Board of Directors

Lisa Griffin Burns was pleased to join the Board of Community Homeless Solutions in April 2019, supporting its mission to serve the most vulnerable in our community, particularly the growing number of youth and families experiencing housing instability. During her tenure, Lisa has brought a thoughtful and candid perspective to the organization, challenging existing practices, identifying opportunities for improvement, and helping translate ideas into action. She values clear goals, honest communication, strong partnerships, and the willingness to push an organization forward when meaningful change is needed. Looking ahead, her goals for the organization include expanding and diversifying the Board, increasing community awareness of CHSolutions and its impact, and ensuring that the organization is more broadly recognized for the vital work it does throughout the community.

A longtime Monterey County resident, Lisa has spent 25 years supporting students and families through her professional work. Before turning her attention to education, she served for seven years as Director of two Monterey community centers, Casanova Oak Knoll and Hilltop Park Center. In 2000, she left to help launch a new charter school, the International School of Monterey (ISM), which has grown into a highly regarded public K-8 school in Seaside serving students from Monterey County through the rigorous International Baccalaureate program.

During her 18 years at ISM, Lisa was a member of the Administrative Leadership Team, providing expertise in human resources, volunteer engagement, operations, and facilities and safety management. She was especially passionate about building community, making it a cornerstone of her leadership style and ensuring that every member of the ISM community felt supported, valued, and truly part of its uniquely caring culture.

It is this passion for community that Lisa has carried into her nonprofit advocacy work since leaving the International School of Monterey. In June 2019, she stepped away from ISM to broaden her focus to issues affecting the county as a whole, with a commitment to continued learning, growth, and community engagement. Her goal has been to understand what is happening in the community, raise awareness, respond to emerging needs, and help create meaningful change. Lisa became deeply involved in housing affordability and homelessness after participating directly in Monterey County’s 2019 biennial Point-in-Time (PIT) Count. Seeing firsthand the staggering impact of rising housing costs and the lack of affordable housing on families, youth, and older women experiencing homelessness was pivotal in shaping her ongoing community advocacy and engagement.

In addition to serving on the Board of Community Homeless Solutions, Lisa is deeply committed to community advocacy and service in support of housing affordability and homelessness, foster youth, the nonprofit sector, and those impacted by cancer. She serves as a Court-Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) for a foster youth in Monterey County and promotes housing affordability solutions, including accessory dwelling unit (ADU) construction, through United Way’s ADU Advisory Committee. She also volunteers with COVIA’s Home Match program, which connects people seeking housing with homeowners who have space to share, helping address both housing insecurity and social isolation.

Lisa spent more than a decade as a Co-Director, board member, and volunteer with the Monterey County Nonprofit Alliance (NAMC), including its Annual Awards Celebration and Advocacy Committee. She is also an active organizing member of Women’s March Monterey Bay. Inspired by her own experience with Healing Touch during cancer treatment, Lisa serves on the Board of Healing Partners of the Central Coast (HPCC), helping extend this support to others navigating cancer and their healing journeys.

Lisa holds an M.A. in International Policy Studies from the Middlebury Institute of International Studies (MIIS) and a B.A. in Business Management. Before moving to the Monterey Peninsula in 1989 to pursue graduate studies, she lived and worked overseas in the Middle East and Germany as the daughter of a diplomat, experiences that fostered her lifelong curiosity about the world, travel, and foreign affairs. Outside of her professional and community commitments, Lisa enjoys swimming, walking her dog, Rambo, bicycling and e-biking, gardening, kayaking, painting, and even skydiving! She brings that same enthusiasm, positivity, curiosity, and passion to her service on the Community Homeless Solutions Board.