The Chief Communications Officer (CCO) for the Nevada Division of Emergency Management/Homeland Security is a visionary leader responsible for creating and implementing communication strategies that build Nevada’s resilience against natural and human-made disasters. This role supports Nevada’s diverse communities across all phases of emergency management—preparedness, response, and recovery—by fostering clear, accurate, and timely communication. The CCO’s responsibilities include leading initiatives to build a statewide culture of preparedness and resilience while aligning communication strategies with the division’s overarching goals. During both crisis situations and routine operations, the CCO oversees all communication efforts to ensure that information is consistently delivered to the public, media, and internal stakeholders. Collaboration is central to the role, with the CCO working closely with local, state, and federal agencies to coordinate information-sharing efforts that facilitate unified responses to emergencies.A key part of the role involves managing the Joint Information Center (JIC), and coordinating unified messaging and public information efforts during disaster responses. The CCO ensures JIC operations maintain clarity and cohesion across all communication channels, strengthening public understanding and trust.

I pride myself in having been responsible for effectively driving marketing communications strategies; from the conceptualization and planning stages, through to implementation and performance analysis. As the Joint Information Director, I was charged with activating the State Joint Information Center as an extension of the governor’s office in March of 2020 to ensure the State delivers one united message for Nevada’s COVID-19 response efforts. The team comprised of nine to 16 members worked with local, state and federal agencies to prepare and disseminate Nevada Health Response campaigns to include: brochures, press releases, talking points, posters, press briefings/conferences, social media, public and media inquires, political updates and briefs, weekly reports, videos and the website. I develop and implement messaging to keep state and federal agencies, the media, and Nevada citizens informed during emergency situations. Additionally, I maintain the state's readiness strategies year-round, create multi-platform campaigns to keep the public prepared, and manage projects such as creating an interagency PIO toolkit and serving on the Sierra Front Wildfire Cooperators team. I have served on the Nevada Emergency Alert System Board for 12 years and support the AMBER and Silver Alert programs.

I worked closely with the Public Safety Director to keep the public and the media informed during emergency situations. I also created awareness campaigns, wrote press releases, organized press conferences, strategic planning and program development, implemented safety training programs, and developed the department's monthly progress and annual reports.

As publisher, I managed the newspaper's $8 million budget and coordinated the various departments: operations, finance, advertising, editorial, circulation, and marketing. In addition to the newspaper, we published niche products such as an emergency preparedness guide and a book on the Angora Fire.

I managed 11 regional advertising directors throughout Northern Nevada and the Sierra to meet aggressive ad sales and training goals for the group. Additionally, I worked with business owners to find the advertising strategies and products that would best help them be successful.

As Director of Advertising for the Nevada Appeal and eight regional newspapers, I was responsible for developing and meeting our $11 million budget goals, training our sales staff of 50, and developing partnerships with local businesses and competitive media for community events. I worked with businesses to come up with media strategies that best fit their goals, and worked with sales staff to come up with training and incentives that best supported their career successes. Additionally, I oversaw advertising sales for Tahoe.com and Reno.com.

As a sales manager, I trained my team of 13, ensuring they had the skills and knowledge necessary to reach our revenue goals while helping their clients achieve their own business goals.

As sales supervisor for my team of four, my team and I cultivated a new advertising sales territory through cold calls, building a strong rapport with clients while surpassing our monthly sales goals. I was named Salesperson of the Year in 1995, and my team achieved Team of the Year in 1997.