Najah Bazzy
Ethel and James Flinn Foundation
Najah Bazzy, founder and CEO of Zaman International, has long known how to transform compassion into action. For more than two decades, she’s stood beside women and children facing poverty and trauma, building Zaman into an internationally recognized nonprofit that uplifts marginalized families with dignity and practical support. Now, Ms. Bazzy brings her insight and lived experience to the Ethel and James Flinn Foundation as its newest Board Trustee.
In December 2025, Ms. Bazzy was formally inducted into the board during a luncheon at the Detroit Athletic Club, where she met fellow trustees and honored recipients of the foundation’s Leonard W. Smith Mental Health Hero Awards. While she brings prior board experience, this marks her first role on a philanthropic foundation board.
As a registered nurse with experience in transcultural health care, Ms. Bazzy is known for her strategic thinking, creative problem-solving, and deep commitment to systems that honor the dignity of the individual. She says her time in the ICU working with patients undergoing bypass surgery informs her leadership philosophy to this day.
Ms. Bazzy’s path is marked by humility and impact. Zaman’s one-stop model for poverty relief includes food, clothing, shelter support, vocational training, and a health clinic all under one roof. In its three decades, Zaman has served 500,000 individuals in southeast Michigan and 5 million globally. The organization’s core values of dignity, integrity, and stewardship are deeply embedded into every interaction, something Ms. Bazzy believes will serve her well as a Flinn Trustee.
Contact: info@flinnfoundation.org.
Charles Fields, Ravi Kavasery, and Mónica Morales
Blue Shield of California Foundation
Blue Shield of California Foundation recently welcomed three new members to its board of trustees: Charles Fields, Executive Vice President of Programs at The James Irvine Foundation; Ravi Kavasery, M.D., Senior Vice President and Chief Medical Officer at Blue Shield of California; and Mónica Morales, MPA, Director of Health and Human Services for Yolo County, California.
To see the full board, click here.
Christie L. Hager
Health Foundation of Central Massachusetts
The Health Foundation of Central Massachusetts announced the election of Christie L. Hager as Chair of its Board of Directors, making her the first woman elected to the role in The Health Foundation’s 27-year history.
Hager previously served as the regional director of Region I (New England) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services under President Obama, where she oversaw the implementation of the Affordable Care Act in New England. She has served in senior roles at MassHealth within the Massachusetts Executive Office of Health and Human Services and holds a faculty appointment at UMass Chan Medical School.
Hager earned her law degree from the University of Connecticut School of Law and her Master of Public Health degree from the Boston University School of Public Health. Her undergraduate degree is from Smith College.
Contact: Izzy Nickel at izzy@ballcg.com.
Dr. Mati Hlatshwayo
Missouri Foundation for Health
Missouri Foundation for Health (MFH) appointed Dr. Mati Hlatshwayo Davis as Executive Vice President and Chief Strategy Officer. A respected infectious diseases physician and public health leader, Dr. Hlatshwayo Davis will help advance MFH’s strategic plan, aligning programs, partnerships, and policy efforts to remove barriers to health and opportunity across Missouri. Her first day with the foundation was February 23, 2026.
In this role, Dr. Hlatshwayo Davis serves as a key member of the executive team, working closely with President and CEO Dr. Dwayne Proctor and the board of directors to help all Missourians be as healthy as possible, regardless of geography or background. She will focus on strengthening internal alignment, deepening partnerships across sectors, and amplifying community-led solutions that address the root causes of poor health. Her appointment reinforces MFH’s commitment to collaborative leadership and to serving as a trusted, statewide resource.
Dr. Hlatshwayo Davis most recently served as Director of Health for the City of St. Louis, where she led a comprehensive modernization of the city’s public health infrastructure. During her tenure, the department expanded staffing, achieved national reaccreditation, and launched the city’s first Behavioral Health Bureau and City Justice Center Health Monitoring Bureau, efforts that contributed to improvements in mental health access and a renewed spotlight on jail deaths. She also spearheaded innovative mobile health initiatives that reached more than 13,000 residents in marginalized neighborhoods annually.
