Our Team

STAFF

CANDICE COOK SIMMONS, Esq.

President

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

ERIKA ALEXANDER

Co-Founder,
Color Farm Impact and Color Farm Media

BEN ARNON

Co-Founder,
Color Farm Impact and Color Farm Media

ALVIN STARKS

Director,
Equality Fund, Open Society Foundations U.S. Programs

Bridgit Antoinette Evans

Chief Executive Officer,
Pop Culture Collab

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Candice Cook Simmons, Esq.

Candice Cook Simmons, Esq. is a groundbreaking attorney and business strategist known for changing the way businesses imagine the utilization of Intellectual Property as the strategist and attorney behind Dominique Ansel and the trademarking and international scaling of the Cronut pastry. She is an Executive Producer, the former Chief Strategy Officer for RadicalMedia LLC, and was the Founder and Managing Member of The Cook Law Group. Candice has been featured in numerous publications as one of New York City’s top attorneys and was selected as one of the top Chief Strategy Officers in media in 2023 and 2024. She earned a Juris Doctorate from Vanderbilt University and a bachelors degree from the University of Virginia with additional studies at Oxford University and Stanford's Graduate School of Business. She serves on the Board of Directors of Playwrights Horizons (which in 2024 celebrated 5 Tony Awards for its hit production Stereophonic) and Greyston Bakery--the impact brownie company that uses open hiring to staff its organization and is known for being the delicious brownie inclusion in Ben & Jerry's ice cream. No stranger to the philanthropic world, in addition to her board work, Candice serves on the Advisory Committee for The HistoryMakers--the largest collection of African American oral history which was acquired by the Library of Congress. She is a member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Incorporated and Jack & Jill of America. She previously served in philanthropic advisory roles for The Apollo, The United Way, Education Through Music, America Needs You, and Culture Shift Labs.

ERIKA ALEXANDER

Award-winning actress Erika Alexander starred in the Oscar-nominated film AMERICAN FICTION and was nominated for Best Supporting Actress from the Independent Spirit Awards and the NAACP Image Awards. Erika also starred as Maxine Shaw in LIVING SINGLE, which garnered her two NAACP Image Awards for Outstanding Actress/Comedy Series. As a director, her debut film, “THE BIG PAYBACK,” co-directed with Whitney Dow, debuted at the Tribeca Festival and premiered on PBS in 2023.

As a creator, Erika recognizes that stories, when socially conscious and carefully constructed, have the capacity to create impact and meaningful change. As co-founder of Color Farm Media and Color Farm Impact, Erika is on a mission to bring greater equity, inclusion, and diverse representation to media.

Erika is a critical thought leader on racial and gender equity and leadership. Erika serves as a Board member of One Fair Wage and Exponent, and is highly involved with many other social and racial justice orgs, including the Poor People's Campaign, Color of Change, NAACP, UNCF, and others. Her work in content reflects the social activism work she does on the ground.

Erika is a sought-after speaker who delivers keynotes on topics including leadership, communications & performance, and diversity & inclusion. She served as Hilary Clinton’s most traveled surrogate during her 2008 and 2016 election campaigns. Born in Winslow, Arizona, Erika grew up in Flagstaff, AZ and in Philadelphia, PA.

BEN ARNON

Ben Arnon is co-founder of award-winning film and television company, Color Farm Media ans also co-founder of its sister 501(c)(3) non-profit entity, Color Farm Impact. Ben’s professional background uniquely positions him to lead a 21st century, forward-thinking company that spans across media/entertainment, technology and social impact.

As co-founder of Color Farm Media, Ben has produced award-winning projects including the documentary film “John Lewis: Good Trouble,” which was nominated for 3 Emmy Awards and won the NAACP Image Award for Best Documentary Film, as well as “The Big Payback,” a critically acclaimed documentary film focused on reparations for Black Americans. Ben also produced “Finding Tamika,” an Audible Original Series that won the prestigious duPont-Columbia Award for Excellence in Journalism as well as a Webby Award and Audible’s True Crime Audio Series of the Year.

Prior to launching Color Farm, Ben was integral in scaling the Facebook-incubated tech startup, Wildfire, from 6 to over 400 employees and an acquisition by Google. In media, Ben has led business development for Yahoo! Music and worked in numerous roles at Universal Pictures, Universal Music Group, Jersey Films and Scott Rudin Productions.

Ben is active in Democratic politics, social activism, community organizing, and photography. He represented the 36th Congressional District of California as a Delegate for Barack Obama in 2008, after having organized both Maxine Waters’ and Jane Harmon’s districts for the Obama campaign in 2007-2008.

ALVIN STARKS

Alvin Starks is the program director of the equality team of the Open Society Foundations U.S. Programs, overseeing grantmaking related to racial justice and racial narratives. He is a progressive racial justice thinker, writer, and strategist whose work supports a new generation of ideas and organizations to explore the intersection of human rights, racial justice, cross-movement building, and gender equity.

BRIDGIT ANTOINETTE EVANS

Bridgit Antoinette Evans is widely recognized as one of the foremost thought leaders in the culture change strategy field. A professional artist and strategist, she has dedicated her career to the relentless investigation of the potential of artists to drive cultural change in society. Fifteen years of work at the intersection of pop culture storytelling and social change has evolved into a vision for a new, hybrid culture change field in which creative and social justice leaders work together to create and popularize stories that shape the narratives, values, beliefs and behaviors that define American culture. In 2016, Bridgit was a Nathan Cummings Foundation Fellow, piloting Culture Changes Us, a coordinated learning system designed to accelerate the social justice sectors’ understanding and use of culture change strategy. For Unbound Philanthropy and Ford Foundation, she has led multi-year culture change research and strategy design projects aimed at unearthing breakthrough narrative and engagement strategies for the immigrant rights and gender justice movements.