Lavender Phoenix is powered by queer and trans Asian and Pacific Islander people. We are led primarily by young, trans and non-binary folks, for the entire QTAPI community. Our work is powered by volunteer members who directly understand how our lives have been shaped by different oppressions and legacies of resistance. Programs are led by leaders in volunteer committees, strategy is created by our Core Committee, and staff help to guide and facilitate our collective learning.
Staff Tina, Executive Director
Tina (she/her/ella) is a queer daughter of immigrants, born in the Philippines, raised in a working-class Black and Brown immigrant community in the South Bay of Los Angeles County. She has been living on Ohlone lands in the San Francisco Bay Area since 2000. Guided by her own experiences growing up in a working-class immigrant household, Tina has dedicated over two decades to movement-building and community work locally, nationally, and internationally. Her deep commitment to justice is grounded in an anti-imperialist and internationalist vision, rooted in the national liberation movement of the Philippines and shaped through solidarity work across borders.
Since 2004, Tina has served in the non-profit sector, and since 2007, she has been deeply engaged in grassroots organizing with organizations including the Filipino Community Center, GABRIELA, Migrante, and the California Domestic Workers Coalition. Her work centers low-income and marginalized communities of color, survivors of trauma and violence, and LGBTQ communities, always striving to confront and resolve systemic inequities. Her experience ranges from coalition and movement building to campaigns, programs and services to policy advocacy and leadership development to strategic planning, operations and organizational development.
You can catch Tina dancing and singing wherever there’s music and in the streets with her people chanting her heart out, sharing stories over home-cooked meals, trekking through nature, and living it up on adventures with her life partner Irma and her fur baby Juicy. She’s thrilled to Serve the People with her unwavering commitment to Lavender Phoenix—an organization she has admired for many years now and now gets to build power with, in movement and in love!
Meha D., Deputy Director
Meha (she/they) is a queer South Asian child of immigrants currently living on unceded Patwin land in Vallejo, California. She was born, raised, and nurtured across the southwest and midwest regions of Turtle Island until 2017 when she began to call the Bay Area home. Her early work life was rooted in centering the agency and power of young people through program design, community building, and stewarding cultures of care. Over time she began to focus on organizational development, resource mobilization, and funder organizing in order to shift systems and institutions toward more liberatory practices and possibilities. Meha is honored and delighted to join the LavNix community as our first-ever Deputy Director. In this new role, she will support LavNix staff and members to relate to each other and our resources in ways that live into our values. She enjoys spending time with loved ones, watching and learning from furry and feathered friends, and immersing herself in worlds of imagination (both her’s and other’s).
Cynthia F., Lead Organizer
Cynthia (they/them) is a queer, first-generation Chinese organizer, passionate about building new world systems and dismantling imperialism and capitalism. Born in Hong Kong, Cynthia was raised on Ohlone lands between Hilltop and Pacific East Mall, in an immigrant, working-class and religious family. These conditions set the foundation for their ongoing political journey, which brought Cynthia from being pre-med in undergrad, to organizing and power-building back home in the Bay. Cynthia joined Lavender Phoenix in 2015 as part of the Communications Committee and in 2017, the first Core Committee. Cynthia now comes directly from the frontlines of fighting for housing justice in San Francisco with organizations like the Housing Rights Committee and the Eviction Defense Collaborative. They bring a wide-range of experience in direct action, campaign strategy, policy work, and organizing for tenant unions, against evictions and for housing as a human right. As Lavender Phoenix’s lead organizer, Cynthia is excited to sow, tend and cultivate seeds of leadership and justice in trans and queer APIs for our movement. Outside of organizing, Cynthia finds joy in being outside and by water, reading, and dreaming/wondering.
Jasmin H., Community Organizer
Jasmin is a mixed race, queer, cisgender woman raised outside of Boston and re-located to San Francisco in 2005. Jasmin’s work has ranged from training theater artists in social justice pedagogies as the American Conservatory Theater’s Associate Director of Education & Community Programs to leading workshops on creating liberating and affirming spaces for youth as co-founder of The Remix Cultural Consulting Collective. Currently, Jasmin brings her experience and drive to Lavender Phoenix, alongside organizations such as Asians4BlackLives and the Bay Area Transformative Justice Collective. She continually works to heal her own wounds, transform old patterns, and vision new ways of being, and to bring this same opportunity for growth and change to the community. Outside of her organizing endeavors, Jasmin delights in the culinary (both cooking and eating), astrology, watching and creating live theater, moving herself through dance or a good hike, and laughing with friends.
