Our People
Complete biographies
Kristin Urquiza, MPA
Board President
Executive Director, Co-founder
Kristin Urquiza, MPA is the nation’s top disaster equity advocate, with expertise in race, economic, environmental, and health policy. An experienced grassroots organizer, Urquiza co-founded Marked by COVID and catalyzed the nation’s foremost community-led Covid justice movement days after the death of her father, Mark Urquiza, to COVID in June 2020.
Sarah Senk, PhD
Board Secretary
Sarah Senk, PhD is an associate professor in the Department of Culture and Communication at California State University Maritime Academy. She completed her Ph.D. in Comparative Literature in 2011 at Cornell University, where she focused on contemporary Anglophone writing, trauma theory, and memory studies.
Ryan Pukos, MPA
Board Treasurer
Policy Lead
Ryan Pukos, MPA has served as Marked by COVID's volunteer Policy Lead since the organization's founding and is one of the country's leading experts on COVID justice policy. He has also spent the last decade plus working at the intersection of urban planning and economic development with the Grand Central Partnership in New York City.
Kimberly Jones, Esq.
Board Director
Since 2007, Kimberly Jones, Esq. has served as a leading advocate for low-income students, first-generation students, students with disabilities, and students of color. Currently, Ms. Jones serves as the Executive Vice President at the Council for Opportunity in Education (“COE”).
Christine Keeves, MPH
Board Director
Communications Director, Co-founder
Christine Keeves, MPH co-founded Marked by COVID in 2020 and has built the communications infrastructure that drives the organization's national reach. A public health communicator with 20 years of experience, she brings rare fluency across earned media, digital strategy, and health advocacy — translating the human toll of COVID into stories that reach policy makers, funders, and the public.
Media contact: Christine@MarkedByCOVID.com
James E. Young, PhD
Memorial Advisor
Distinguished University Professor James E. Young, PhD is the author of Writing and Rewriting the Holocaust, The Texture of Memory, At Memory’s Edge: After-images of the Holocaust in Contemporary Art and Architecture, and The Stages of Memory: Reflections on Memorial Art, Loss, and the Spaces Between. His articles, reviews, and Op-Ed essays have appeared in The New York Times Magazine, Book Review, and Op-Ed pages, The Los Angeles Times, The Chicago Tribune, The Forward, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, and more.
Tara Swanigan
Tara Swanigan lost her father, Charles Krebbs, to COVID on August 7, 2020 (Phoenix, AZ)
Press Coverage:
Washington Post - COVID becomes plague of elderly, reviving debate over ‘acceptable loss.’ (09/30/22)
NPR - Charles Krebbs Is Among The More Than 200,000 People Who Died Of COVID-19 (09/23/20)
Wall Street Journal - Why Did Covid Overwhelm Hospitals? A Yearslong Drive for Efficiency (09/17/20)
Kaitlyn Urenda Harrison
Kaitlyn Urenda Harrison lost her mother, Genevieve Martinez BS R.N., to COVID on July 20, 2020 (Santa Fe, NM / El Paso, TX).
Press Coverage:
Teen Vogue - Conspiracy Theories Around Mass Shootings, Tragedies Affect Families Left Behind (06/15/23)
The New York Times - The Toll of One Million Deaths in the U.S. (05/14/22)
Fox4 - Dallas skyline goes amber to honor COVID-19 victims (01/19/21)
Fiana Garza Tulip, MA
Fiana Garza Tulip, MA lost her mother, Isabelle Papadimitriou, to COVID on July 4, 2020 (Brooklyn, NY / Dallas, TX)
Press Coverage:
The New York Times - As Covid Deaths Rise, Lingering Grief Gets a New Name (12/08/2021)
NBC News - A Texas respiratory therapist died of COVID-19. Her daughter is turning grief into action (09/10/20)
CNN - Op-Ed: Why I’ve been so vocal about my mom’s Covid-19 story (07/27/20)
Karlee Greer
Karlee Greer lost her father, Mike Horton, to COVID on April 28, 2020 (Dallas, TX)
Press Coverage:
99% Invisible - Don’t Forget to Remember (01/30/24)
TIME - ‘My Frustration Turned Into Anger.’ (11/19/21)
The New York Times - U.S. COVID deaths approach 500,000 (02/02/21)
CBS19 - East Texas Woman Taking A Stand Against COVID 19 (10/20/20)