Board of Directors

The Sacramento Area Animal Coalition is run solely by a volunteer board of directors. We are currently recruiting new board members.

Shannon Asquith, President

Joined SAAC board: 2007
Shannon has worked or volunteered for Sacramento area municipal and nonprofit animal shelters since 1998. She was volunteer coordinator for City of Sacramento Animal Care Services from 2002 to 2006 and continues to volunteer regularly for Sacramento County Animal Care and Regulation.

Shannon’s passion is to save lives and reduce unnecessary euthanasia by providing affordable spay/neuter services to needy families. Her focus is on fundraising and she is currently pursuing a master’s degree in philanthropy and development from St. Mary’s University in Minnesota and an MBA from National University in Sacramento. She hopes to combine her passion for saving lives with fundraising and business skills to increase the resources available for needy Sacramento area families.

Shannon adopted her first dog, Loomis, from the Sacramento SPCA in 1996. At almost 14 years old, he is still her best friend and the driving force behind her passion to help animals.

Kim Kinnee, Vice President

Joined SAAC board: 2008
Kim is the executive director of the Yolo County SPCA and an outspoken advocate for bringing more low-cost spay/neuter opportunities to Yolo County. She began fostering dogs for the Yolo County SPCA in 1998, joined its board of directors in 2000, and became executive director in 2004. She is also the chairperson of SAAC’s Spay Day Committee. Kim and her husband have fostered many dogs over the years, welcoming them into their home, socializing and caring for then, and finding them great forever homes. They have several pets of their own, including a large feral cat, appropriately named Chubbers.

Jonel Jorgensen, Treasurer

Joined SAAC board: 2001
Jonel is a founding member of the Sacramento Area Animal Coalition. After working for 20 years as an auditor and information technology manager for the state of California, Jonel began volunteering for TEAM (Teaching Everybody Animals Matter), a nonprofit affiliate of the Sacramento County shelter. She has volunteered for SAAC’s Spay Day event every year since 2002 and now serves as Treasurer for both TEAM and SAAC, lending her financial expertise to facilitate programs for animals. Jonel shares her home with her husband and the various neighborhood cats who come to visit. When she is not volunteering on behalf of animals, Jonel is traveling around the United States in a 19-foot Airstream. In 2009, she and her husband logged more than 12,000 miles and visited 30 states.

Alexis Raymond, Secretary

Joined SAAC board: 2006
Alexis brings nearly two decades of expertise in public relations, marketing communications, writing and editing to SAAC’s efforts to reduce animal overpopulation. She is currently the communications director for RedRover, a national nonprofit organization, and has volunteered for the Sacramento SPCA since 2003 as a dog walker and Web site photographer. Alexis has conducted publicity and media outreach for Spay Day since 2005 and manages SAAC’s Web site and other communications.

Alexis rescued her first dog, Nikki, in 2003 and adopted her second dog, Dewey, in 2004 from a shelter where he had been living for two years.

Ashley Dunleavy

Joined SAAC board: 2009
Ashley is immersed in animal welfare in the Sacramento region. She is the canine coordinator for the Yolo SPCA, a volunteer for the City of Sacramento Animal Care Services and United Animal Nations’ Emergency Animal Rescue Service, and has fostered dozens of dogs for various organizations. As the Spay Day 2009 Clinic Recruitment Coordinator she was instrumental in enabling SAAC and its partners to spay/neuter a record 1,020 animals. Ashley’s focus on the SAAC board is encouraging more veterinary clinics to participate in Spay Day and to offer more low-cost spay/neuter options for dogs. Ashley most recently adopted Windy, a dog who was removed from a hoarding situation in rural Nevada in 2008. Windy had never been near people, but she now is an energetic member of Ashley’s family who loves her morning bike rides.

Brittany Honeyman

Joined SAAC board: 2011

A lifelong animal lover, Brittany started acting on her passion in 2008 by becoming a volunteer for the Washington Animal Rescue League in Washington, D.C. and a member of her law school’s Student Animal Legal Defense Fund. After graduating, Brittany moved to Sacramento and began volunteering at Sacramento County Animal Care and Regulation and fostering for LAPCATS. Brittany is an attorney who shares her home with her boyfriend and several cats: Sharkey, an eight-year-old domestic shorthair; Sierra, a four-year-old ragdoll mix who began as a foster from the Washington Humane Society but quickly became a permanent member of the family; and a whole slew of foster cats. Her goal is to end euthanasia of all healthy and treatable pets and feral cats that enter animal shelters.

Alicia Mittleman

Joined SAAC board: 2011
Alicia is a social worker and has a long love of animals. She has volunteered with the Yolo County SPCA as a dog foster parent since 2008. Alicia shares her home with her husband Andrew, infant daughter Natalie, Pembroke Welsh Corgis Mikey and Marty, fox-terrier mix Sparkey and cat Violet.

Tracy Rhine

Joined SAAC board: 2008
Tracy began acting on her passion for animal welfare in 1995, helping Friends4Life with weekend pet adoptions around the Sacramento area. Since then Tracy has continued working with nonprofit organizations, including serving on the Board of Directors for Wildlife Care Association, which helps injured and orphaned wildlife in the region. Tracy joined SAAC as a Spay Day volunteer in 2003, and her primary focus is on Spay Day clinic participation.

Tracy shares her home with her husband, daughter and five pets: Maggie, a nine-year-old border collie rescued by Highway Patrol on I-80; Benjamin, a five-year-old year old pit bull mix who was adopted from WOOFF; Lucy and Larry, two-year-old cats who were relinquished at their veterinarian’s office; and, Elmo, a feral cat who came with their house.

Pam Runquist

Joined SAAC Board: 2001
Pam is a founding member of the Sacramento Area Animal Coalition. She got involved in SAAC because she wanted to balance her efforts to rescue, foster and adopt animals with efforts to control animal overpopulation through spay/neuter programs. Pam currently serves as chair of the SAAC Feral Cat Committee. She is involved in animal welfare advocacy on a national level through her job as veterinary advocacy director with the Humane Society Veterinary Medical Association. She also volunteers locally with the Yolo County SPCA, fostering cats and helping wth cat adoptions and doing TNR (trap, neuter and release) in the Yolo County area.

Pam and her husband, BJ, lost both of their beloved black lab mixes, Keri and Ralph, to cancer in 2009. They currently share their home with several rescued felines, including the most recent addition, Minnie, a brown tabby who was living in a feral cat colony who hasn’t stopped purring and playing since she arrived.

Lynnette Seymour

Joined SAAC board: 2008
Lynnette brings years of volunteer management and event planning to the SAAC board. She is a former volunteer at the Sacramento  SPCA and adoptive parent to dogs Rooster and Otter.

Advisory Members:

Jennifer Fearing
Barb Jones, DVM
Laurie Sipperstein-Cook, DVM