Mari Eva Mendes (she/her) is a fundraising and communications strategist with over two decades of international and US experience in philanthropic enterprise, training, and program development.
Through MEM Consulting, Mari Eva speaks to international and national audiences on philanthropy, fundraising, and development communications techniques. She also coaches early- and mid-career professionals, conducts fundraising equity workshops and training sessions nationwide, and supports nonprofits in need of fundraising and communication implementation plans, building development departments from the ground up.
Upon her return to the US about a decade ago, she has held leadership roles in NYC community-based organizations such as Harlem United, where Mari Eva oversaw communications and development operations for a $50 million public health portfolio that serves local Black and Latine/x residents experiencing homelessness and chronic health conditions and, more recently, as NRDC’s first Director of Partnership Fundraising, collaborating with environmental justice partner organizations to strengthen their organizational and fundraising capacity and support NRDC’s equitable fundraising practices. As Girls for Gender Equity’s first Chief Development and Communications Officer, Mari Eva directed fundraising and communications teams supporting programming to center the leadership of Black cis and trans girls through policy change, direct service, and narrative shift using intergenerational Black feminist perspectives.
While living in the United Arab Emirates and India, she pivoted from international marketing to fundraising and advocacy around gender, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, and caste. She is the founder and former Executive Director of Maya for Women, one of the few registered organizations advocating for equitable inclusion of lesbian, bisexual, queer, and trans women in India.
As part of her commitment to increasing Black women’s voices in philanthropy and fundraising spaces, Mari Eva served on the Community Centric Fundraising’s inaugural Global Council Steering Committee (2023), a movement coalition of BIPOC-led and centered fundraisers and philanthropists. She collaborated with other members to organize their strategic planning process and a three-city international retreat in Mexico City, Toronto, and Los Angeles, where they identified key programmatic areas for the next three years. Currently, Mari Eva supports NTEN’s Session Advisory and Community Equity Committees, a nonprofit democratizing technology.
She also brings her life experiences growing up in Tulsa, Oklahoma, as a Black cis woman with multiethnic, linguistic, and racial Creole heritage from the Mexican Gulf region and family ties throughout Oklahoma, Texas, and Louisiana: a world (still) often entrenched in white supremacist institutions and ideology. She approaches her work with a Global South/Black feminist lens, sharing her passion for development data and moving resources to underserved communities of color.
Mari Eva is a fluent Arabic speaker and holds a triple-major Bachelor of Arts from Bangalore University (India) in Sociology, Economics, and South Asian History with certifications in Professional Fundraising, Women of Color in Leadership, Counseling Psychology, Sexuality and Gender, and Restorative Justice Circles. She is the proud mother of five adult children and is based outside of New York City, where she lives with her wife of 15 years, two cats, and a cute little dog.
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