2011 Board of Directors

Carolyn Altman, LMSW, Board Chair
Ms. Altman has been a resident of Brooklyn for the past 15 years, and is a mental health professional. Her experience includes work with adult, geriatric and aging issues, death and dying, care giving, bereavement, physical and cognitive loss, trauma, and sexual identity issues. Ms. Altman is a graduate of Brandeis University and Hunder College School of Social Work, with post-graduate training at the Institute for Contemporary Psychotherapy.

Rabbi Stephen Roberts, Board Member
Rabbi Roberts is the immediate past president of the National Association of Jewish Chaplains, is a Board Certified Chaplain trained as a psychiatric chaplain, and serves as Associate Executive Vice President of the New York Board of Rabbis. His work includes eight years as Chaplain at Payne Whitney Psychiatric Clinic, where he lead inpatient and outpatient spiritual care groups. Rabbi Roberts also has an MBA from The Wharton School in Marketing and Finance.

Jessica Rosenberg, Ph.D., Treasurer
Dr. Rosenberg is a social worker with over 20 years of experience in direct practice, administration, and academia. She is on the faculty of Long Island University and has published on the relationships between social work, mental health, and labor movements. She has also co-authored scholarly articles on Rainbow Heights Club.

Melanie Spritz, D.O.
Dr. Spritz has served as a mental health professional to members of the transgender community for many years and upholds the highest standards of care. She has served as a consultant on the needs of this community to Heights-Hill Mental Health Service and numerous other organizations. She serves as lab director for the Rainbow Heights Club rapid HIV testing program. She is herself a person of transgender experience.

Mike Woram, Board Member
Mr. Woram lives and works in the local Brooklyn community. He has worked as a Senior Research Associate at Columbia University and as a consultant to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, including its investigation of Three Mile Island in 1979. Since 1980, he has been self-employed as a consultant to the nuclear industry, and in computer and software services. He also offers pro bono technical assistance to Heights-Hill Mental Health Service South Beach Psychiatric Center Community Advisory Board on database design and maintenance.

Daniel Garza, M.D.
Daniel Garza is the consulting psychiatrist for the Health Outreach To Teens, the largest LGBT youth primary health clinic in New York. He also runs a solo private practice in Manhattan. He consults for the SCO Family of Services’ GLBT group foster homes and for Physicians for Human Rights’ Asylum Network. He is a graduate of Columbia University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons and completed his psychiatric residency at the Mount Sinai Medical Center also in New York, and returned to Columbia to complete a post-doctoral fellowship in Public Psychiatry. Dr. Garza is an Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the Mt. Sinai Medical Center and is the Director of the Assisted Outpatient Treatment, or “Kendra’s Law,” program for the borough of Queens. He teaches regularly on adolescent mental health, commitment law, the health of racial and sexual minorities, and substance abuse.

Suzy Ritholz, LCSW-R, Board Member
Ms. Ritholz is the newly appointed Director of Social Services at Services and Advocacy for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Elders (SAGE).   Ms. Ritholz is also a doctoral candidate (ABD) at New York University, whose current research interest includes: “Exploring the relationship between client self-determination and mental health recovery -- is therapeutic alliance a mediating factor?"   She received both her MSW and BA degrees from New York University.  Currently residing in Bedford Stuyvesant, she has lived in Brooklyn since 2001.