Meet the Team
Chris Anthony
Founder and CEO
Chris Anthony is the Founder and CEO of FireWERX, where he leads a cross-sector effort to modernize wildfire preparedness, response, and resilience by accelerating the adoption of technology and innovation for the fire service.
Kristen D. McGee
Chief of Staff
Kristen McGee is Chief of Staff at FireWERX, where she serves as the CEO's principal partner, driving execution of strategy across operations, partnerships, and priority initiatives within a growing network of public, private, and non-profit partners.
Shivani Ray
Director, Grants and Operations
Shivani is Director of Grants & Operations at FireWERX, where she leads organizational operations, financial stewardship, and grant management in support of the Fire Innovation Strategy. She oversees the systems and processes that enable FireWERX to responsibly deploy philanthropic capital, support public and private partners, and scale pilot-to-adoption pathways.
Tracy Mallard
Director of Federal Partnerships
Tracy Mallard is the Director of Federal Partnerships at FireWERX, where she collaborates with federal agencies to cultivate a shared vision and scale operationally relevant science and technology to address national-scale wildfire challenges and ensure near-term return on investment.
Thomas Olavson
Director of Innovation
Thomas Olavson advises FireWERX on innovation programs and technology evaluation as a pro bono consultant through Google's AI Collaborative: Wildfires initiative. Thomas is a Senior Director of data science at Google, where he currently leads modeling & analysis for the Cloud Programs Office (special projects for the Cloud CEO).
Jackie Williams
Director of State & Local Partnerships and Special Projects
Jackie Williams is the Director of Local Partnerships and Special Projects at FireWERX, where she serves as the primary liaison for local government partnerships, assists them to implement Fire Innovation Units, identifies Pilot-to-Scale opportunities, and leads special projects to advance FireWERX’s innovation strategy.
Saerin Cho
Fractional General Counsel
Saerin Cho is the fractional General Counsel to FireWERX, providing strategic legal leadership across risk management, contracts, compliance, and nonprofit governance to support its mission and operations.
Haley Rotheram
Deputy Director, Grants and Operations
Haley is Deputy Director of Grants & Operations at FireWERX, where she leads FireWERX’s grants, operations, and Pilot-to-Scale Pathways work, while helping translate strategy into implementation across projects, partners, and funding streams. Haley manages catalytic funding mechanisms, grant-funded initiatives, pilot project operations, partner coordination, and internal systems.
John Messina
Technology Transfer Liaison
John is the Technology Transfer Liaison for FireWERX, where he supports shared learning across Fire Innovation Units and helps agencies identify, evaluate, and implement innovative solutions that improve wildfire preparedness, response, and community resilience.
Katherine Li
Program Success Manager for Wildfire Innovation
Katherine is a Program Success Manager for Wildfire Innovation at the Stanford Sustainability Accelerator, where she builds and manages the Stanford–FireWERX partnership, helping to scale university wildfire research-backed technologies through FireWERX's pilot-to-scale innovation pathways.
"Wildfire management today is where defense was decades ago: facing mounting threats but hamstrung by fragmented bureaucracy. FireWERX applies the defense tech paradigm to wildfire, treating it as a national security issue and mobilizing technology accordingly."
- Chris Anthony, Founder & CEO, FireWERX
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