Jim Eagle, Board Chair has been a volunteer board member for BAAITS for 12 years. He has been a grant writer, event fundraiser, regalia maker and Powwow Co-Chair. He has been a board member of several non-profits in the Bay Area. He is a member of the Sisseton Wahpeton Oyate, a Dakota tribe. Jim is also a USA Boxing Coach.

 

Miko Thomas, Board Treasurer has been a board member for BAAITS for over 20 years, including 5 years serving as a Co-Chair and is one of the founders of the BAAITS Two-Spirit Powwow. Miko had brought on many special projects to BAAITS from Native American Poetry, Art Exhibitions, Traditional Dance Classes, regalia making, and collaborations such as Shake The Feather in partnership with the Native American Health Center and Native American AIDS Project. Miko has been a board member of several nonprofits in the Bay Area such as the GLBT Historical Society, The Ducal Court of SF, NAAP and the HRC Committee. Miko is an enrolled member of the Chickasaw Tribal Nation. Miko is currently the President of the Board for the Ducal Court.

 

Morgan Wallace, Board Secretary, (Chickasaw/Sac and Fox) was born in Ada, Oklahoma, where she later ventured to California after a brief time in the military. Morgan works with the arts of music, acting, and screenwriting.

 

Dr. Roger Kuhn, former Board Secretary is a Poarch Creek Two-Spirit Indigequeer soma-cultural activist, artist, sex therapist, and sexuality educator. Roger’s work explores the concepts of decolonizing and unsettling sexuality and focuses on the way culture impacts and informs our bodily experiences. In addition to his work as a licensed psychotherapist, Roger is a faculty lecturer of American Indian Studies at San Francisco State University. He is a board member of the American Indian Cultural Center of San Francisco, a board member and community organizer of the Bay Area American Indian Two-Spirit powwow, and a member of the LGBTQ+ Advisory Committee of the San Francisco Human Rights Commission. In 2022, Roger was featured in the Levi’s Pride campaign. He is currently writing his first book, Soma-Cultural Liberation, which will be published by North Atlantic books in 2024. His latest music project Mvto (pronounced Muh Do) will be released in 2023. www.rogerjkuhn.com

 

Javier Stell-Fresquez (Piru & Tigua Pueblo ancestry, Mixed Chican@) grew up in El Paso, Texas, and moved to The Bay in 2018. Almost a decade volunteering on the BAAITS Two-Spirits Powwow Committee has led to her producing Weaving Spirits Festival of Two-Spirit Performance with Miko Thomas. Her artistic work includes Mother the Verb, and Chaac & Yum, a short art film currently showing in film festivals internationally (culmination of a dance project by the same name). As a Native Launchpad Artist of the Western Arts Alliance, she is connecting with Indigenous and allied venues and producers to connect and strengthen relations across Turtle Island. He hopes to work with our circle of BAAITS community leaders to build an ongoing space of two-spirit life and decolonizing for all the children coming after us.

 

Faun Harjo (he/him) is a transmasculine/Two-Spirit artist who was born and raised in Oklahoma of the Muskogee Creek and Chickasaw Nations. Fauns Art is graphic, installation and video work. Now residing in San Francisco, he performs amongst his peers and family.

 

Susana M. Cáceres is a queer embryonic immigrant, made in El Salvador and born and raised in Pico Union and South Central, Los Angeles, CA. She is of Pipil, Maya and Lenca indigenous ancestry. She speaks her truth trough poetry, drum, song, dance and film. Susana earned a M.A. in Latin American Studies with a concentration in Women's Studies from the University of California, Los Angeles and completed her undergraduate studies at Cal State Long Beach majoring in Human Development and minoring in Spanish. She’s worked in nonprofits since she was 16 and held the position of Executive Director for two women’s nonprofits. Most recently, serving as ED for 4 years at El/La Para TransLatinas, a nonprofit organization for Latin American transgender women (translatinas) in the Mission of San Francisco. Currently she works as a coach and donor advisor and she does transnational solidarity work with the women of the U’wa tribe in Colombia via Mujer U’wa, an organization she runs with her friends. In coaching, Susana emphasizes self-wisdom, self-love, grounding and abundance in supporting her client’s purpose.

 

Crystal "xtal" Azul Barajas Barr is a mestiza queer femme artist, curator, and educator, with indigenous roots in Mexico and so-called San Antonio. They were invited to sit at the BAAITS Drum 2016 and are honored to support as co-drum keeper of the drum We'wha.  Xtal is the current co-curator of the annual National Queer Arts Festival visual art exhibition.

  

Ruth Villasenor, Emeritus Board Member, a Chiricahua Apache, Mexican woman who identifies as Two Spirit, has been a member of BAAITS for 20 years and recently retired. A Traditional Indigenous Values filmmaker, a community activist, and KQED 2003 local hero, Ruth continues her life-long commitment to bridge communities, bring cultural awareness to non-natives and continue helping Native communities remember traditional roles of multiple genders before colonization. The former co-owner of Paws & Claws, an Oakland-based Natural Pet Food Store, voted Best Pet food store in 2017 Ruth and her wife Diane sold their business in 2018 to retire in the sun.

 

Ken Harper, Emeritus Board Member, (Cherokee) also known as drag persona Kenya Pfister began performing with the Brush Arbor Gurlz from the first show when they came together in 2004 until today. Ken created the AIDS Through Native Eyes Art Exhibition (A 25 Year Retrospective of the Native American Response to AIDS through Poster Art) that was shown first in San Francisco in 2005 and later in New York City in 2007.

 

James Brandon, Non-Voting Board Member
As the first ally to be asked to participate on the BAAITS Board, James Brandon provides expertise in writing and fundraising efforts. James Brandon produced and played the central role of Joshua in the international tour of Terrence McNally’s Corpus Christi for a decade and is co-director of the documentary film based on their journey, Corpus Christi: Playing with Redemption. He’s the co-founder of the I AM Love Campaign, an arts-based initiative bridging the faith-based and LGBTQ2+ communities and has served on the Powwow Steering Committee for Bay Area American Indian Two-Spirits (BAAITS) in San Francisco, before joining the Board. Brandon is a contributing writer for Huffington Post, Believe Out Loud, and Spirituality and Health Magazine, and his Young Adult novels, Ziggy, Stardust & Me, and The Edge of Being are indie bestsellers.