Karla Bauer, Membership Services and Communication Coordinator
Karla Bauer joined the staff of MNCASA in May, 2007. Previously, Ms. Bauer had served many functions at the Community Action Council of Dakota County. She had served as sexual assault services coordinator since 2005, where she provided both direct services and community outreach and education on the issue of sexual violence. Before moving to sexual assault advocacy, Ms. Bauer had worked primarily in domestic violence advocacy with CAC, working with the Lewis House shelter where she focused on court advocacy for victims, and worked to improve community outreach. Ms. Bauer has also volunteered at the Crisis Resource Center in Steele County, and is a graduate of MN State University, Mankato.
Email: karla(at)mncasa(dot)org Phone: Ext. 207
Donna Dunn, Executive Director
Donna Dunn became the Executive Director of MNCASA in July, 2006. Prior to this, Ms. Dunn served as the program manager of the Sexual Violence Justice Institute, the criminal justice arm of the coalition. An activist in the movement to end violence against women, Ms. Dunn has over 20 years of experience in community based private non-profits. She was the director of Victim Services of Dodge/Fillmore/Olmsted Community Corrections and served as the Sexual Assault Program Director for the state of Minnesota.
Ms. Dunn has lectured on team collaboration and sexual assault response across the U.S. She believes that multidisciplinary collaboration brings together the community forces that need to be working in tandem to stop violence against women. She is a graduate of Gustavus Adolphus College and Vanderbilt University.
Email: donna(at)mncasa(dot)org Phone: Ext. 201
Melia Garza, Sexual Violence Justice Institute Collaboration Specialist
Melia Garza began her work with sexual violence as a volunteer advocate while attending Carleton College in Northfield, MN. After graduating, she spent a brief period of time as a Youth Counselor at a residential treatment center for juvenile sex offenders. Following her short stint working with the offenders, Melia became the Sexual Assault Program Coordinator and Volunteer Coordinator at HOPE Center in Rice County, MN. In this position, she provided direct services to primary and secondary survivors of sexual violence, helped organize community outreach and education opportunities, was a member of the Sex Offender Task Force, trained volunteer advocates, and collaborated with law enforcement, medical staff, prosecution, probation, and education as part of the Rice County SMART. In her work at the Minnesota Coalition, she works as part of the Sexual Violence Justice Institute (SVJI) providing technical assistance to multidisciplinary teams across Minnesota. She’s very excited to be working with MNCASA and SVJI, continuing to develop relationships with professionals who respond to sexual assault, and working to improve policies and practices related to sexual violence.
Email: melia(at)mncasa(dot)org Phone: Ext. 212
Lindsay Gullingsrud, Sexual Violence Prevention Coordinator
Lindsay Gullingsrud joined the staff of MCASA it July, 2007. Prior to this, Ms. Gullingsrud worked as the Sexual Violence Education Coordinator in the Women’s Center at Minnesota State University, Mankato (MSU-M). During her time at MSU-M, Ms. Gullingsrud established the Sexual Violence Education Program, the first point of care for students in crisis, as well as designed and implemented preventive programs addressing sexual violence on campus. Before starting her employment with MSU-M, Ms. Gullingsrud worked within Nicollet and Sibley Counties as the Sexual Assault Program Coordinator for Crime Victim Services, Inc.
Ms. Gullingsrud has worked closely at the community and university levels with regards to education, outreach, and creating a coordinated systematic approach to addressing sexual violence within our communities. Lindsay is a graduate of Minnesota State University, Mankato.
Email: lindsay(at)mncasa(dot)org Phone: Ext. 203
Sharon Haas, Sexual Violence Justice Institute
Sharon Haas joined the Sexual Violence Justice Institute team of MNCASA in October 2009. Previously, in her work with the MACC Alliance of Connected Communities, she coordinated member agency teams in Evaluation Capacity Building and facilitated staff teams and affinity groups in efforts to improve outcomes for service recipients and community participants. Prior to her work with MACC, Ms. Haas coordinated a family violence prevention project with Merrick Community Services in East St. Paul. Her efforts to address domestic violence include work as an intern with the Battered Women’s Justice Project providing technical assistance for advocates and others around a coordinated systems response to domestic violence. In her work with the Minnesota Center Against Violence and Abuse, Ms. Haas conducted surveys and provided Spanish translation for a study on the intersection between domestic violence and child abuse. Prior to this, she served as a legal advocate for victim/survivors of domestic violence with the Minneapolis Intervention Project. Ms. Haas is graduate of James Madison College at Michigan State University and the University of Minnesota School of Social Work.
