Meet Our Team

Jim Hanna

Executive Director
jhanna@ccfoodsecurity.org 

Jim has over 30 years of experience in food systems work. His projects include founding the New American Sustainable Agriculture Project in 2002. In partnership with recent immigrants and refugees, he established a program with a goal to build immigrant-owned farm enterprises in Maine. His publications include co-authoring “Whole Measures for Community Food Systems: Values-Based Planning and Evaluation.” He was the original editor and writer for “Race and the Food System” located at the web-based USDA Food Security Learning Center hosted by WhyHunger. He is a co-founder of the Northeast Network of Immigrant Farming Projects among others. He has worked as a consultant assisting groups with organizational development and evaluation. His clients include Growing Power, USDA, Heifer International, Cultivating Community, Northeast Organic Farmers Association, Center for African Heritage, WhyHunger, Four Directions Development Corp. and Coastal Enterprises, Inc.
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Alison LaPlante

Food Fuels Learning Coordinator VISTA
laplaa@portlandschools.org

Alison is our Food Fuels Learning VISTA Coordinator. She is excited to continue Grace Montgomery’s work on Phase 2 and to support development in new directions. Alison recently graduated from the University of Maine at Farmington with a degree in Community Health Education and minors in Nutrition Education and Childhood and Adolescent Health. Her field of study has only amplified her passion of helping those in need, with a focus on health disparities within a community. Alison is driven to make a difference in the lives of those she will be serving with the goal of improving their overall quality of life.  

Food Access Organizer
gleaning@ccfoodsecurity.org

Colleen Donlan was born and raised in Portland, ME and attended Portland schools. Colleen graduated from Colgate University where she studied Political Science and Environmental Studies, focusing on food systems through internships and research projects. She completed her second year as an AmeriCorps VISTA with CCFSC in August 2020 and is excited to continue to work with CCFSC on food access projects. ​​

Kristina Kalolo

Farm to School Project Director
​kalolokristina@gmail.com

Kristina is passionate about working at the intersections of social change, sustainable food systems, and collective healing. She also currently serves as the Markets Manager for the Somali Bantu Community Association and is on the Steering Committee of Maine Food Strategy, the Leadership Teams for Maine Farm to School Network, Maine Farm to Institution, Maine Farmer Resource Network, and Food Fuels Learning. Kristina has participated with food webs through her roles as a fishmonger, rural and urban farmer, artisan chocolatier, cafeteria worker, and farm to table caterer. She received her B.A. in Anthropology, Sociology, and International Studies from Elmira College, her M.A. in International Development and Social Change from Clark University, and participated in Food Solutions New England’s Network Leadership Institute.

Lauren Hickey

Local Foods Coordinator VISTA
lauren@ccfoodsecurity.org

Lauren is deeply passionate about food justice and sustainable food systems. She has been pursuing this passion since high school, when she and a friend led a grassroots Farm to School initiative in her hometown in Connecticut. After high school, she moved to Maine to attend Bowdoin College, where she studied Environmental Studies and Government and Legal Studies with a focus on food systems. During college, she continued exploring food justice from various angles and locales: she worked on a organic farm, interviewed farmers across the state for a summer research project, led a service trip to Aroostook County, worked with migrant agricultural workers in Downeast Maine, and wrote a children's book based on her research with campesino farmers in Bolivia. She is thrilled to join the CCFSC team and make connections with food system stakeholders in the Portland area.