Our U.S. Board

Mike served as administrative executive at Adventist Medical Center in Portland, Oregon, for 38 years. He is now “retired” and lives in Vancouver, Washington, with his wife Donna. When he’s not visiting his two kids and six grandkids, he loves to spend time hiking the mountains and serving on the board of several nonprofits. Mike and Donna helped build a school in Kenya and Mike has personally visited some of the zero-income villages in western Uganda where Ourganda works.

Michael and his wife, Kim, are proud parents of five children and four grandchildren. They love to travel, and Michael has enjoyed coaching youth sports for over 15 years. He is a former police officer, has worked as a vice president at U.S. Bank, and has been a business consultant for 20 years and counting. Michael and Kim sponsor a child in Uganda, and every time Michael hears a story or sees a photo of someone in need, he can’t wait to use his influence and experience to make a difference.

What do you call a person who travels to the same part of Uganda year after year? Committed? Obsessed? Focused? Ron and his daughter visited western Uganda in 2006 and helped set up a new NGO for orphans. His love for the kids and families coupled with obvious, heartbreaking medical needs, led him to found Ourganda in partnership with the other board members. Ron’s love is his family (wife Fran, two daughters, two sons-in-law, three grandkids), his hobby is hiking (preferably in the snow), and his passion is helping people find hope.

Marla is a busy wife to Paul (16 years and counting) and mom to Camden and Kylie. In 2000, she became a registered nurse. She has worked as a nurse on a cardiac care unit, at the county jail, in intensive care, and currently works as a certified diabetes educator. In her free time, Marla loves being outdoors; especially camping, attending live music shows, and watching baseball and football games. Whenever she has to be indoors, you might find her playing strategy board games with friends. Her passion for health and wellness education and disease prevention coupled with her love for the under-resourced in Uganda makes her a perfectly valuable board member.

Ron is a retired educator and general contractor. His wife, Phyllis, is an RN who traveled to western Uganda in 2014 and left part of her heart with the beautiful people 11 times zones away. Ron’s former hobbies were drag racing (19 years) and sailing in the Puget Sound and the San Juans (12 years). Ron’s business and building experience matched with his excitement for helping the most vulnerable people of Uganda make him a valuable member of the board.

She was a little girl named Joy, only three years old, when she dreamed of being a missionary doctor in Africa. In 2016, her dream came true when she served on a team that traveled to an orphanage and school in western Uganda. On the weekend, she visited one of the zero-income villages near the Congo border where people have nothing but hope that someone loves them. Now, Dr. Joy Staley serves on our board of directors. She is a clinical psychologist who has a private practice at the Center for Counseling and Psychotherapy in Yakima, Washington, while teaching classes on behavioral medicine and counseling students at Pacific Northwest University of Health Sciences (a DO Medical School) and Heritage University.

Steve has been a businessman for 40 years in Southern California and Vancouver, Washington. His primary passion, however, is helping those who need a hand, especially vulnerable women and kids. Steve has traveled to Mexico on numerous mission trips to Hermosillo, Baja, and Coahuila City. When he learned about a new non-profit that saves and extends lives in western Uganda, he jumped in with both feet. “It doesn’t take much to save lives in the forgotten parts of the world,” Steve says. “So why wouldn’t I do this?”