Our Hen House

Jasmin Singer (Executive Director) is a writer and activist living in New York City. In addition to her work for Our Hen House, she is a contributing writer for VegNews Magazine, a host for VegNews TV, and was also named by VegNews as one of twenty stand-out stars of the animal rights movement. She has also written for Satya Magazine and Heeb Magazine, and contributed to dozens of blogs. From 2007-2010, Jasmin was the campaigns manager for Farm Sanctuary, and — with Our Hen House — stayed on as a consultant through September 2010. Her workshops — which have been featured in publications such as TimeOut NY and The Village Voice — have been presented at universities and law schools throughout the country, as well as conferences such as The Animal Rights National Conference, Taking Action for Animals, Farm Sanctuary’s Hoe Down, Let Live Northwest Animal Rights Conference, the Institute for Critical Animal Studies North American Conference, the SUNY Social Justice Conference, and the NYC Food & Climate Change Summit at Climate Week NYC, which was organized in conjunction with the United Nations’ Climate Change Summit. She has also presented at VegFests across the country including in New York City, Madison, WI, Portland, ME, Boston, MA, and New Orleans, LA. For her activism, Jasmin has been featured in media outlets such as CNN, Trece:Veinte, Freakonomics, and the New York Observer. Prior to her animal activist career, Jasmin was an actor-educator with the AIDS-awareness theatre company, Nitestar. As an actor, she has also performed in (and produced) the show, Mortified, and has been seen in New York City at the Midtown International Fringe Festival, where she won rave reviews for her starring role in “Exhibit This”. Visit her website, www.jasminsinger.com. Email her at jasmin@ourhenhouse.org.

Mariann Sullivan (Board President and Program Director) is a lawyer and an adjunct professor of animal law at Brooklyn Law School, Cardozo Law School and Columbia Law School. She found her way into animal law through the Committee on Legal Issues Pertaining to Animals of the New York City Bar Association and eventually served as chair of that committee. She is also the former chair of the American Bar Association’s Tort Trial Insurance Practice Section’s Animal Law Committee. With David Wolfson, she is the author of a trilogy of articles on farmed animals and the law: “Foxes in the Henhouse: Animals Agribusiness and the Law, A Modern American Fable” in Animal Rights: Current Debates and New Directions; “What’s Good for the Goose… The Supreme Court of Israel, Foie Gras, and the Future of Farmed Animals in the United States,” in the 2007 volume of the Duke Journal of Law and Contemporary Problems; and “If it Looks Like a Duck: New Jersey, The Regulation of Common Farming Practices, and the Meaning of ‘Humane,’” in Animal Law and the Courts. Mariann is also the author of “The Animal Welfare Act: What’s That?” which was published in the New York State Bar Association Journal. She has spoken at various conferences and animal law related events throughout the country, as well as Animal Rights Africa’s Animal Law Review Consultation Workshop in Johannesburg. Mariann has served on the board of directors of Farm Sanctuary and The Animals Agenda, and currently serves on the board of Animal Welfare Trust and Animal Welfare Advocacy. Email her at mariann@ourhenhouse.org.

Suzanne Gorman (Treasurer) is a CPA and an animal rights activist living in Long Island. She has a Masters in Accounting from Pace University and almost 10 years accounting experience with preeminent accounting and law firms, as well as major public corporations. Suzanne adopted a vegan lifestyle in 2007 after viewing PETAs ”Meet Your Meat” video, and  she began her animal rights activism volunteering for Farm Sanctuary. Suzanne aims to educate others on issues of animal cruelty and the health benefits of a vegan lifestyle. She gave birth to a son last summer and is dedicated to raising him with a vegan lifestyle.