Email: shaas(at)mncasa(dot)org Phone: Ext. 202
Leah Lutz, Sexual Violence Justice Institute
Leah Lutz joined MNCASA in April, 2008. Leah has over twelve years experience in sexual/domestic violence-related work. From 2003-2008, Leah was Executive Director of HOPE Center in Rice County, MN. In this position, she lead a community-based advocacy organization that offers support to victim/survivors of sexual/domestic violence, provides educational support to the entire community, and collaborative support to other organizations that serve victims/survivors. Leah has been a frequent presenter at statewide and regional training/educational events. In 2004, Leah helped form the Rice County SMART Team and co-chaired the team for four years. Leah is happy to be working at MNCASA and hopes to use the lessons learned from the Rice County process to help other communities build a coordinated victim-centered response for victim/survivors of sexual violence.
Email: leah(at)mncasa(dot)org Phone: Ext. 206
Megan McKinnon, Office and Systems Manager
Megan McKinnon joined the staff of MNCASA in April 2007. Prior to that she worked as the East African language coordinator for an interpreting agency, and as an executive and editorial assistant at the St. Paul-based National Youth Leadership Council. Ms. McKinnon also worked for the Minnesota Senate and as an AmeriCorps VISTA with the Minnesota Literacy Council. She is a graduate of the College of St. Catherine.
Email: megan(at)mncasa(dot)org Phone: Ext. 204
Caroline Palmer, Staff Attorney
Caroline Palmer joined the MNCASA staff in January 2008. Previously she worked as the Pro Bono Development Director at the Minnesota State Bar Association, where she staffed the Legal Assistance to the Disadvantaged Committee and the Bar Foundation. She also served as Executive Director of LegalCORPS (providing pro bono services to nonprofits and small businesses) as well as the Minnesota Volunteer Attorney Program. For five years prior Caroline worked as a staff attorney at the Minnesota AIDS Project where she developed a program through an Equal Justice Works fellowship focused on permanency planning for parents living with HIV. She represented clients in family law, domestic violence, and estate planning matters, and also served as the corrections systems advocate. She helped to develop two state laws addressing stand-by custody and third-party custody and served on a work group focused on permanency planning issues administered by the National Abandoned Infants Assistance Resource Center at the University of California, Berkeley. Caroline has a BA from Barnard College and a JD from Hamline University School of Law (where she currently serves as an adjunct professor in public interest law). She was a 2009-10 Policy Fellow at the Center for Study of Politics and Governance at the University of Minnesota's Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs.
Email: caroline(at)mncasa(dot)org Phone: Ext. 214
Laura Williams, Sexual Violence Justice Institute Program Manager
Laura Williams joined the staff of MNCASA in December 2006. With over 15 years of experience in victim services, she has worked as an advocate, outreach worker, volunteer coordinator, trainer, analyst and a project coordinator, primarily in Dodge, Fillmore, and Olmsted County Victim Services. For five years, Laura served as a founding co-director of the Minnesota Model Protocol Project, the forerunner to the Sexual Violence Justice Institute. She is co-author of the Minnesota Model Sexual Assault Response Protocol.
More recently, Ms. Williams worked at the Virginia Department of Criminal Justice Services as a Terrorism Victim Assistance Analyst and in Olmsted County as the Coordinator of Children First, a community initiative focusing on healthy youth development.
Ms. Williams’ interest in working to end sexual violence began as a college student in the late 1980s at Carleton College where she organized to raise awareness about non-stranger rape, including the College’s first mock trial on sexual assault. She is a graduate of Carleton College and the University of Minnesota’s Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs.
Email: laura(at)mncasa(dot)org Phone: Ext. 213
