Dr. Linda Braddy joined the American Red Cross North Texas Region as its CEO in February of 2023. Linda served as the president of Dallas College Brookhaven Campus from 2019 to 2023, where she was responsible for leading initiatives which contribute to the vibrancy, growth, and economic stability of Dallas County. Among her responsibilities, Linda served as interim provost while helping Dallas College restructure to meet the needs of students and the community during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Prior to joining Dallas College, Linda served in leadership roles at Tarrant County College Northeast Campus near Fort Worth. First, as dean of the division of mathematics and natural sciences, and later as vice president for academic affairs. Previously she served as deputy executive director of the Mathematical Association of America in Washington, D.C.
Linda is a committed volunteer and servant leader, serving as a court-appointed special advocate for Dallas CASA, the chair of the board of directors for Mathematics Learning by Inquiry Inc., the liaison to the board of directors for Metrocrest Services and the Metrocrest Chamber of Commerce.
Brian Moeschler is the Regional Donor Services Executive of the American Red Cross North Texas Region.
Prior to starting his current position in September 2017, Moeschler served the organization in many capacities, supporting Humanitarian Services, Service to the Armed Forces, International Services and Disaster Services.
He has also led business operations in support of real estate planning and project and corporate initiative design, implementation and analysis.
Moeschler earned a bachelor degree from the University of Oklahoma and a master of science in emergency management from Millersville University (Pennsylvania).
Moeschler will use his wealth of knowledge and decade of Red Cross experience to bring leadership and passion to the North Texas Region.
Vondell Brown joined the American Red Cross North Texas Region in December 2023. He brings 35+ years of experience in a variety of non-profit and military spaces. He brings a wealth of knowledge, skills and abilities to the Red Cross, including dynamic and diverse team building, strategic planning and implementation, customer retention, problem-solving, budget creation and discipline.
Vondell joins us from the Wounded Warrior Project, where he managed life-changing veteran programs and events that served more than 100,000 veterans and families on the West Coast, Alaska and Hawaii. Before joining the Wounded Warrior Project, he attained the rank of first sergeant before retiring from the Army in 2010 with an honorable discharge.
Vondell has a bachelor's degree in business administration management from Western Governors University and obtained an MBA in project management and performance improvement from Grantham University.
Ariane Einecker is the Chief Development Officer of the American Red Cross North Texas Region. She assumed this role in August of 2014, having previously served as the Director of Major Gifts and Deputy Chief Development Officer. She joined the Red Cross team in November of 2012.
In her tenure with the Red Cross, Einecker is particularly proud of the work that she and her team have done to fuel the Red Cross mission within the region, as well as nationally, raising more than 130 million dollars to fund critical needs. She has served in key leadership roles through multiple disaster relief operations, including as the fundraising chief for the regional response to Hurricane Harvey. She is an active member of the Center for Nonprofit Management and the Association of Fundraising Professionals. She is an alumnus of Leadership North Texas. Einecker is a graduate of the University of Arizona, and makes her home in Flower Mound, Texas with her beloved English Mastiff, Eddie.
Katrina Farmer was introduced to the American Red Cross more than 30 years ago when she took a Red Cross lifeguard certification class. Since that prescient beginning, she has dedicated her life to the service of others through work with nonprofit humanitarian organizations.
Farmer was promoted to her current role in June 2018 after serving as executive director for the Red Cross Texas Big Country chapter, one of seven chapters in the North Texas Region, for eight years. Before joining the Red Cross in 2009, Farmer spent 13 years with Girl Scouts of the USA, working her way to become the chief operating officer.
Farmer provides leadership to the North Texas disaster workforce and supports the response to disasters of any magnitude. She also works closely with government agencies and community partners to ensure a Red Cross disaster response effort that is coordinated with those of local, regional and state entities.
Farmer graduated with her bachelor’s degree in criminal justice from Missouri Southern State University. She resides in Archer County, Texas, with her husband.
Katrina Gonzalez has spent the last 20 years dedicating herself to support those who serve across the United States and around the world. Mrs. Gonzalez has over 7 years of American Red Cross experience in program management, with expertise in implementing effective tactical operations. Katrina and her team serve to assist military service members, veterans, and their families by developing and strengthening relationships with military leadership, community organizations, support groups and businesses to bridge service gaps to provide a one-stop shop resource center for clients. These services range from creating emergency cases for service members and their families, providing following up services after an emergency, locating critical community assistance to meet the needs of our clients, or providing resiliency resources to units, service members and/or their families.
As the military spouse of an active-duty Sailor for 21 years, Katrina brings a wealth of knowledge and firsthand experience that has embedded a deep compassion to serve those who serve. Katrina has worked closely with military leadership to provide more resilient and mission ready troops. She supported Navy Region Southwest with direct focus on pre-deployment resiliency, during deployment sailor and family support and post-deployment return coordination and resiliency.
Mrs. Gonzalez has traveled the country providing training and program support from San Diego to New York. Most recently, she deployed to Kuwait for 7 months as a Site Directorate to support Camp Buehring and Ali Al Salem Air Base. Katrina participated and assisted with the policies for the Anti-Terrorism Force Protection and Emergency Management planning at ASG Kuwait. She also worked closely and provided support to all unit commanders with escalation protocols for mental health and support.