Her leadership in St. Louis earned regional and national attention for strengthening organizational capacity, advancing public health policy, and rebuilding trust between institutions and communities.
Before her government service, Dr. Hlatshwayo Davis practiced at the John Cochran Veterans Hospital and served as faculty at Washington University School of Medicine. She has held leadership roles in HIV medicine; medical education; and diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives. She currently serves as a board member of the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) and is executive producer and co-host of IDSA’s “Let’s Talk ID” podcast. A frequent contributor to international media, she has been featured by outlets such as the BBC, CNN, and Al Jazeera.
Contact: Courtney McCall at cmccall@mffh.org.
Katherine Howitt
The Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts Foundation
The Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts Foundation appointed Katherine Howitt to Vice President of Policy and Research. Ms. Howitt succeeds Kaitlyn Kenney Walsh, who was recently named president and CEO of the foundation. Ms. Howitt will oversee the foundation’s policy and research agenda, guiding work focused on health insurance coverage and access to care, behavioral health, and racial inequalities in health.
Ms. Howitt previously served as Director of the Massachusetts Medicaid Policy Institute, a dedicated arm of the foundation’s policy and research agenda that aims to promote the development of effective Medicaid policy solutions (MassHealth in Massachusetts) through research and policy analysis. In that role, she oversaw the release of an influential report on Massachusetts’ Estate Recovery policy, which documented how the policy disproportionately harmed low-income families and perpetuated intergenerational poverty. The report and its accompanying media coverage helped spur changes to state law that will reduce financial harm on MassHealth members and their families.
Ms. Howitt also expanded the foundation’s role as an educational resource on Medicaid policy by leading webinars and briefings that reached hundreds of policymakers, advocates, and community-based organizations. She has been invited by MassHealth to serve with other community experts as an advisor to MassHealth on the Delivery System Technical Advisory Committee and the Payment Policy Advisory Board. Prior to joining the foundation, Ms. Howitt worked at Community Catalyst where she led campaigns to expand and protect Medicaid coverage at the state and federal levels.
Contact: Izzy Nickel at 617.243.9950 or izzy@ballcg.com.
Dr. Nora Suric
Health Foundation for Western & Central New York
Nora Suric, PhD, President of the Health Foundation for Western & Central New York, has been named to the Board of Directors of Grantmakers in Aging (GIA), a community of funders mobilizing money and ideas to strengthen policies, programs, and resources for all people as they age. The GIA board includes leaders in philanthropy and healthy aging issues from across the United States.
Dr. Suric brings decades of expertise in philanthropy with a focus on older adult issues to her role with GIA. Before joining the Health Foundation as President in 2017, she served in roles with The John A. Hartford Foundation and the Brookdale Foundation.
She established the position of Director of National and Internal Partnerships at the International Longevity Centre Global Alliance. She also served as the Vice Chair of the United Nations NGO Committee on Ageing, which provided consultation to the development of the United Nations International Plan on Action on Ageing in 2002. In 2021, Dr. Suric collaborated to launch a statewide campaign to advocate for a Master Plan for Aging in New York State. In 2022, Gov. Kathy Hochul initiated the plan and named Dr. Suric to the state’s Master Plan for Aging Stakeholder Committee.
Contact: Kerry Jones Waring at 716.380.7319 or kjwaring@hfwcny.org.
Annie Ulevitch
Hellman Foundation
The Hellman Foundation announced that its Executive Director, Annie Ulevitch, has accepted a position with a new start-up foundation, and her last day with the foundation was March 13.
Annie served as the foundation’s Executive Director for three years. Among the many milestones during that time, she partnered with the Board and Foundation team to shape a thoughtful spend-down strategy that the Hellman Foundation will continue implementing in the years ahead. The foundation’s highest priority remains their commitment to the community partners and programs that are building equity and opportunity in the San Francisco Bay Area.
During this time of transition, the Board is reflecting on what the foundation needs in its next leader.
Contact: Laurel Severt at laurel.severt@thirdplateau.com