Sergei Shkurkin, Founder and Senior Consultant

Sergei Shkurkin has been working directly or in support of front-line social services since 1985. He has written and linguistic fluency in Russian and has worked as a professional interpreter and translator. In 1994, Mr. Shkurkin co-founded True Management Services, LLC. Since that time, the company has steadily grown to ten consultants providing technical assistance, training, and project management and coordination services in a wide range of areas to CBOs and local governments, with a focus on rural California areas, the Central Valley, and faith-based organizations.

 Mr. Shkurkin’s primary areas of expertise include Training and technical assistance, especially as it relates to housing, emergency shelter, Medicaid, Medi-Cal, billing, audits, and compliance. Successful funding proposal development for capital and program projects. Developing and delivering tailored training curriculums. Youth and family services, with a focus on foster youth. Social services, with a special focus on housing and homelessness, including operational and capital development. Re-entry services for persons currently or formerly incarcerated. Affordable housing and community development. Organizational development, including fiscal reporting, grant administration, and program evaluation services. Refugee services. CalAIM, Medi-Cal, Medicaid, and other social service program implementation duties.  Prior to his tenure with TMS, Mr. Shkurkin served as Executive Director of Saint Vincent De Paul Housing in San Francisco, an agency providing emergency shelter and housing with services in San Francisco and Oakland. Between 1988 and 1994, he was Director of the Broderick Christian Center, an agency providing a day center for those experiencing homelessness, transitional housing for homeless families, refugee resettlement, a cost-free child development center, and transportation services for persons living with mental challenges. Mr.Shkurkin earned a BA in Psychology from the State University of the East Bay, and a Master of Science in Community Development from the University of California, Davis.

Tamara Gutel, Chief Executive Officer

Tamara Gutel is a grant writer and management specialist with experience in writing, implementing, managing, and evaluating public and privately funded projects. Ms. Gutel has a BA in Business Management from Evangel University and a Master’s Degree in International Community Development from Oxford. Her project experience includes foster youth, youth and adults experiencing homelessness, low-income and transitional housing, persons formerly incarcerated, and international refugees. Recently, Ms. Gutel has become a specialist in CalAIM, assisting several organizations in applying for and implementing CalAIM in over 30 California counties, several in rural areas. Her CalAIM experience includes providing technical assistance in program planning, document synthetization, hiring, organization, policy updates, data management, MCP and partner agency coordination and contracting, and Path CITED and IPP grant application and implementation. Ms. Gutel has also served in Executive Leadership roles for several community-based organizations providing humanitarian aid and resources, specializing in cross-culture communication and programming.

Becky Garrow, MPH Consultant

Becky Garrow, MPH, has a BA in Sociology from UC Davis and a master’s degree in Public Health from San Diego State University. She is experienced in research, evaluation, project coordination, surveys, data collection, and public health consulting, helping nonprofits, government agencies, and other organizations identify and achieve their project goals and objectives, creating and executing evaluation plans and research protocols, and build staff capacity with custom training and technical assistance. Ms. Garrow has worked with clients across the United States and Canada and provided trainings to international audiences. She has direct experience with training, technical assistance, and in-person data collection activities in rural areas in California and across the United States. She is formerly an adjunct faculty for the Allied Health Department at Sacramento City College, where she teaches Social Determinants of Health for the Community Health Worker certificate program. Currently, she is an instructor at the UC Davis School of Continuing and Professional Education. Her current projects include clients of the California Consortium on Urban Indian Health, the Public Health Institute, the National Association of Chronic Disease Directors, the Center for Healthy Children and Communities, Hospitality House of Grass Valley, Shores of Hope, and the National Opinion Research Center (NORC) at the University of Chicago. Previous clients include the California Department of Public Health, Nutrition Education and Obesity Prevention Branch, Veritable/Good Environmental Justice Consulting, Facente Consulting, and CityServe Network. Previously, Ms. Garrow managed the Survey Research Group at the Public Health Institute. She has served in research scientist and project coordinator roles at the California Rural Indian Health Board, California Tribal Epidemiology Center, and San Diego State University Research Foundation.

Scott Wead, Consultant

Scott Wead has over 20 years of faith-based non-profit experience. Previously, he served as the Director of International Operations for a global ministry and oversaw the management of over 90 employees in office locations in London, Manila, Brisbane, Durban, Toronto, and Bangalore. During the Covid-19 pandemic, he was involved with the writing of a USDA Farmers to Families food box proposal and the management of the last-mile logistics of a massive relief effort of this program helping to coordinate the delivery of over 5,000,000 food boxes through food banks, schools, and local churches. Since that time, he has helped to secure over $17 million in funding from the Department of Health and Human Services and other government agencies for numerous faith-based non-profit organizations in rural and underserved communities. Mr. Wead also is experienced in providing fiscal and administrative technical assistance to help ensure programs run by faith-based groups adhere to federal fiscal and program standards. Mr. Wead is familiar with CalAIM and in the spring of 2022 was involved with writing sixteen IPP applications that were funded. He is currently helping a large Los Angeles faith-based non-profit become operational as a CalAIM provider with Health Net. Mr. Wead has a BS in Communications from the University of Kansas.