Ari Solomon (Board Member)is the President and co-creator of the celebrated vegan candle line A Scent of Scandal®. After graduating from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, Ari first worked as an actor in New York and Los Angeles, and later hosted the wildly popular ARI’S HOLLYWOOD UPDATE on Miami’s Y-100FM. Now a prolific activist and writer for animal and human rights, Ari’s letters have appeared in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Miami Herald, and The Advocate. He regularly blogs for The Huffington Post

Carol Leifer (Advisory Board) is an accomplished stand-up comedian and an Emmy-winning writer and producer for her work on such television shows as Seinfeld, The Larry Sanders Show, Saturday Night Live and The Academy Awards.  She has starred in several of her own comedy specials, which have aired on HBO, Showtime, and Comedy Central. Carol’s book, entitled When You Lie About Your Age, the Terrorists Win is a bestseller. In promoting her book, Carol recently appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show, The Late Show with David Letterman, The View, The Today Show, Real Time with Bill Maher, Fresh Air with Terry Gross on NPR, and The Howard Stern Show on Sirius/XM. Carol recently guest starred on Curb Your Enthusiasm as the “Lemonade Mom.” She was one of the writers for last year’s Oscars with hosts Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin and for her work on that, she was nominated for an Emmy.

Dan Piraro (Advisory Board), creator of the BIZARRO cartoons, was raised in Oklahoma in the late 1900s and escaped as soon as possible. In addition to 13 collections of BIZARRO cartoons, Piraro has published two books of prose, including “Bizarro Among the Savages” (Andrews McMeel, 1998), and a political satire disguised as a children’s book recounting the Bush administration’s foray into Iraq called, “The Three Little Pigs Buy the White House” (St. Martins, 2004). BIZARRO has won an unprecedented three consecutive “Best Cartoon Panel of the Year” awards from the National Cartoonists Society, and in 2010 was given their highest award, “Outstanding Cartoonist of the Year.” Piraro regularly speaks and performs comedy across the country, and works as an animal rights and environmental activist. For his animal rights-themed cartoons, he has won numerous awards from the Humane Society of the United States. He also writes a monthly humor column for VegNews Magazine. Since 2002, Piraro has sporadically toured the U.S. with his one-man stand-up comedy show called “The Bizarro Boloney Show”. Piraro has appeared on CNN and “Fresh Air” with Terry Gross on NPR. In 2007, Dan Piraro reached the self-proclaimed pinnacle of his career thus far when he and BIZARRO appeared as a clue on the popular game show, “Jeopardy!” and was included as a clue in a New York Times crossword puzzle.

Donny Moss (Advisory Board) is a documentary filmmaker and activist living in New York City. He is the producer and director of the award-winning documentary,Blinders, which exposes the truth behind the tradition of New York City’s infamous horse-drawn carriage trade. More recently, he produced a short documentary calledChristine Quinn: Behind the Smile. Donny lives in New York City with his husband, Jim, and their animal companion, Max.

James E. McWilliams (Advisory Board) is a writer and associate professor of history at Texas State University, San Marcos, historian. His books include Just Food: Where Locavores Get It Wrong and How We Can Truly Eat Responsibly (Little, Brown) and A Revolution in Eating: How the Quest for Food Shaped America (Columbia University Press). His work on food and agriculture has appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, Slate, Forbes, Travel and Leisure, The Los Angeles Times, The International Herald Tribune, and the Texas Observer.  He regularly post articles at theatlantic.com and blogs at eatingplantsdotorg.wordpress.com.

JL Fields (Advisory Board) is director of corporate and foundation relations for a college in New York City, and teaches courses on nonprofit management at a local university. JL has over twenty years of nonprofit experience, which includes leading three organizations as CEO, and serving on the board of directors for a variety of organizations. Currently, JL is a board member for Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary. JL blogs about her transition to a vegan lifestyle at JL goes Vegan, and is the editor of Stop Chasing Skinny.

Lori Gruen (Advisory Board) is Professor of Philosophy, Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, and Environmental Studies at Wesleyan University where she  also coordinates Wesleyan Animal Studies and directs the Ethics in Society Project. She has published and lectured widely on topics in animal ethics, including the illustrated book Animal Liberation: A Graphic Guide (with Peter Singer and artist David Hines), and most recently her book Ethics and Animals: An Introduction (Cambridge, 2011). Lori has documented the history of the first 100 chimpanzees in research in the US and is currently working on a book exploring human relations to captive chimpanzees.

