White Plains, NY, January 2, 2020–Nonprofit Westchester, whose mission is to advance and advocate for the needs and interests of the county's nonprofit sector and the people and communities they serve, has elected a new Executive Committee, starting January 2020.

The new Executive Committee appointments are Anahaita Kotval, President; Barbara Finkelstein and Richard Nightingale, Vice President; Erica Martinson, Treasurer; and Heather Miller, Secretary. Terry Kirchner will serve as President Emeritus.

“I am very excited about the formation of our new Executive Committee, as each of these exceptional leaders will add to the type of expertise and commitment needed to move our mission forward” said Jan Fisher, Executive Director, Nonprofit Westchester. “This group of highly accomplished professionals will be a key asset to our organization, as we work to ensure that people from all  backgrounds have meaningful opportunities to work, live, attend school, recreate and thrive in Westchester. 

Anahaita Kotval is the Chief Executive Officer of Lifting Up Westchester, a non-profit serving homeless and other extremely low-income residents of Westchester County. After more than twenty years in the securities industry, she moved to the non-profit sector in 2011 and served as Chief Operating Officer & General Counsel for Inspirica, Inc., the largest provider of services to homeless individuals and families in lower Fairfield County, Connecticut.

Prior to joining Inspirica, Anahaita was Managing Director and General Counsel at RBS, managing the firm’s legal, regulatory, and reputational risk, and serving as a member of the Management Committee for the Americas. Prior to joining RBS, Anahaita was a Senior Trial Counsel for the Enforcement Division of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Anahaita has extensive experience providing pro bono legal and other services to the non-profit community, and currently serves as a Director of the Pro Bono Partnership, where she was honored with the Partnership’s Volunteer of the Year and Volunteer of the Decade awards. She has also served as a volunteer and Director of My Sister’s Place, and Director of the  Westchester and Fairfield County Community Foundation. She is the former founder and Chair of the RBS Greenwich Capital Foundation, a former Director and Co-President of the Women’s Bond Club of New York, and a former Executive Committee member of the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association’s Compliance and Legal Division, and Director of OneMain Financial, Inc., a public consumer finance company. Anahaita received B.Sc. magna cum laude in Applied Math and Economics from Brown University and J.D. cum laude from Harvard Law School.

Barbara Finkelstein is Chief Executive Officer, Legal Services of the Hudson Valley (LSHV), the largest provider of free civil legal services to almost 600,000 poor and low-income individuals in Westchester, Putnam, Dutchess, Orange, Rockland, Sullivan, and Ulster Counties. Since Ms. Finkelstein became Executive Director and CEO, LSHV has increased its budget by eightfold, and has grown to a 154-person staff with a $18 million-dollar budget and ten offices. She is the first woman to lead the organization, and under her leadership, LSHV has made great strides in securing funding from public and private sources to increase services to low income residents of the Hudson Valley facing civil legal problems affecting the necessities of life.  Among her achievements are the creation of domestic violence, family law, children’s advocacy, veterans and military families, foreclosure and LGBTQ units.  Ms. Finkelstein created an LSHV affiliate, the Hudson Valley Justice Center, to serve clients without status whom LSHV cannot serve due to Legal Services Corporation restrictions.

Prior to joining LSHV, Ms. Finkelstein served as Assistant Project Director at Queens Legal Services, where she directed services to clients and assisted with overall program operations. Ms. Finkelstein is a member of Chief Justice Janet DiFiore’s Permanent Commission on Access to Civil Legal Services in New York, The New York State Bar Association’s Committee on Legal Aid, Vice President of the New York Legal Services Coalition. Ms. Finkelstein received her J.D. from Rutgers School of Law – Newark, and her B.A. from Hunter College of the City University of New York.

Richard Nightingale is President & Chief Executive Officer, Westhab, Inc.. Mr. Nightingale joined Westhab in 2001 and became President & CEO in 2014. Westhab, headquartered in Yonkers, is Westchester’s largest provider of housing and services for the homeless and largest nonprofit developer of affordable housing. Westhab has built 900 affordable and supportive housing units with an investment of over $130 million, currently manages 1,500 affordable and supportive units, and operates a wide range of social services and community programs including job training programs and youth centers. In recent years, Westhab has also expanded its impact in the area, and recently broke ground on the affordable 63-unit Dayspring Commons residence in Yonkers and the adjacent full-service Dayspring Community Center.

Mr. Nightingale received his BA from Tufts University and his MSW, with a concentration in Administration, from Fordham Graduate School of Social Services. He has completed additional coursework in Real Estate Development and Finance at New York University and leadership training at Harvard Business School.

Erica Martinson is Property & Casualty Team Leader at Brown & Brown of NY Insurance Agency, where she oversees the Personal Lines and Claims Departments, as well as the Non-Profit division of the Commercial Lines Department. As part of the Leadership Team, she leads the development of internal training and education and helps develop best practices for client services. Working with then agency principal Mark Rollins, she was instrumental in developing the agency’s Non-Profit Guard brand and expanding their risk management services for the sector.

Ms. Martinson has been active in various non-profit and trade organizations including Bridges to Community, Junior Achievement, TechAssure, and the National Association of Insurance Women- NYC, and is a past member of the Advisory Boards of the Great Potential Program at Purchase College and World Trade Council of the Westchester County Association, where she served as president, Ms. Martinson is currently a member of the Alumni Advisory Board of the PACE Executive MBA Program. Ms. Martinson earned a BBA degree from the College of Insurance, and MBA from PACE University, and she holds several professional designations. She has taught in the NYS Insurance Broker’s Licensing Course at Westchester Community College, and in the CPCU program for the Westchester-Fairfield Chapter of CPCU. 

Heather Miller is Executive Director at Thomas H. Slater Center, Inc. an organization whose mission is to improve the quality of life and maximize the potential of the people they serve by providing them with the tools, resources, services and programs they need to be successful. Under her leadership, she has develop their Step Up Girls Program, Next Generation Boys Group, Health and Fitness, Summer Thrift Store, Summer Youth Employment Program, Gardening Project, the Haitian Resource Center and the senior programs, Young At Heart, For Diane Drop In Center and Senior Theater Workshop.

Previously, Ms. Miller worked in management at the YWCA of Westchester and Central Westchester  as Director of Outreach, and Westhab as Manager of Employment and Training, positions she held while she maintained a part-time position at the Slater Center. She currently serves on the Board of Directors at WestCOP. Previously, she has served as Immediate Past Chairman, White Plains Juneteenth Heritage Committee; President, Rotary Club of White Plains; Vice-President, Access Westchester; and Advisory Board Member, White Plains Community Action Program. She is the recipient of community service awards from the Westchester NAACP ACT-SO; Westchester Chapter of the National Association of Negro Business and Professional Women, Inc.; Martin Luther King Institute for Nonviolence and the Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc., Pi Iota Omega Chapter, and was named Rotary District 7230 President of the Year in 2015. Ms. Miller earned a bachelor’s degree in Liberal Arts, and a master’s degree in Public Administration (Not For Profit) from Pace University.

For more information, contact Jan Fisher jfisher@npwestchester.org 914-441-439-0203 or visit www.npwestchester.org.

About Nonprofit Westchester

Nonprofit Westchester (NPW) is Westchester’s only membership organization dedicated solely to advancing and advocating for the needs and interests of the county's nonprofit sector and the people and communities they serve. Representing 170 nonprofit organizations, the mission of NPW is to strengthen the impact, capacity and visibility of the nonprofit sector in Westchester County.

For more information, visit www.npwestchester.org.