The New Growth team is a combination of talent and leadership at community development corporation New Growth and parent organization West Central Missouri Community Action Agency.
Amanda Battles
Business Counselor, New Growth Women’s Business Center
Amanda understands rural communities and the challenges local businesses face. She helps them achieve their goals with business development assistance and a focus on building credit scores for getting more rural entrepreneurs bank-ready.
abattles@newgrowthmo.org
Patty Cantrell
Outreach & Development Director, New Growth CDC
Patty Cantrell is a rural development champion. She brings an MBA and a career in community economic development and journalism to her job since 2018 building New Growth. As a writer, facilitator, and project developer, Patty tells the story of what is possible, and helps make it happen.
pcantrell@newgrowthmo.org
Jaclyn Carroll
Farm to School Specialist, West Central Missouri Community Action Agency
Jaclyn brings rural west central Missouri roots and a farming background to her farm-to-school work. She connects area schools with farms and helps them work together on local food purchasing for healthy children and strong farms.
jcarroll@wcmcaa.org
Lakyn Coleman
Business Counselor, New Growth Women’s Business Center
A born entrepreneur, Lakyn brings a keen sense of rural life and small business dreams to her job. It’s her job to help entrepreneurs, men and women, assess where they are and where they want to go, and then assist them in taking their next best steps to success.
lcoleman@newgrowthmo.org
Aaron Franklin
Chief Finance Officer, West Central Missouri Community Action Agency
Aaron brings an extensive background in nonprofit management and accounting, as well as financial industry experience, to his job overseeing finances for both West Central Missouri Community Action Agency and New Growth CDC.
afranklin@wcmcaa.org
Tiffany Frost
Business Services Director/WBC Director, New Growth CDC
Tiffany loves getting down to details. It’s a great passion to have as overall manager of the New Growth Women’s Business Center and related business services at New Growth. Her background in business and regulatory compliance supports her, and all of us.
tfrost@newgrowthmo.org
Sheridan Garman-Neeman
Chief Community Wealth Building Officer, New Growth CDC
Sheridan is a powerful leader and excellent manager. This is on top of her heartfelt love for rural and lifelong quest to improve life for the people she loves, in the places she loves. She now leads New Growth after several years building a partner nonprofit in the region, and being part of New Growth’s founding in 2017. She brings an extensive background in business, finance, and economic development to this executive director work.
sgarman@newgrowthmo.org
Lyndsey Heathman
Compliance Coordinator, New Growth CDC
Lyndsey brings great attention to detail to her role in the work of New Growth Capital, an emerging Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) and SBA micro-lending intermediary. She is responsible for maintaining and auditing loan files, financial accounting and reporting activities. She brings an extensive background from 10 years working with lender audits in the housing industry.
lheathman@newgrowthmo.org
Cathy Horn
Administrative Coordinator, New Growth CDC
Cathy is our quiet, patient keeper of administrative detail and accomplisher of essential everyday tasks, from ordering supplies to organizing paperwork. She likes to make things run smoothly, and we like her help making that happen.
chorn@newgrowthmo.org
Cristina Jopling
Food Value Chain Coordinator, West Central Missouri Community Action Agency
Cristina’s talent for making friends everywhere she goes serves her job well. Her purpose is to discover what regional food and farm entrepreneurs need, and help them find and connect with resources along the farm-to-market continuum, or food value chain. She brings practical experience, including bakery industry work and Peace Corps time in Africa.
cjopling@wcmcaa.org
Katie Nixon
Food Systems Director, West Central Missouri Community Action Agency
Katie Nixon is a farmer and local food systems champion who has been working with and for food producers for more than 13 years in the Kansas City region. She has built a dynamic and growing Food Systems Program while operating a certified organic diversified market farm, and providing leadership for the Kansas City food Hub, a local farmer cooperative.
knixon@wcmcaa.org
Mary Lou Schussler
President, West Central Missouri Community Action Agency, New Growth CDC
Mary Lou guides the development of New Growth with a steady and gracious hand. Her 27 years of service at West Central Missouri Community Action Agency fortify her perspective on ups and downs, and challenges and opportunities. She is a human resources professional with years of experience. She also serves on the New Growth Women’s Business Center advisory board.
mschussler@wcmcaa.org
Chris Thompson
Chief Executive Officer, West Central Missouri Community Action Agency, New Growth CDC
Innovation is Chris Thompson’s middle name. He is not satisfied with a status quo that keeps rural people and places behind. His experience working across the nation to lift up struggling communities with innovative community development led him to West Central from a career in law. It is also the inspiration behind his launch of New Growth as an affiilated and innovative community development corporation.
cthompson@wcmcaa.org