Board of Trustees

Dale Russakoff is a freelance writer who spent 28 years as a reporter for the Washington Post, covering politics, education, social policy, and other topics. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, ProPublica and other publications. She is the author of The Prize, a best-selling book about Mark Zuckerberg’s $100 million gift to the Newark schools. Her recent work focuses on education and immigration. She was first drawn to Family Promise more than 25 years ago as a volunteer and then a coordinator at Congregation Shomrei Emunah. She is in awe that FPE, with a tiny paid staff and an army of volunteers, has helped so many parents with young children overcome homelessness for so many years. Dale grew up in Birmingham, Alabama during the Civil Rights era and credits her parents with encouraging her to think critically about the world around her, particularly the racial segregation and inequity in her own hometown. She lives in Montclair, New Jersey, with her husband Matthew Purdy, an editor at The New York Times. They have two grown sons and two grandchildren.

Lamont Swittenberg is Vice President, Brand Strategy & Planning at Peacock, a division of NBCUniversal. In this role, Lamont leads a team that develops positioning strategies and shapes multi-platform marketing campaigns, based on consumer data, macro trends and brand & cultural insights.

Before joining NBCUniversal, Lamont worked as VP, Brand Planning at PHD, an Omnicom Media agency. Prior to PHD, Lamont worked in brand management roles for a number of well-known companies, including Coca-Cola, Virgin Mobile and Hewlett-Packard.

Lamont has a BS in Marketing from the University of Virginia and an MBA from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is an Advisory Board member for the Center For The Study Of The American South (CSAS) at UNC. In his free time, Lamont enjoys listening to music, writing and spending time with his family in Maplewood, New Jersey.

Jane Quinn is a former television producer and writer for social and educational programming in New York City. She hopes to help further enlighten the public on the efforts and accomplishments of Family Promise of Essex County in the coming year.  She has an extensive background in fundraising for schools and charities in New Jersey, California, and Tokyo, Japan.

While co-chairing fundraising events for a local elementary school in Burlingame, California Jane also worked with Art In Action, a non-profit group in northern California. She had the opportunity to not only bring art programming into local elementary schools that had been defunded but also teach art through the program at various underprivileged schools in East Palo Alto, California. In Tokyo, Jane chaired fundraising efforts for The International School of the Sacred Heart and Hands on Tokyo, a non-profit volunteer clearinghouse for orphanages and local environmental efforts. Jane lives in Short Hills with husband Kevin Quinn.

Davianne Harris is Chief Client Officer at Sparks and Honey, a cultural intelligence agency, where she also serves as head of the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion practice. Davianne is a passionate leader and has expertise in social impact, business transformation, and diversity equity and inclusion strategy. She works on driving organic growth among companies while embedding diversity, equity, and inclusion into the way organizational transformation is achieved.

Davianne holds a B.A. in Communication and Consumer Psychology from the University of Pennsylvania and an M.A. in Media, Culture and Communication from NYU. She lives in South Orange, NJ with her husband and two children.

Abigail Carlton is the Head of Social Impact for Indeed, the world’s top job site. In this role, Abbey leads Indeed’s efforts to democratize opportunity for job seekers around the world, including the 250M job seekers who visit Indeed every month, through product innovation, strategic partnerships and community engagement.

Prior to joining Indeed, Abbey led The Rockefeller Foundation’s efforts on jobs and economic opportunity. Earlier in her career, she held research and program management positions at New York University, the US Department of Labor, and the law firm Cravath, Swaine and Moore, LLP. Abbey is a fellow with The Aspen Institute’s First Movers program, a mentor through PhilanthropyNY’s Young Leaders program, and previously served on the board of Start Small Think Big, a national nonprofit focused on supporting low-income entrepreneurs.

Abbey received a bachelor’s degree in Industrial and Labor Relations from Cornell University and a master’s in Public Policy from Georgetown University. She lives in Montclair with her husband and four sons.

Lizzie Wolff is a strategic communications executive with over twenty years of experience. She most recently served as the Vice President of External Communications at Standard Industries, a global manufacturing company. Lizzie began her career in public relations at Vanity Fair, eventually being named Executive Director of Communications. She previously led communications at theSkimm, a digital media brand for millennial women, and worked at Hiltzik Strategies, overseeing a range of corporate, crisis, and non-profit clients. She hopes to amplify the mission and impact of Family Promise of Essex County, shining a light on the incredible work they do for families in our community facing homelessness.

Lizzie graduated from Duke University with a degree in Psychology. She lives in South Orange, NJ with her husband and three children.

Miriam Chilton is Chief Growth Officer for Trybal Gatherings, a leading provider of Jewish summer camp experiences for young professionals. Prior to joining Trybal Gatherings, Miriam was the Chief Operating Officer for Kaplen JCC. Miriam is a strong leader who stimulates organizational growth and transformational change by creating systems, processes and experiences that help people flourish.

Miriam holds a B. A. in Politics from Ithaca College and an M. B. A./MS from Boston University.  Miriam and her husband raised their two children in Montclair and currently reside in Little Falls.

Michelle Kudesh is Executive Director at PGIM Real Estate, the global asset management business of Prudential Financial.  Michelle is a part of the portfolio management team for the non-core U.S. debt strategies and manages all financial and operational aspects of the platform.

Michelle also represents PGIM Real Estate on Prudential’s Community Engagement Council.  She leads several company-wide community service activity and program initiatives each year working with various community partners.  Michelle is passionate about giving back.  When she is not planning a service activity at the office, she can be found fundraising for Big Brothers Big Sisters, volunteering for The Red Cross, serving food at various soup kitchens in the area or running the bingo at the nursing home nearby.

Michelle received her B. S. in Finance from Lehigh University College of Business and an M. B. A. from New York University School of Business.

Michelle is a resident of Maplewood where she lives with two adorable Shih-Tzu mix rescues.

Michelle Pallak is a partner and head of the nationally-recognized pro bono practice at McCarter & English, LLP, where she works closely with the firm’s lawyers and partner organizations to strategically and effectively implement the firm’s commitment to service.  She represents pro bono clients in forums ranging from immigration court to the Supreme Court of the United States, and supervises the firm’s innovative Pro Bono Fellowship for the City of Newark.  Previously, Michelle was an attorney in the Special Litigation Unit at the New York Legal Assistance Group and in the U.S. Legal Program at the Center for Reproductive Rights; in both roles, she used litigation and other forms of advocacy to defend and protect constitutional and statutory rights of individuals and families.  Before law school, Michelle worked in disaster relief in Manhattan, in a single women’s homeless shelter, and on political campaigns in South Central Los Angeles and Brooklyn, and she volunteered as an ESL teacher for refugees in New York and Portland, OR.  Michelle is a graduate of Fordham University School of Law and Reed College.  She lives in Maplewood with her family.