Kailani Kaʻaihue, Consultant

Kailani is from and currently resides on the Big Island of Hawaiʻi, where she partakes in journaling, reading, hiking, and various ocean sports. She lived in Phoenix, Arizona for three and a half years while completing her higher education at Grand Canyon University. During this time she worked as an intern for Neighborhoods to Nations, one of True Management Service’s, LLC major clients, assisting the True team on a number of key projects.  She graduated in the Fall of 2022 with her BA in English with an Emphasis in Professional Writing. Being aware of her talent and skill both as a writer and researcher, True leadership asked her to join the team upon graduation.  Kailani is working to perform as a writer analyst on grant projects and is particularly inspired by her family of business owners and educators who have worked with grants to benefit the community of Hawaiʻi. Kailani has a heart for serving others and is eager to learn about those who come from diverse walks of life. She enjoys finding solutions to various social issues and one day hopes to apply her skills as a writer analyst to, fund programs that benefit Native Hawaiian communities. Some personal goals Kailani has set for herself that are unrelated to her career include – running a marathon and writing a romance novel.

Albany Magallanes, Consultant

Albany Magallanes is a bilingual and bicultural project support staff and data collection specialist. Fluent in written and spoken English and Spanish, Ms. Magallanes has provided outreach services in both of these languages, created Spanish language outreach materials, assisted clients with HIPAA compliance standards, and provided fiscal grant management technical assistance and oversight. From 2009 to 2015, Ms. Magallanes worked for the Public Health Institute, where she conducted over 15,000 interviews in English and Spanish, and monitored over 5,000 recorded interviews while working on the CDC-funded Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance Study. She possesses strong communication and project management skills. In her capacity as a Research Assistant with the Cancer Registry of Greater California, she collaborated and worked closely with secure, confidential data collection that included protected and private patient and survey-respondent health information. Albany is proficient in HIPAA data collection requirements and patient confidentiality. She has experience conducting primary qualitative and quantitative data collection activities for scientific research projects, including those involving medical records.

Nasiya Jae Gordy-Brown, Consultant

Nasiya Jae Gordy-Brown has a BA in English and Mass Communications from California State University, Hayward. For over a decade, Ms. Gordy-Brown has served numerous nonprofits, working directly with at-risk youth and those with mental health challenges. She has completed case management services for clients throughout northern California in Hayward, East Oakland, Berkeley, Sacramento, and West Sacramento. Previously, she successfully ran the Mayors Summer Job Program for Oakland youth, developing new initiatives and opportunities to connect and serve an at-risk youth population. She currently provides technical assistance and in-depth case management training for TMS.  She is a specialist in CalAIM ECM guidelines and has developed training in ECM standards and guidelines to apply to existing case management systems.

Kai Milam, Consultant

Kai Milam has been directly working with non-profit organizations for over 10 years. His experience includes both adults and youth experiencing homelessness. While earning his bachelor’s in psychology, he worked with transitional-age youth, providing housing support and daily living skill education. Today, Kai manages an Enhanced Care Management (ECM) and Community Support (CS) program across multiple counties. He hopes to improve California’s Social Services by helping other Community-Based Organizations (CBOs) implement their own programs.  

Tara M. Sirvent, PhD, Consultant

Tara M. Sirvent is a seasoned researcher, grant writer and manager, program evaluator, and higher education professional. Dr. Sirvent has a PhD in Plant Pathology with emphases in Molecular Biology and Natural Resources from Cornell University. She earned a bachelor’s degree in both Chemistry and Biology at Vanguard University. She is a passionate and innovative leader in not only higher education but also within the community. Recently, Dr. Sirvent has become a specialist in CalAIM, assisting several organizations in applying for and implementing CalAIM in several California counties, several in rural areas. Her CalAIM experience includes providing technical assistance in program analysis and planning, optimization of policy protocols, data management, as well as agency coordination and contracting. Dr. Sirvent has over twenty-three years of teaching and leadership experience in various disciplines of STEM, including the natural, physical, and health sciences. She is a seasoned practitioner of culturally responsive pedagogy and active learning that facilitates equity and student success. She uses her prolific grant-writing and project-management experience to improve student outcomes and to facilitate faculty development and mentoring to support student success initiatives, including HSI and MSI-specific strategies.