President
Vice President
Treasurer
Secretary
Kathleen Gillespie joined the Impact Board in October 2015 because she wanted to both advocate for the extraordinary clients Impact serves and provide energy and support to the talented staff, board and generous donors who assist Impact clients as they recover from serious mental illness. Following a career as a healthcare consulting firm partner, Kathleen serves on several nonprofit boards involved in healthcare for older adults, education for underserved and minority communities, and civil liberties, including Three Crowns Park Senior Living, the Barat Education Foundation and the Nominating Committee of the ACLU of Illinois. Kathleen has an undergraduate degree in History and a master’s degree in Counseling Psychology.
Don joined Impact in 2019 after a nearly 40-year career as a Financial Services Executive. He was drawn to the organization’s mission of offering holistic care to participants, providing comprehensive services in housing, employment and clinical support so that each person can live as independently as possible within the community.
Throughout his career at Northern Trust, Don has held various leadership positions across business units. He most recently served as head of relationship management for the Institutional Asset Management Group. His team worked side by side with portfolio managers, client investment officers, consultant callers, retirement solutions and other investment specialists to create and implement customized investment strategies for clients.
Actively involved in volunteerism, Don has served as Treasurer of the Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra, and has held a number of board positions with Congregation Hakafa.
Don served as Impact’s Board President from 2023-2025.
Treasurer
Peter Michaels has spent his entire professional career as a Financial Adviser, working with individuals, companies, pension plans, endowments and foundations to help achieve their goals for their investment programs. Peter obtained the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) designation.
It is his passion for working with clients and helping them achieve their objectives that attracted him to volunteering for Impact. The agency’s ability to provided tangible, measurable services, such as affordable housing, clinical services and employment education, to those with chronic mental illness, is very meaningful to Peter. He has volunteered with the organization for over 15 years, and during that time he has assisted Impact in bringing additional housing units to the agency and maintaining its financial stability during challenging budgetary times.
Carol Henes joined the Impact Board in 2016, although she first learned about the organization during its early years. Carol has lived in Evanston since 1981 and has served on the boards of several not-for-profit organizations including the Evanston Mental Health Board, the Evanston Community Foundation, Leadership Evanston and the United Way. Carol was an administrator at Northwestern University for close to 20 years. Before transitioning to higher education, she worked in the health care field. She has an undergraduate degree in music and social work and a master’s degree in public health.
Renee Lanam is a senior executive with over 20 years experience in the areas of finance and legal. Former CFO and General Counsel for Equinix, Inc., a multi-national company that designs, builds and operates Internet data centers and former attorney at Gunderson, Dettmer, a business law firm for entrepreneurs, emerging growth companies and venture capitalists.
Renee chose to be on Impact’s board because she believes that those in need must be part of our communities and provided with the services they need to succeed. Impact’s model of scattered sites in our community and wrap around clinical and job placement support is successfully executed by a passionate team of professionals.
Dr. Anne Chodzko has been a licensed clinical psychologist for the past 24 years and spent the early years of her career as the Clinical Coordinator for Northwestern Memorial Hospital’s Emergency Housing Program, a housing and clinical stabilization program for homeless individuals whose life trajectories had been altered by serious and persistent mental illnesses. Dr. Chodzko spent the next 17 years providing clinical treatment in a 400 bed psychiatric residential facility in the Edgewater/Uptown neighborhood of Chicago. Dr. Chodzko has been referring clients to Impact Behavioral Health Partners for over 20 years. As her professional career has moved more towards private practice, joining Impact’s Board of Directors in July of 2017 enables her to remain actively engaged in her passion of improving the lives of those directly affected by serious mental illnesses.
Dan smith is a Level II Bank Manager and Mortgage Professional at TCF Bank.
His interest in Impact began thanks to its talented and enthusiastic staff and board. He has great confidence in the Impact team to deliver services and care to our community. Seeing the lives affected by this good work keeps his passion and engagement strong in the organization.
Erika is a senior marketing professional at Walgreen Co., leading digital strategy for health and pharmacy marketing campaigns.
Her interest in Impact stemmed from her former career as a Clinical Social Worker when she provided clinical and crisis services for adults with mental illness. She witnessed the challenges that people with mental illness encounter when they don’t have stable housing or clinical support. As a member of the board, she hopes to help improve the lives of participants in the program and to expand the services to more individuals and communities.
President
Molly joined the Impact Board in November 2020. She is an experienced development professional and has held positions in higher education and healthcare systems for the last 15 years. Molly has significant experience in individual giving and working with major gift donors as well as corporate and foundation giving.
Molly is currently the Director of Philanthropy, National & International at Northwestern Memorial Foundation working across many clinical areas to raise significant support for research, education and care for the medically underserved. She grew up in Evanston and is looking forward to helping the team at Impact advocate and provide services for people with mental illnesses.
Secretary
Catherine joined the Board at Impact in September 2021. Catherine is an attorney and spent several years serving as an Assistant State’s Attorney for Cook County, including many years in the Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence Division. During her time as a prosecutor, Catherine routinely encountered individuals suffering from the devastating and cyclical effects of mental illness, housing insecurity, and unemployment. The absence of adequate support for the mentally ill and their families within the criminal justice system and elsewhere motivated Catherine to join the Board to help advance Impact’s mission.
Catherine currently works for Rush University System for Health furthering the institution’s efforts toward policy and equity compliance for its employees and patients. Catherine grew up in Evanston and is grateful for the opportunity to give back to a community that gave her so much.
Vice President
Erin joined the Board at Impact in December 2024. Erin Ankin is a strategic and versatile executive leader and in-house counsel with over 20 years of progressive experience. She has an established record of accelerating corporate growth, mitigating risk, implementing and overseeing legal and corporate governance, leading collaboratively and creating policies and processes to enhance efficiency and corporate culture, diversity, equity and inclusion. Her approach to leadership is informed by helping others succeed, leading with an emphasis on the “why” and a commitment to integrity and excellence.
Erin currently serves as Executive Vice President, Corporate Operations at Bridge Industrial, serves on Bridge’s executive leadership team and oversees their day-to-day operations and strategic initiatives. Prior to joining Bridge Industrial, Erin served as managing partner, general counsel and chief compliance officer at Waterton. She is honored to serve on the Impact Board and support Impact’s mission to champion opportunities for people with serious mental illness by providing comprehensive services in housing, employment, and clinical support so that each person can live as independently as possible.