2019 Speaker Biographies

Sarah Gambill
Associate Director of Donor Relations,
Portland State University Foundation

Sarah holds a dual BA in Psychology and Gender Studies from The University of Texas at Austin. Her background includes a variety of positions and projects supporting missions that work toward empowering individuals and promoting more equitable, healthier communities. After gaining experience in nonprofit administration, communications, marketing, development and volunteer management, Sarah became most drawn to development work upon realizing fundraising is the key component driving a nonprofit’s ability to move its mission forward. Sarah moved from Houston to Portland and joined PSU Foundation in June 2014. She spent her first 4 years at PSUF focused on planned giving and principal gifts and has since moved into the role of Associate Director of Donor Relations. Sarah is drawn to planned giving because it is one of the most accessible ways a person can make a transformational gift. She sees incredible value in connecting community members to opportunities that create tangible impact and loves helping donors consider their legacy and what mark they hope to leave on the world. Her specialties include program building, complex gift agreements, financial and impact reporting, and donor stewardship.

Tara Siegman, MPA
Director of Donor Relations & Grants,
Oregon Jewish Community Foundation

Tara Siegman is passionate about philanthropy and the power of community. As the Director of Donor Relations & Grants at Oregon Jewish Community Foundation she is deeply honored to support kindhearted individuals and families as they actualize their philanthropic values (tzedakah) and improve the world (tikkun olam) through thoughtful giving. She has been with OJCF for five years and has worked with community foundations since 2005.

With more than 25 years in the nonprofit sector, Tara has worked in statewide philanthropy, local fund development, and national public health policy. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science & Public Policy from George Washington University and a Master of Public Administration with a specialization in Nonprofit Management from Portland State University.

She is a 21/64 Certified Advisor trained in multigenerational philanthropy. Tara holds certificates in Nonprofit Financial Stewardship (Harvard University), Giving With Purpose (Learning by Giving Foundation), Grant writing (The Grantsmanship Center) and Jewish Studies (Florence Melton Adult Mini-School, a project of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem).

Cheryl Acheson
Regional Representative,
Bonhams, Portland

Sheryl Acheson is a regional representative for Bonhams. Sheryle graduated from Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida, with a BA in History and Public Affairs. She also attended Sophia and Waseda Universities in Tokyo where she studied Japanese History and Arts, and has lived around the world including Singapore, Sydney, and Hong Kong prior to moving to Portland. Sheryl has worked for Bonhams for 14 years as a regional representative for Oregon and Idaho, and has assisted numerous nonprofits and large estates with the sale of gifts of jewelry, decorative arts, paintings, and furniture. Some sales have included property which broke world records at auction. She has served on the boards of Oregon Episcopal School, Chamber Music Northwest, White Bird Dance Company, and Oregon College of Arts and Crafts.

Rebecca Bibleheimer, JD, LLM
Senior Philanthropic Advisor,
Oregon Community Foundation

Rebecca Bibleheimer is a Senior Philanthropic Advisor with the Oregon Community Foundation. She provides gift planning assistance to donors who are interested in supporting charitable initiatives throughout Oregon and serves as an internal technical consultant to all philanthropic advisors throughout the state. Prior to joining OCF, Rebecca worked as a philanthropic advisor and planned giving consultant for US Bank Charitable Services Group and as a trusts and estates attorney for a tax boutique law firm. She has almost twenty years of experience in these fields. Rebecca is a member of the California State Bar and the Oregon State Bar and holds a Legal Letters Master (LLM) in tax law from the University of Florida, Levin School of Law.

Rebecca served on the Board of Trustees for the Oregon Humane Society for 6 years and currently serves on a number of planned giving and investment related nonprofit committees in Portland, Oregon where she lives. She is the past President for the Northwest Planned Giving Roundtable and has served on its executive committee for ten years and was recently elected to serve on the National Association of Charitable Gift Planners board of directors starting in 2020.

Aviva Shiff Boedecker, JD
Senior Consultant,
Sharpe Group

Aviva Shiff Boedecker is a senior consultant based in San Francisco. An attorney with more than 30 years of gift planning experience, Aviva has served for more than a decade each as a director of planned giving at the University of California, Berkeley and the Marin Community Foundation. She initiated San Francisco Ballet’s planned giving program after beginning her career in the private practice of law.

Aviva has served on the board of the National Association of Charitable Gift Planners and is a past president of the Northern California Planned Giving Council and of the Marin County Estate Planning Council. She has been a member of Planned Giving Today’s Editorial Advisory Board, writes for many planned giving publications and is a frequent lecturer on planned giving and a resource on philanthropy for professional advisors and individual donors.

