Our Team

Core Staff

  • Prior to joining BuildUS, Justin Maxson served as a senior advisor at the Amalgamated Foundation, where he worked helping disadvantaged communities access federal resources. Before that, he served in the Biden administration as Deputy Under Secretary for Rural Development at USDA, where he helped manage the only federal agency with the explicit responsibility for rural development. As Deputy Under Secretary for Rural Development, he managed the launch of the Rural Partners Network, contributed to federal rural development policy to address climate change, and worked to make it easier for small towns and rural communities to access federal resources. Formerly, he served as the chief executive officer of the Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation supporting economic and racial justice in the South. Before that, he spent more than a decade as the president of the Mountain Association, a community development financial institution advancing economic and sustainable development opportunities in eastern Kentucky and Central Appalachia. Maxson holds a bachelor’s degree in anthropology from the University of Kentucky, and a master’s in anthropology from Boston University. He lives in Winston-Salem, NC and has two young adult children.

Justin Maxson

  • Kokei has spent years working with cities to design and execute urban development strategies, with a particular focus on climate adaptation and technological innovation. Most recently, Kokei worked as a Senior Consultant at IBM. Prior to that, while at Van Alen Institute, she managed a critical workstream of a $200M bond program to deliver a series of climate adaptation projects in Greater Miami. At the New York City Economic Development Corporation, she co-managed RISE: NYC, a technology innovation program that brought cutting-edge climate solutions to small businesses impacted by Hurricane Sandy. Kokei holds an MBA from the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley, and is a graduate of New York University.

Kokei Otosi

  • Manu most recently spent several years on the strategy team at Rivian, where he worked on projects ranging from Rivian’s IPO — which raised nearly $12 billion in financing — to selecting a site for Rivian’s multi-billion dollar second production plant. Manu holds a B.S. in Electrical Engineering & Computer Science from the University of California, Berkeley. During college, Manu also led a student-run consulting group focused on environmental and social responsibility.

Manu Prakasam

  • Sarabeth brings a passion for creating systems that serve people to operations and administration work. Having spent over a decade in the nonprofit sector, Sarabeth knows that thoughtful administrative systems are an essential part of the work–and that without them, we will replicate the same oppressive systems we seek to dismantle in the world. She leads teams toward more unified collaboration to improve project management and program implementation, comfortably straddling strategy and implementation functions. Sarabeth has held administrative and operations leadership roles at several organizations focused on equity and human rights including Health Global Access Project, Open Society Foundations, and the International Rescue Committee. Sarabeth holds a Masters in International Development from the Josef Korbel School of International Studies at the University of Denver in Colorado.

Sarabeth Harrelson

Senior Advisors

  • Sameera served in the Biden Administration as Deputy Director of the National Economic Council where she advised on community development finance with a focus on manufacturing, innovation, domestic competition, and global supply chains. In the Obama Administration, she served as a Senior Policy Advisor for the National Economic Council before joining the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta as Director of Engagement for its Community and Economic Development Department. Sameera is an expert on community development financial institutions and international microfinance and previously served as a senior advisor and chief of staff to the Department of Treasury’s Undersecretary for International Affairs.

Sameera Fazili

  • Bobby Clark is a communications strategist who advises political, philanthropic, and advocacy organizations on narrative and message development, communications structures, and campaigns. A graduate of the University of Oklahoma and Vanderbilt Law School, Bobby is a leader in shaping persuasive public narratives and developing successful communications campaigns to advance national, state, and local policies. An alumnus of Howard Dean’s presidential campaign, Bobby was an early pioneer of digital communications strategies to build power. Bobby went on to help found and build ProgressNow - a network of state-based communications organizations across the country focused on persuading and mobilizing voters to advance state and federal policies. As Vice President for Communications and Programs at the Gill Foundation, the nation’s largest funder of LGBTQ equality, Bobby helped develop successful campaigns for the freedom to marry and nondiscrimination protections. Bobby now works as an independent consultant leading projects to better understand public attitudes and create more persuasive narratives on a broad range of issues, including jobs and the economy, immigrant rights, health equity, housing solutions, and tax fairness. Bobby is a senior communications advisor to Heartand Fund, focused on strategies to persuade and mobilize rural Americans and also founded and serves as a senior advisor to Winning Jobs Narrative – an expansive project focused on rebuilding connection with working class voters across race and geography to build strong majorities for a people-centered economic agenda.

Bobby Clark

  • Jill Fuglister is the Principal of Fuglister Strategies, a consultancy dedicated to catalyzing environmental and social change through research and analysis, expert guidance, and strategic program design for foundations and NGOs. In her most recent role, Jill led an $8M annual environmental and climate justice portfolio at Meyer Memorial Trust, overseeing approximately 100 new grants each year and several long-term impact investments aimed at driving change through policy campaigns and innovative projects. Through that work she spearheaded efforts to create a new collaborative Federal Readiness and Leverage Fund to support community-led decarbonization and economic development efforts in the Pacific Northwest. She was also co-chair of the Funders Network Partners for Places Program, a collaborative grant program that supports equitable sustainability and climate action partnerships in cities across the US and Canada. Prior to Meyer, she led the Coalition for a Livable Future, an urban sustainability organization that united nearly 100 diverse organizations to pursue a shared agenda for change. Throughout her career, Jill has sought to transform organizational cultures, fostering inclusion, racial diversity, and the adoption of equity-based practices and policies. She holds a master’s of science degree in environmental studies from the University of Oregon and a bachelor’s in government from the University of Notre Dame. Jill lives in Portland, OR with her husband and two adult children.

Jill Fuglister