Meet the Board

TAMARA, founder of Santuario de Karuna

AMY is one of our newer board members. She has been a valued volunteer at Santuario de Karuna with her family for years. Born in Santa Fe, Amy has always had a strong connection to animals, and an ardent interest in the health of our planet. She has volunteered with the Santa Fe Animal Shelter and Humane Society and local organization Zero Waste New Mexico where she aided in the effort to ban plastic bags in Albuquerque.  Amy is profoundly thankful for the joy the residents at the sanctuary share and the hope that living vegan brings to her and her family. Amy is a foodie, a maker, a photographer, a homeschool mom, and a small business owner. Amy is honored and excited to serve on the board.  Amy is a huge asset to our board & brings great experience & expertise to SDK in many ways!

DANNY, our newest  board member has been a SdK supporter for many years. In fact, he was our biggest customer at our popup events. Danny is a NM native but has lived and traveled the world.  He has held many interesting jobs including teaching.  He is retired and currently lives in Las Vegas, New Mexico along with his three rescue dogs.  Danny is also a frequent visitor of the Inn Sanctuary on site. He is a great new addition to our board! 

JOY is the 2nd longest board member of the sanctuary. She leads a lot of our fundraising events including the annual vegan bake sale and yard sale.
She is always willing to step in to help whenever needed. She is our meme generator expertise! She is a long time vegan and loves to try new vegan recipes. She is also a co-organizer of Abq-Vegan and hosts a lot of the restaurant and fundraising meetups. She has been fostering animals and volunteering for various animal rescues, shelters, and sanctuaries for many years. She has been a speech-language pathologist in the public schools for over 15 years, working with children of all ages. She is from Albuquerque and lives with her daughter and their 6 companion animals.

LISA is our longest board member.  She has been with the sanctuary since the very beginning. In fact, she was there when Karuna, the cow first came home.  She is a long time vegan, an animal lover and advocate for animal rights. Lisa believes they are all someone, not something.  She lives in Albuquerque with her husband Chris and their doggies.  Lisa is originally from the Boston, MA area and has a BS in Accounting and is a CPA.  She is also the organizer of the local Albuquerque vegan group Abq-Vegan & volunteers for other vegan organizations & local non-profits in NM.  You can catch her at most Santuario de Karuna tabling & fundraiser events around town.  She also does a lot of the SDK Facebook & Instagram posts.

SHAY is one of our newer board members but a long time volunteer and supporter of the sanctuary. Shay moved to NM about 15 years ago from the west coast area.
She plans a lot of the sanctuaries fundraisers including the annual fudgeraiser. She also does most of the baking for Tia Mom’s Cocina, all vegan baker in Albuquerque.  Tia Mom’s 1st popup in fact benefited Santuario de Karuna.  They continue to be one of the sanctuary’s biggest supporters. They donate food and treats to a lot of the sanctuary’s events. Shay has done a lot of volunteer work for other non profits helping both animals and humans. 
Shay is one of the admins for the local vegan Facebook and Instagram pages. 
She currently lives with many rescued dogs and cats.