Her lecture topics include marketing dos and don’ts, how to identify planned giving prospects, legacy planning and what to do with gifts: the good, the interesting and the illiquid. She has lectures specially designed for boards, for volunteers and for professional advisor groups. She recently presented at the Association of Fundraising Professionals’ International Conference.

Aviva is a Big Sister with Big Brothers Big Sisters and has been involved with a variety of nonprofit and community organizations. She is an alumna of the University of California, Berkeley and the University of California, Hastings College of the Law and a member of the California Bar.

Eden Rose Brown, JD
Founding Attorney,
Law Office of Eden Rose Brown

Attorney Eden Rose Brown is dedicated to providing comprehensive, highly personalized counsel in wealth preservation strategies, family legacy design, and estate, tax and charitable planning. As the founder of the Law Office of Eden Rose Brown, she holds the highest standard of client service, scholarship, and innovation.

Ms. Brown has a BA from the University of California, Berkeley, and her JD from the Northwestern School of Law at Lewis and Clark College. Prior to private practice, Ms. Brown served as an Air Force Judge Advocate during the Persian Gulf War, receiving the United States Meritorious Service Medal and achieving the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. She is a member of the Oregon and Hawaii Bar Associations, the Probate and Trusts Section of the Oregon State Bar, the Judge Advocate Association, WealthCounsel, the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys. She is admitted to practice before the United States Court of Military Review, the United States Court of Military Appeals, the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington and the Supreme Court of the United States.

A respected teacher, author and lecturer, Ms. Brown has appeared as a guest on radio and television and enjoys speaking locally and nationally to professional advisors, charitable organizations and the public. A dedicated philanthropist, Ms. Brown has served as a director on numerous boards, including Chemeketa Community College, Cedar Sinai Park, The Oregon Jewish Community Foundation, Willamette Humane Society and the Marion-Polk County Medical Foundation.

Amy Carrier, PhD
Senior Director, Advancement Information Management,
Oregon State University Foundation

Amy Carrier is the Senior Director of Advancement Information Management at the Oregon State University Foundation, which she joined in January 2018. Prior to that she served as the Director of Prospect Management and Research at Barnard College in Manhattan; she also spent 11 years at Georgetown University in a number of roles. Before joining Georgetown’s advancement team, Amy was the manager of the Alliance for Regional Stewardship, a network of civic entrepreneurs working to address the issues facing today’s regions. Amy studied at Trinity University, Weston Jesuit School of Theology, Georgetown University, and the University of Colorado Denver; she completed her PhD in Public Affairs in 2015. She has spoken at the Association of Professional Researchers for Advancement, the Conference of Jesuit Advancement Administrators, and the American Planning Association, and taught statistics at the University of Colorado Denver’s Graduate School of Public Affairs.

Michael Davis, MBA, CTFA
Philanthropic Advisor,
US Bank Charitable Services Group

As a Philanthropic Advisor in US Bank’s Charitable Services Group, Michael works with high net worth individuals and families to facilitate charitable giving and provide resources to charitable organizations to assist in the stewardship and growth of their endowment and planned giving programs. Previously, he has worked in the development offices at both Lewis & Clark and Reed College, and has direct experience in annual giving, major giving, and gift planning. He has a BA from Kenyon College, an MFA in creative writing from the University of Oregon, and an MBA from Portland State University. He currently serves as president of the executive committee for the Northwest Planned Giving Roundtable.

Lon Dufek, CPA, CFP®
Senior Manager, Office of Gift Planning,
Providence Foundations of Oregon

Lon P. Dufek has been involved in the field of gift planning for over 40 years.  For 10 years, he was Executive Vice President of Crescendo Interactive, Inc., the developers of Crescendo Planned Giving Software.  Lon joined Providence in April of 2000 and is Senior Manager in the Office of Gift Planning with the Providence Foundations in Oregon.  He provides charitable planning expertise to major donors, financial professionals and their clients assisting them in fulfilling their philanthropic goals.  He has taught extensively on the subjects of planned giving and charitable estate planning, has written articles on these topics for national publications and is recognized nationally for his expertise in the area of gift planning.

Jackson Lewis, JD
Senior Fiduciary Advisory Specialist,
Wells Fargo

Jackson Lewis is a senior fiduciary advisory specialist at Wells Fargo where he is focused on personal trusts, estate planning and wealth management services. For the last 18 years, he served as a trust and estate attorney for Tonkon Torp, LLC in Portland. In his role as head of wealth planning, he counseled affluent individuals and families on estate planning and administration, probate litigation and business succession planning. He also has extensive experience advising charitable organizations.

