Fundraising Fundamentals

Diana Abellera 

Born and raised in Atlanta, GA, Diana Abellera has been fighting for social justice and environmental justice throughout her career. She created education programs for organizations, such as the Environmental Justice and Climate Change Initiative and Urban Habitat, that engage low-income communities and communities of color in campaigns for healthier and more equitable environments. 

Abellera served as the Development Manager and Education Director at People’s Grocery, where she focused on engaging the West Oakland community in developing a local food system. As the Regional Food Systems Director for Community Alliance with Family Farmers (CAFF), Abellera oversaw Farm to Market programs and staff in 5 regions throughout California. As Chief Operating Officer at CAFF, she built a strong development program and created systems across finance, development, and programs. Abellera served as a co-chair on the Board of Directors at FACES (Filipino-American Coalition for Environmental Solidarity) for four years, and she currently serves on the finance committee. Abellera graduated with the first cohort of the Next Generation Leaders of Color program, a year-long professional development program offered that provided workshops, technical assistance, coaching, and peer support groups for non-profit managers. 

After a 14-year career working in non-profits, she founded Abellera Consulting in 2016 to build the capacity of organizations working to advance social and environmental justice. Now Abellera loves working with small and mid-sized organizations to develop their fundraising programs, write grants, and direct resources to impactful programs in communities throughout the country. 

Aimee Retzler 

After spending sixteen years with GAP Inc. in San Francisco, CA, Aimee and her family moved to the Sierra Foothills in 2007. Aimee has immersed herself in the community through volunteering for schools, nonprofits, and teaching Nia classes. 

She founded and is the Co-Director of Sierra Harvest, a Nevada County organization that educates, inspires and connects families to fresh, local, seasonal food. Her passion for making sure kids get the best food they possibly can is what fueled her to begin the farm-to-school program in Nevada County. She has been involved in guiding the activities of Sierra Harvest since October 2008, building the organization from a grassroots community coalition to a respected social profit. 

She is also a strategic business planning and marketing consultant and is a member of the CNL coaching and consulting network. She was identified as an emerging sage leader in Nevada County making significant community contributions and is a graduate of the Nevada County Community Leadership Institute. She enjoys sharing her fund development tips and techniques with food and farming leaders in California to build a funding platform that is relationship based and not reliant on public funding for program operations.