Dave Scullin joined CFT as president and CEO in January 2017 after a forty-year career with two major global firms, Deloitte and Arthur Andersen. He is a multifaceted leader, strategic business adviser, financial expert, and CPA.

With over 100 employees and assets of more than $1.2 billion, CFT is one of the largest of nearly 800 community foundations in the nation. CFT focuses on growing giving in our region, catalyzing change in critically important areas such as education, medical and scientific research, and public safety, and strengthening the local philanthropic sector of donors and nonprofits.

To support the mission of amplifying philanthropic impact in North Texas and beyond, Scullin works with CFT’s strong board of trustees who have wide-ranging knowledge of community needs, philanthropic perspective, and fiscal responsibility to steward more than 1,000 charitable funds for families, companies, private foundations, and nonprofits. CFT also attracts grants from numerous state and national foundations as well as the state of Texas.

CFT created and operates North Texas Giving Day, which in 2020 raised $58.8 million on just one day to benefit 3,000 nonprofits in the North Texas region. It has become the nation’s largest single-day of community-wide giving, and it has encouraged the development of online giving days across the United States. CFT’s other major initiatives include Educate Texas, a statewide public-private initiative to improve public education; the Caruth Fund grantmaking; the Working Family Success Network of North Texas; and CFT for Business.

CFT has been especially active during the COVID-19 pandemic by deploying its giving day platform, opening ten unique relief funds, and co-developing a shared grant application process, North Texas Cares, to enable more than 30 philanthropic partners to extend grants rapidly. Altogether during the pandemic, nearly $100 million of relief funds have been extended for community support for North Texas nonprofits.

Before joining Communities Foundation of Texas, Dave served as a strategic advisor to Fortune 500 clients with an extensive network in the North Texas community and beyond. Scullin was recognized as a top partner, holding multiple leadership roles over his career, including managing partner, lead client service partner for major global clients, industry leader, and creator of Deloitte’s nationally recognized North Texas CFO Forum.

Dave serves on the Board of Directors of Austin Industries and chairs its audit committee and has also served on numerous civic and other nonprofit entities.

Dave was featured as part of D Magazine’s Dallas 500:The Most Powerful Business Leaders in Dallas-Fort Worth in 2017, 2018 and 2019.

Dave lives in Collin County with Susan, his wife of more than forty years. His two adult children, their spouses, and his four grandchildren also reside in Texas.

 

Sarah Cotton Nelson joined CFT in 2008 and is currently the chief philanthropy officer.  Over the years, Sarah and her team have championed ways to enhance CFT’s policies and procedures to ensure more racially, geographically, and culturally inclusive grantmaking and community-responsive nonprofit capacity building.  Today, Sarah leads a team of 14 who work through the tools of grantmaking, programs, and sharing of insights to contributing to CFT’s overall objective of supporting Thriving Communities for All in the region. 

Sarah has a unique ability to connect people to data in order to catalyze community members to solve issues and is passionate about moving the needle on racial equity. She led CFT’s 2012 – 2014 Data-Driven Decision-Making Institute (D3) for nonprofits, the Working Family Success initiative; integrated a racial equity lens into CFT’s 2018 Dallas Economic Opportunity Assessment and 2020 Collin County Economic Opportunity Assessment; and partnered with the City of Dallas to produce their 2019 Equity Indicators Report. In 2017, she created CFT’s first racial equity-focused grant RFP, and was a founding member of Dallas Truth, Racial Healing, and Transformation.

Named to the list of D Magazine Heroes of 2020 for her involvement in the creation of North Texas Cares, some of Sarah’s other accolades include: 2019 Stagen Integral Leadership; Dallas Innovates 2018 Movers and Shakers; 2017 Presidential Leadership Scholars; 2016 Change Leaders in Philanthropy fellowship by Grantmakers for Effective Organizations (GEO); and 2013 Leadership Texas. She is a current member of the Dallas Assembly, TACA’s board of directors, and the Bush Institute North Korea Freedom Scholarship Committee.
 
 

Ann Beeson has been the Chief Executive Officer at Every Texan since 2013. Under her leadership, Every Texan has advanced school finance reform to help ensure all Texas children receive a quality education, passed landmark legislation to protect Texans from surprise medical bills, and helped to reduce the number of uninsured Texans. Ann is a proud Dallas native whose mother and extended family live in Collin County.

In her career, Ann has transformed organizations and embraced a wide range of innovative strategies to advance social change.

After law school, Ann served as law clerk to the Honorable Barefoot Sanders, then chief judge of the Northern District of Texas.  Ann previously served as Executive Director of U.S. Programs at the Open Society Foundations, as well the national Associate Legal Director of the American Civil Liberties Union, where she argued twice before the U.S. Supreme Court.

