We call TreePeople headquarters “Yurt Village” because it’s comprised of 7 yurts nestled together in a little corner of Coldwater Canyon Park at the very top of Beverly Hills.

Each yurt contains one or two different teams – a massive yurt at the front of the village houses the Forestry team; another holds the Environmental Education team, another Policy, another Park Operations and Grants, and one more large yurt contains Marketing/ Communications and Development.

The entire village works together like a machine to support the daily operations of TreePeople. The work of each individual varies even more than the yurts do, and each person on our little campus is vital to the big picture of planting trees, doing reforestation work in the mountains, supporting students and teachers, maintaining the park, and creating equity through environmentalism in LA.

One of the biggest pieces of the machine that keeps TreePeople running is the Development team. Put simply, it’s their job to ensure that the entire organization has the funding to continue its work. The team is comprised of three absolute rockstars and it’s time that these unsung heroes receive some credit where credit is due!

Courtney Gross is our Director of Major Gifts. An LA Native, Courtney is adept at soliciting and closing major gifts, implementing successful donor-centric events and high touch meetings, and working with and managing teams. She’s passionate about health and can be seen getting her 10,000 steps in around the village any given day!

Richard Rosenbaum is our Director of Individual Giving. After moving to LA from New York to pursue graduate studies in Public Administration at USC, he has been in the nonprofit world for most of his career. Richard loves hiking with his family in the San Gabriel Mountains above his home in tree-lined Pasadena.

Alina Nakano is our Annual Giving Coordinator. The scope of her work is diverse – she creates emails, runs our Tree Dedication program, and MUCH more. After receiving her Bachelor’s in Environmental Science and Biology, Alina decided to focus her career on the intersection of science and nonprofit work.

Together, the three make our incredible development team. Their efforts have allowed an immeasurable amount of work to be accomplished and without them, TreePeople couldn’t do all of the great things it does every single day.

Thank you, Development Team!