Racquel Garcia

Racquel Garcia is the Executive Director of the HardBeauty Foundation, a nationally recognized recovery advocate, speaker, and systems change leader with more than 16 years in long-term recovery. She has dedicated her career to transforming how communities respond to substance use, mental health, justice involvement, and family recovery. Racquel has helped develop innovative peer support programs in hospitals, emergency departments, maternal health, and criminal justice settings across Colorado. She currently serves as Chair of the Colorado Behavioral Health Administration Advisory Council and is appointed by Attorney General Phil wiser to the Colorado Opioid Abatement Council. Through her work, Racquel is committed to ensuring that recovery is seen as an investment—not an expense—and that every person has the opportunity to build a life of purpose, connection, and hope.

Kristen Pendergrass serves as the Vice President, State Policy at Shatterproof. Previously, she worked at the Pew Charitable Trusts leading state relations and strategy for the Substance Use Prevention and Treatment Initiative and for the Pew-MacArthur Results First Initiative helping state and local governments incorporate evidence-based policymaking into the budget and policy processes.

Before joining Pew in November 2015, Ms. Pendergrass worked as a policy advisor for the House Majority Caucus in the Oregon Legislature, chief of staff to the Oregon House Majority Whip, and as a legislative assistant in the Massachusetts House of Representatives.

Kristen holds a master’s degree in social welfare policy from the Boston University School of Social Work and a bachelor’s degree from Vanderbilt University.

Shelly Weizman, JD is a human rights lawyer whose areas of interest include advancing public policy related to addiction, mental health, and disabilities. She currently serves as the Associate Director of the Center on Addiction and Public Policy at the O’Neill Institute at Georgetown Law, where she works on a project portfolio focused on the overdose epidemic and how the law can promote access to treatment and support recovery. She is faculty in Georgetown’s Master of Science in Addiction Policy and Practice, where she introduced and teaches a course on addiction and mental health law and policy. Prior to her role at Georgetown, she served in the Office of the Governor of New York, where she oversaw policy and operations related to addiction, mental health, and disabilities. She also previously served in the New York State Office of Mental Health implementing systemic reforms within New York’s public mental health system. She began her legal career as a civil rights attorney representing people living in institutional settings in New York City. Before law school, she worked with adolescents with substance use disorder and their families in her hometown of Houston Texas. Shelly is the recipient of the 2022 Boston Congress for Public Health’s 40 Under 40 Public Health Catalyst Award, the 2021 Mary L. Fleming Memorial Mentor of the Year Award from the Stop the Addiction Fatality Epidemic (SAFE) Project, and the 2019 Distinguished Public Service Award from the New York Alliance for Inclusion and Innovation.