Shivani C., Leadership Development Manager
Shivani (they/them) is a trans, non-binary, second generation Indian-American person. Born and raised in Lenape land in New Jersey, Shivani has slowly traversed their way across Turtle Island before settling in Ohlone land in Oakland in 2021. Despite studying film and television in college, they have spent most of their career working in education — first as a high school English teacher and later as a post-secondary pathways counselor. Shivani brings a passion for building relationships, developing youth leadership, supporting others in telling their stories, and creating spaces for collective learning and growth. They first joined Lavender Phoenix as a volunteer supporting the Asking for Help workshops for TGNC South Asian folks and later co-founded the Community Safety Committee. Now, as Lavender Phoenix’s Leadership Development Coordinator, Shivani is excited to facilitate opportunities for members to learn the skills, knowledges, and attitudes to lead in a values-based way. Shivani cultivates joy through long walks (preferably to get bubble tea), cooking with friends, camping, and playing with their cat, Remy.
eri o., Development Manager
eri (they/them) is a gender-nonconforming millennial sea turtle of Japanese descent. Born and raised on unceded Kanaka Maoli lands on the island of O’ahu, Hawai’i, eri has been riding the wave of life as a nonprofit administrator and educator. In 2013, they moved to unceded Ohlone lands (specifically, Oakland, CA) where they lived and organized at a Trans & Queer Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (TQBIPOC)-centered collective home and community space called Oakland SOL for 6 years. eri comes to Lavender Phoenix with a deep passion for creating a world where TQBIPOC can thrive and tap into our magic. They’re a former Board member of the National Queer Asian Pacific Islander Alliance, a former member of Peacock Rebellion, Liberate(d) 23rd Ave, and is currently part of the Mugworts Queer Cabin Collective. eri lives in North Highlands, Sacramento on unceded Nisenan lands and enjoys being an extra-extrovert, binge-watching reality TV shows, and being in or near the water whenever possible!
Jenica G., Cultural Organizer
Jenica is a trans and queer Filipino-American and proud Ilokano, born and raised on Bay Miwok land in the Bay Area. Jenica currently resides on Tongva land, where she studied animation and developed a passion for nurturing queer spaces on her college campus. She began her journey with Lavender Phoenix as a Summer Organizer in 2021, discovering the power of communication work and the wisdom that everyone has the potential to organize. After joining LavNix’s Communications and Core Committees, Jenica deepened her community work by teaching digital art through AYPAL’s Fresh Off the Block program where she supported youth in realizing their inner storytellers. She continues to develop her cultural work and propagandist skills, fighting for Filipina women and children’s rights as part of the National Democratic Movement. Now, as Lavender Phoenix’s Cultural Organizer, Jenica is excited to support the community in telling powerful stories that make revolution irresistible. Alongside organizing, Jenica loves emboldening others to be silly and to create art, whether it be through animation, zines, or linocut. She finds joy in rewatching old anime and skateboarding.
Deema H, Community Safety Organizer
Deema (They/Them) is a TransMasc child of immigrant parents from Lebanon. Deema was born and raised on unceded Ramaytush Ohlone land in San Francisco, CA. Deema graduated from Humboldt State University, where they spent three years co-coordinating the University’s Social Justice Summit and working with Keynote Speakers such as Climbing Poetry, Mia Mingus, and Judge Abby Abinanti. After graduating, they worked with the Arab Resource and Organizing Center, engaging with working class immigrant Arab families through services, relationship building, and regular outings to San Francisco parks, as well as organizing for Palestine, focusing on rapid response throughout the genocide in Gaza. They are excited to be in community with other API queer and trans folks to create alternatives to policing, real solutions that benefit all oppressed people. Outside of organizing Deema enjoys hiking, cooking, and learning about herbs.
Julz A., Membership Coordinator
Julz (they/them) is a queer, non-binary mixed Filipino political educator, organizer, and student born and raised in the Bay Area Ohlone lands — starting their life in unceded Yelamu lands in Frisco and growing up in unceded Huchuin-Aguasto lands of the East Bay.
Julz’s passion for political education and making revolutionary lessons accessible to the masses was fueled by their experience growing up working class in the Bay and being exposed to so much radical history around them. What guides their political work is their deep belief in building working class power as a means to defeat capitalism and build a new world where we all can see the fruits of our labor. Julz has supported the development of frontline youth, workers, and oppressed people’s leadership. They most recently worked as an organizer, community educator, and then, director of Youth Vs Apocalypse — working to organize, develop, and politicize a strong base of working class youth of color ready to leverage their power in the environmental justice movement and beyond.
Beginning their journey with Lavender Phoenix as a 2022 Summer Organizer, Julz is excited to continue their work with us as our Membership Coordinator, where they hope to cultivate love and dedication to study amongst our members, foster deep alignment and commitment to each other and our work, and sow pockets of principled joy and connection to sustain our organizing for the long run — after all, we have a world to win.
Outside of work, Julz enjoys nerding out over revolutionary history, reading for hours in the sun, organizing with GABRIELA Oakland to fight against imperialism back home in the Philippines and in the diaspora, sharing tsismis with loved ones, curating playlists inspired by their friends, and learning about how we can live in reciprocal relation with the land.
Volunteer Committees Communications