In October 2020, Katrina left the mobility role and accepted the position as the Service to the Armed Forces Director for the North Texas Region.
Dominica.McCarthy@redcross.org
Dominica McCarthy began as the Regional Volunteer Services Officer for the North Texas Region in May 2023. She oversees a team of staff and volunteers who recruit and engage volunteers that support the American Red Cross’s mission across the 121 counties within the North Texas Region.
McCarthy was previously the Associate Dean for Dallas College Brookhaven Campus for two years, where she developed and oversaw cross-campus advising. Over her more than eleven years of service to Dallas College she coordinated campus programming for hundreds of attendees and has worked extensively with volunteers.
Before that, McCarthy served in social services supporting families navigating public aid and job search assistance. She has also served as a case manager supervisor overseeing more than 200 foster children at a foster care and adoption agency. She earned a Master of Arts in Community Counseling from Argosy University and a Bachelor of Science in psychology and sociology from Oklahoma State University.
Brian Murnahan is the Regional Communications Director for the American Red Cross North Texas Region. He joined the Red Cross team in February 2022, having spent the past ten years as President of his own public relations firm in Fort Worth, Texas. Murnahan has a team of three professional communicators and a crew of great volunteer writers, social media enthusiasts, photographers and videographers to help share the great work done by the Red Cross.
Murnahan has spent 25 years in public relations working for both public and private sector organizations guiding them during good times and bad as they worked with their staff, clients, the public, local officials and regulatory agencies. He is a longtime member of the Greater Fort Worth Public Relations Society of America Board of Directors in numerous roles; the Northeast Tarrant Chamber of Commerce, where he served on the executive committee and was on the initial board of advisors for IDEA Works, a Fort Worth entrepreneurial incubator among others.
Murnahan has lived in Texas since 2004 and currently lives in Fort Worth. He is a proud father of two adult children and has great companions Rory an oversized cat and a small, but energetic dog Whiz.
Deshun Avery joined the American Red Cross as the executive director for the Panhandle Plains Chapter in August 2023. The chapter consists of 41 counties with over 434,000 residents.
Prior to joining the Red Cross, Avery served at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center for 18 years. Avery helped create a values-based culture and provide leadership training and development classes to over 5,000 employees, who were located on various campuses in Lubbock, Amarillo, Abilene, Midland, Odessa, Dallas, San Angelo and many more satellite locations throughout Texas, including employees at 27 correctional facilities.
Avery has gleaned a wealth of inspiration from activist and civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. One of his favorite quotes from Dr. King is, “Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, ‘What are you doing for others?’”
Working for the American Red Cross, Avery plans to ‘do for others’ by helping to alleviate human suffering across the panhandle plains community.
Kara Nickens joined the American Red Cross North Texas Region as the executive director for the Texas Big Country Chapter in June 2023. Nickens is based in Wichita Falls, where she engages with community stakeholders and oversees Red Cross programs and services from Wichita Falls to Abilene, San Angelo, Brownwood and everything in between.
Before joining the Red Cross, Kara served as the chief executive officer for the Wichita Falls Area Food Bank. During her tenure at the food bank, they implemented several new programs, including a mobile pantry program that delivered food to people in food deserts who might not otherwise have access to nutritious food. Under her leadership, the food bank doubled the amount of food distributed.
Kara received a bachelor’s degree from Midwestern State University in Wichita Falls and spent the first 20-plus years of her career serving as the executive director for private living and day habilitation programs for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
Adolph Aguirre is based in Fort Worth, where he engages community stakeholders and oversees Red Cross programs and services for more than 3.3 million people in Cooke, Denton, Erath, Johnson, Hood, Palo Pinto, Parker, Somervell and Tarrant counties.
Aguirre joined the Red Cross after serving as the commanding officer and executive director of The Salvation Army in McAllen, Texas, from 2019 to 2022. In that role, he oversaw various operational procedures, grew strategic community partnerships and helped raise more than $2 million to fund Salvation Army programs.
Prior to that, he held the same position with the Salvation Army in Laredo, Texas from 2016 to 2019. In 2018, he received the Jefferson Award from the Laredo Area Community Foundation and represented Laredo-Webb County at the National Jefferson Awards Ceremony in Indianapolis, Indiana.
A Dallas-native, Aguirre is a graduate of Dallas Christian College and received a Master of Divinity from Asbury Theological Seminary with a focus in leadership, anthropology, theology and philosophy. He is also working to complete a Master of Business Administration in Leadership and Management from Trevecca Nazarene University.
Karen Holt lives north of Longview in Diana, Texas. Holt joined the Red Cross in the Spring of 2022. The East Texas Chapter is composed of 29 counties between DFW and the Arkansas and Louisiana border.
Holt has a passion for volunteerism—serving on city, county and state boards—and is a former New Diana ISD trustee, where she served the district for eight years. She has also helped the most vulnerable in the Tyler and Longview areas, serving as the executive director of East Texas CASA and previously as the housing navigator with Community Healthcare prior to joining the Red Cross.
Holt is a proud mom to Haleigh, Addison and Claire.