Volunteer Coordinator/ Program Support Margie brings many years of organizational expertise to her work at stone circles and has a keen eye for systems, operations, and organizational structure. Her great love is creating sacred spaces for speaking from the experiences of our lives, which she does through her documentation work of activists and through group work. A writer, mother, and practitioner of Tara meditation, Margie is excited to help build a community at The Stone House that embodies the ideals of peace, respect, and liberation for all beings.
Jennifer Jackson, Operations Director, joins stone circles after 16 years in New York City, where she worked on a range of issues centered around community, staff and organizational development, internal capacity building, and personal and collective empowerment for human rights, social services and arts nonprofits. As a certified life coach and ordained interfaith minister, she also enjoys the opportunity to engage with people 1:1, as well as organize groups for spiritual and holistic experiences. Meditation, yoga, dance, Reiki and singing form the basis of her eclectic spiritual practice.
Tricia Lindley, Hospitality Coordinator Tricia Lindley is from West Texas, and after being in the area for a year of service, couldn't bring herself to leave the North Carolina beauty! Community and relationships are the foundation for her life and work, practicing a path of Servant Leadership as she goes.
Tahz Walker, Land Steward/ Farm Manager Tahz Rufus Walker is an African American farmer who has spent the past seven years working on both small farms and in community gardening and community food settings across the South. Raised in Atlanta, Georgia, Tahz has witnessed a dramatic shift in cultural food traditions as well as access to healthy food choices in many urban and rural communities that he has lived in. This has fueled his work and awareness around sustainable agriculture, ecology based education, and food justice. Tahz strives to grow food that is healthy, affordable, using sound ecological practices. He envisions a food-system where farmers come in many shapes, colors and sizes, where youth have a voice in the food they consume, and where there is honor and justice in putting your hands in the dirt. In his work at The Stone House, Tahz cultivates a 2 acre organic farm, stewards overall land use and animal care, supervises volunteers, and works to help youth and adults imagine a new ideas in their relationship to food.
Additional Support
Jesse Maceo Vega-Frey, Programs For Jesse, a life of liberation is a dance between strength and suppleness, struggle and laziness, and wisdom and love. He likes helping people explore the range of skillfulness between these and finding the sweet spots where they all just breezily come together. Jesse is an artist, war-tax resister, and a man who really just loves sitting around- which some people call meditating.
Mike Dolan Fliss, Technology A student of martial arts and Buddhism, Mike finds everything practice and sometimes finds practice play. He's particularly interested in the intersections of spiritual work and dismantling oppression, the Bodhisattva precepts and perfections, and community participation as a mirror for self development. How he's walking is as important to him as where he's going. He is sustained through practice with others in Aikido and Chen style Tai Chi and occasionally apprentices in these full-time. Mike’s a graduate of a Masters in Social Work, operates BrightRoots consulting and is currently building a house out of cob.