Danielle Legg (Coordinator) is elated to be a member of the flock here at Our Hen House. Growing up on a farm, her first best friends were not the usual 4-legged companions, but instead were pigs, goats, cows, and sheep. In April 2009, after watching a short Mercy for Animals exposé on chickens, her previously-held view that some animals were friends, while others were food, changed forever. After visiting Farm Sanctuary in May 2010, she became committed to devoting her life to protecting farmed animals. In 2010, she organized a screening of MFA’s Fowl Play, and followed the screening with an event that paid veg-curious folks to get full on amazing vegan eats. During the summer of 2011, Danielle participated in several weekly vigils with Toronto Pig Save, which gave her the opportunity to talk with both the drivers of transport trucks, and the employees of the slaughterhouse. The highlight of that summer was tabling with We Animals and The Ghosts in Our Machine at the Toronto Vegetarian Food Festival. Danielle currently lives in Ontario NY, and frequently volunteers at Snooter’s Farm Animal Sanctuary, across the pond in Ontario, Canada. When Danielle isn’t on the farm, she’s doing all she can to change hearts and minds about animals used for food. This summer, she’ll begin her studies in nutrition, with the goal of earning a bachelor’s degree in Nursing. Danielle’s dog, Arcot, is her constant companion, and her cat, Pekoe, can most often be found demanding attention by tapping the laptop keyboard with her massive polydactyl paws.

Jennifer Parrucci (Reviewer) is a vegan activist and writer living in Brooklyn. She is currently co-coordinating Farm Sanctuary’s Walk for Farm Animals for New York City. She is also the New York Team Leader for Best Friends Animal Society. In this role, Jennifer has helped organize events, as well as contribute articles, to the Best Friends Network. On weekends, Jennifer volunteers her time as an Adoptions Counselor at the ASPCA. When she is not doing all of the above, Jennifer can be found hanging out with  hanging out with her vegan husband, Chris, and her two cats, Anacapri and Desmond.

Piper Hoffman (Reviewer) is a writer and attorney living in Brooklyn with her husband, two cats, and occasional foster kittens. She has a B.A. magna cum laude from Brown University and a J.D. cum laude from Harvard Law School. Piper has professional experience with the laws related to animal rights, employment, poverty, homelessness, women’s rights, and being childfree. She blogs at piperhoffman.com and her writing has been published by Salon, Forbes Woman, and others.

Allison Bair (Graphic Designer) is a freelance artist who works and lives in upstate New York. While photographic evidence may prove otherwise, everyone who has met Allison believes she was born with a pencil in her hand. With a BFA in Graphic Design and Fine Art and a minor in Illustration, she is currently making a career out of her life-long passion by freelancing and launching Brown Bair Studios. When she’s not working, you can find her out walking Truman, her 3-year-old rescued beagle, helping him to pursue his lifelong mission to sniff every inch of town. Visit Allison at BrownBair.com.

Sally Tamarkin (Contributor) is a community organizer born and raised in New Haven, CT. Most recently, she was the lead organizer of cteQUALITY, the coalition that lead the movement to successfully pass a transgender non-discrimination law in Connecticut. Sally earned a Masters of Social Work in Community Organizing from University of CT in 2008 and, while there, co-authored articles for publication in Social Policy (2010) and Journal of Community Practice (2011). When she’s not brainstorming ways to subvert the dominant paradigm, she enjoys apples, running, and peanut butter. Sally blogs at foreignparts.tumblr.com and tweets at @sallyt, and also does stuff not online, such as, lives in Brooklyn.

Carrie Forrest (Reviewer) is a graduate student in public health nutrition and a future registered dietitian. She also has an undergraduate degree in English, an MBA in marketing and entrepreneurship, and a background in both healthcare fundraising and retail product development. When she is not studying like a madwoman for her degrees, Carrie writes a blog about her adventures in healthy, plant-based living, Carrie on Vegan. Carrie lives on the central coast of California with her vegan husband and two feline babies, Roxy and Xena. She also loves making kale chips, wearing flip-flops, playing with her Vita-Mix, and anything to do with Dr. Fuhrman.

Rose Singer Sullivan (Resident Dog) is the official dog of Our Hen House. When she is not going for a run along the Hudson River, Rose enjoys sitting directly on top of you, french-kissing you without your permission, chomping on carrots and bananas (she is vegan, after all), and making sure that you are fully aware when things are INAPPROPRIATE! Rose is the brains behind Our Hen House and is usually the one to keep the rest of us on track.