Meet the Board

Patricia Artis is the driving force behind Monai Village. She has a B.S. in Sociology from MacMurray College and, alongside her husband Gary, served as a foster parent in Washoe County from 1986–2024 after fostering for two years in Normal, Illinois. Over the years, Patricia and Gary cared for hundreds of children of all ages, including more than 100 youth through their own home-run program.

Through decades of firsthand experience, Patricia saw the same heartbreaking pattern repeat as young adults aged out of foster care without stable housing, rental history, employment history, transportation, or consistent adult support. That experience led her to create Monai Village as a better path forward — one rooted in affordable housing, individualized support, accountability, and community connection.

Aaron Levine (CPA), with over 23 years of extensive experience in Management, Deal Negotiation, Sales, Compliance, Business Development, Revenue Assurance, and Financial and Investigative Analysis, brings a wealth of business and cultural acumen to Monai Village. His professional journey encompasses global, multi-segment, and multi-industry connections, with significant time spent in APJ, China, LATAM, and EMEA, working closely with a diverse range of customers, local internal teams, and partners. In his current role as a World Wide Sales Lead for Amazon Web Services (AWS), Aaron adeptly manages annual cloud revenue of $100 million for Global Financial Services and Life Science companies. His consistent success in surpassing revenue targets and performance metrics in the corporate world translates seamlessly to meeting and exceeding the unique needs of our youth clients at Monai Village. Aaron's unwavering commitment to the community aligns perfectly with the Monai mission, focused on breaking the cycle of abandonment and creating opportunities for young adults to thrive in the real world.

JoAnn Behrman-Lippert, Ph.D., Psychologist and Trauma Consultant, has 40 years of experience working with missing and exploited children, victims of crime, and assessing threats of violence and harassment. She specializes in the treatment of these issues. She also serves as a forensic consultant and evaluator in criminal and civil actions involving child abduction and exploitation, child abuse, violence, and allegations of harassment and hostile work environments,. Dr. Lippert has been a consultant to municipal, county, and federal law enforcement agencies since 1985.
She has also been a frequent consultant and faculty member in U.S. Department of Justice
training and research programs including Reunification of Missing Children, the Missing and Exploited Children Action Program (MCAP). In 1992 she helped develop the reunification protocol for reuniting missing children with their families. In 1999 she completed a five-year research and development grant for the U. S. Department of Justice on treatment models and family trauma response to missing children who have been recovered and to their families.
Beginning in the late 1980s she was part of a consulting group that assessed threats of violence in the workplace and helped in developing protocols for evaluating persons making threats and the workplace milieu with follow up case management services. She maintains a private practice in Reno and Las Vegas, Nevada treating children, adolescents, and their families as well as victims of crime.

Terri has had many roles - wife and mom being the most important over the last 35 years!  Vocationally, she is a Professional Civil Engineer and has had a career with Washoe County and the City of Reno.  Terri and her son started training in martial arts 20 years ago.   It was through martial arts that she met Pat Artis, the founder of Monai Village.  Terri recognizes the need and value of the goals of Monai Village and hopes to contribute to the success of the organization.

Wes Chewjalearn