Mona Kafeel has dedicated her life and career to being a change maker. This year, she transitioned into the executive director’s role at Texas Muslim Women’s Foundation Inc. (TMWF), a nonprofit dedicated to empowering women and their families through multifaceted programs. She is instrumental in creating domestic violence shelters that are trauma-informed and culturally specific. 

Her extensive grassroots community work has led her to serve on multiple advisory boards, including the Asian Advisory Committee to the Congresswomen Eddie Bernice Johnson. Mona serves on the Public Policy Commission of the Texas Council on Family Council which researches, works, and eventually crafts the legislative agenda pertaining to intimate partner violence to ensure that survivor voices are included. Mona also serves on the Senior Advisory Board for senior citizens to the Mayor of City of Plano. In this capacity, she advises the city council on the issues that are important to seniors living in Plano. 

She led a youth led initiative in high schools across Dallas to educate/prevent teen violence. Mona created the Environmental Education Program for children in Plano ISD schools. At Texas Interfaith she led the development of community programs serving at-risk children, seniors, and unemployed adults. Mona is a frequent presenter on diversity, inclusion, and the intersection of faith and family violence.

Mona received the “Education Mentor” award from the City of Plano for her work, and is an alum of both Leadership Plano and the America Muslim Civic Leadership Institute at USC.

Dr. Neil Matkin became Collin College’s third District President on April 6, 2015. He previously served as Executive Vice President of the Louisiana Community & Technical College System where he was Executive Vice President over 16 colleges. Dr. Matkin also served as the statewide Chair of the Board of Regents Articulation and Transfer Committee.

Dr. Matkin's prior roles include: President of the Central Campus of San Jacinto College in Pasadena, Texas; Vice Chancellor and Chief Information Officer for the Virginia Community College System; and Chief Administrative Officer for the Illinois Century Network, a statewide effort under the Illinois Board of Higher Education.

Dr. Matkin currently serves on the Collin County Business Alliance Board and the Congressional Veteran’s Commendation Selection Board. He is also on the Board of the North Texas Commission.

He holds Associate of Arts, Bachelor of Arts, Master of Science, and Master of Business Administration degrees. Dr. Matkin earned his Doctor of Education from Texas A&M University-Commerce.  

 

LaMonte Thomas recently retired from Cigna Health Care North Texas and Oklahoma as president after an almost 24-year tenure with the company. He served as the senior leader for Cigna’s operations, competitiveness, and market growth in the region, and heping to provide access to quality care for Cigna customers. His responsibilities included enhancing customer satisfaction through personalized service; helping to improve quality of care by working in collaboration with area heath care professionals; assisting clients to improve the health and productivity of their workforces; and leading Cigna’s community service efforts.
 
LaMonte’s community engagement is both wide and deep. He is the Immediate Past President of the Plano Chamber of Commerce Board of Directors. He has also served in leadership roles with Salvation Army DFW, TexProtects Champions for Safe Children, Texas Diversity Council, Collin County Business Alliance, KERA, Dallas Mavericks Advisory Council, and Texas Health Community Impact Collin Leadership Council.



 

CFT Trustee Alfreda Norman brings deep experience in banking and community leadership to the board. Alfreda has vast subject-matter expertise on the issue of building economic stability for low-income working families, which is an important discretionary area of CFT’s grantmaking.

Alfreda Norman is a senior vice president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, where she oversees the Dallas Fed’s communications and public outreach programs, which support healthy economic growth and increased understanding of the economy and the Federal Reserve. She has responsibilities for corporate communications, digital communications and design, community development, economic education and financial industry outreach.

Before becoming a senior vice president, she served as vice president of community development at the Dallas Fed, promoting economic inclusion for lower-income communities and individuals.

Prior to joining the Dallas Fed in 2004, Norman was a senior vice president at Bank of America and was one of the first neighborhood development officers hired by Bank of America in Texas, in charge of developing a strategic community development plan to extend credit to low- and moderate-income communities.

In addition to banking, she has extensive experience working with the public and private sectors. She held management positions at the City of Dallas Office of Cultural Affairs and The Container Store corporate headquarters in Dallas.

Norman provides leadership to many cultural and civic organizations. In addition to her service to CFT as board chair, she serves on the board of the Dallas County Community College District Foundation, Southwestern Medical Foundation and the Meadows Foundation. She also serves on the executive board of the Meadows School of the Arts at Southern Methodist University and on the advisory boards of Dallas Promise and the Commit Partnership. She is a member of the Dallas Assembly.