Heather joined Bonnie Brae in the fall of 2020 as Director of Development and a member of the Leadership Team. She oversees the growth of all efforts to raise the resources needed to support the mission of Bonnie Brae. Presently, in addition to leading the normal cycle of board and major donor cultivation, engagement and recruitment, events, marketing/communications, appeals and grants requests, the Development Department is also responsible for leading capital campaign initiatives, including our premier Family Resource Center, the state-of-the-art Conscious Kids Cottage and the Crisis Stabilization Community Home in Chester, NJ.
Heather has over 15 years of experience as a fundraising professional. Most recently, she served as the Director of Individual Giving at Per Scholas, a national workforce development nonprofit organization that provides tuition-free technology training to unemployed or underemployed adults for careers as IT professionals. There she was responsible for implementing the individual donor-giving program, training Managing Directors on development best practices, board recruitment and development and spearheading the annual campaign. As the Associate Director of National Major Gifts for the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) she worked directly with the CEO to strategize on major gift asks of 6-figures+ and with the Senior Vice President, Growth and the Senior Director, Philanthropic Engagement to ensure the organization development staff from 28 regional offices achieved their fundraising goals of $68M annually. Heather was also the Grants and Fundraising Manager for CONNECT, Inc., a nonprofit committed to ending domestic violence and creating peaceful families and safe communities in NYC. There, she set the strategic development path for the organization and was responsible for raising $1.3M annually, board development/stewardship, execution of all federal, state and city contracts with government agencies, grant writing and reporting to all funding sources.
Additionally, Heather has served as a consultant, mentor, coach, grant writer and strategic planner for several Executive Directors, board of directors, development professionals and NPOs in New Jersey, where she had success achieving and increasing fundraising and strategic goals and the visibility of the organizations she collaborated with. Heather was an Adjunct Professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice and serves as a board member of several organizations.
Heather has a Master of Public Administration (MPA) with a concentration in Non-Profit Organization Management and a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science both from Seton Hall University. In her spare time, she enjoys spending time with her family and friends especially her life partner Marlin, their two sons, her nieces and nephews, playing tennis, expressing herself through various art forms and attending Broadway shows.