Jennifer Milburn
Senior Director of Development, Gift Planning,
Oregon State University Foundation

Jennifer Milburn is Senior Director, Gift Planning, at Oregon State University Foundation. She began her 24-year development career as Director of Annual Giving in Intercollegiate Athletics, and progressed to major gift and capital campaign work first in Athletics, then academics. After ten years serving as Director of Development for the Colleges of Agricultural Sciences and Veterinary Medicine during OSU’s highly successful $1 billion campaign, she joined the OSU Foundation’s Gift Planning Office and found her calling. Milburn leads a team of five, front-line gift planning officers, each with a donor portfolio and annual metrics. She also has oversight of gift planning marketing, probate administration, realized bequests, and trusts and contracts.

Jenna Proctor
Research Analyst,
Oregon State University Foundation

Jenna Proctor is a Research Analyst at Oregon State University Foundation specifically supporting the Gift Planning Team. She joined the OSU Foundation in July 2016 after graduating from Oregon State University with an Honors Bachelor of Arts in History.

Stephen Slotemaker
Relationship Manager,
TIAA Kaspick

Stephen Slotemaker is a Relationship Manager at TIAA Kaspick. Steve came to Kaspick from the Oregon State University Foundation where he was Senior Director of Gift Planning. His responsibilities included leading the collaborative development efforts of the gift planning program, oversight of bequest administration, and gift planning marketing. Prior to his seven years with the OSU Foundation, he was an Analyst with Kaspick & Company. Mr. Slotemaker has a BA in Business Administration and earned his MBA from Washington State University. He is also a member of the Northwest Planned Giving Roundtable.

Richard B. Soloman, CPA
Certified Public Accountant

A Certified Public Accountant since 1976, Dick Solomon has had his own tax focused practice since 1981. His community involvements include service on the Oregon Investment Council, the Oregon State Bar Board of Governors and the Oregon Lottery Commission. He has served on numerous boards including as board chair of Planned Parenthood Columbia Willamette and the Oregon Jewish Community Foundation. Currently he serves as a trustee of the Portland State University Foundation and End of Life Choices Oregon.

Lori C. Sweeney
Regional Director,
Providence Foundations of Oregon

Lori (Cloninger) Sweeney has worked in development and fundraising for more than 35 years with experiences ranging from her undergraduate alma mater, Whitworth University, to a prep school in Brentwood, California to Oregon State and OHSU Foundations to Providence Foundations of Oregon. Lori holds a M.Ed. from UCLA. She is a native Oregonian who knows the broad landscape of fundraising in this region and is enthusiastic about development. She is the proud (and harried) mother of a newly-minted Montana State engineering student and is married to a great guy who regularly makes dinner as she pursues the advancement profession.

Jeffrey C. Thede, JD
Partner,
Thede Culpepper Moore Munro & Silliman LLP

Jeffrey C. Thede began his legal career with Miller Nash LLP in 1979 and was with the firm until December 2007, when he left Miller Nash to form Thede Culpepper Moore Munro & Silliman LLP with four of his partners. Jeff’s practice emphasizes estate and trust planning and administration, charitable planning, and tax exempt organizations. He is admitted to practice in Oregon and Washington. Jeff is a member and past president of the Estate Planning Council of Portland, a Fellow of the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel, the Vice President of the ACTEC Foundation, and a member of the Northwest Planned Giving Roundtable. He has served on the boards of Portland Opera Association, the Oregon Cascades Chapter of the American Red Cross, Three Rivers Land Conservancy, and Lake Oswego School District Foundation. He is also a member of the planned giving advisory committees of Oregon Health & Science University Foundation and Providence Foundations of Oregon.

Stephanie S. Zaino, JD
Director of Development, Gift Planning
Oregon State University Foundation

Stephanie Shenigo Zaino is the Director of Development, Gift Planning at the Oregon State University Foundation. An east coast transplant, Stephanie graduated from UNC-Chapel Hill in North Carolina with a BA in Political Science. She then earned her JD from the University of Notre Dame Law School, where she focused on the laws governing Trusts and Estates. After law school, Stephanie worked with Notre Dame’s Office of Gift Planning before serving as the Associate Director of Gift Planning at UNC-Chapel Hill for two years. She is a member of the National Association of Charitable Gift Planners, the Northwest Planned Giving Roundtable (NWPGRT), and serves on the Program Committee for the NWPGRT Annual Conference.