As part of HFL’s 2026-2029 strategic plan, HFL formed a subcommittee for each of our focus areas — Attainable Housing, Healthy Eating Active Living, and Mental Health & Substance Use — comprised of board members and community members. Please join us in welcoming six volunteer community members who will help our work be more informed by the community. These volunteers bring expertise in the field and broader perspectives to our focus area work.

Attainable Housing

LaShawn Jones-Taylor

LaShawn Jones‑Taylor is the Program Manager of Community Outreach for Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Gary, where she oversees grant‑funded programs serving residents across Lake, Porter, LaPorte, and Starke Counties. In this role, she supports families at risk of homelessness through emergency rent and utility assistance, housing stabilization services, and case management, with a strong focus on preventing eviction and displacement. 

Through her leadership of the Safe Haven Homeless Prevention Program, LaShawn works closely with community partners and local government, including service delivery in LaPorte County through the Center Township Trustee and Michigan Township Trustee Offices—to address the immediate financial and systemic barriers families face in maintaining stable housing. Her work provides a practical, frontline perspective on housing affordability, family stability, and the support systems needed for attainable housing solutions. 

LaShawn brings more than 30 years of experience across nonprofit, state government, and corporate sectors, with demonstrated strengths in program oversight, funding compliance, and collaborative problem‑solving. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Marketing Management and is deeply committed to community‑driven approaches that promote housing stability and economic resilience. 

Tina Mahone

Senior Applications Engineer at Cleveland-Cliffs Steel LLC in Burns Harbor, Indiana, with more than twenty years of experience leading data and technology modernization projects in manufacturing and logistics settings. She has successfully developed, led and implemented mainframe‑to‑Windows manufacturing execution systems for three Fortune 500 corporations, bringing a systems‑level, results‑oriented approach to complex operational challenges in transportation, manufacturing and materials industries. 

Born and raised in Michigan City, Indiana, Mrs. Mahone returned to her hometown in 2001 and has since been deeply engaged in faith‑based and neighborhood revitalization efforts. At New Hope Church, she serves on the Board of Trustees and has held roles including Corporate Secretary, Finance Secretary, Finance Committee Chair, and Chair of the committee leading a faith‑based affordable housing development on church‑owned land. She helped initiate and form the New Hope Church pantry, which has served more than 300 families since its launch in August 2025, expanding access to healthy food for residents.  

Mrs. Mahone is also President of the Westside Neighborhood Association, focused on revitalizing Michigan City’s Westside through attainable housing and improvements in nutrition, wellness, recreation, and employment opportunities. Through assistance from Councilman Bryant Dabney, led an effort to survey and provide the desires of the Westside community in the complete renovation of the Pullman Field Park & Playgrouond. She has completed multiple community and civic development trainings, including small developer and neighborhood leadership programs, which strengthen her capacity to bridge technical expertise, faith‑based service, and practical community impact.  She currently serves as a Commissioner and Secretary for the Michigan City Sanitary District. 

Healthy Eating Active Living (HEAL)

Dr. Dominique Edwards is a land steward, local educator, and urban planner rooted in Northwest Indiana. She currently serves as the new Planning Director for the City of Michigan City, where she is bringing embedded planning praxis home—leading work across planning, zoning, food systems, and community development with a focus on equity, accountability, and community voice.

Born and raised in Michigan City’s Eastport neighborhood, Dr. Edwards manages and volunteers at the Walker Street Park Community Garden, working alongside residents, farmers, and neighbors to grow food, share knowledge, and advance local food sovereignty. Her work connects food access to deeper histories of land loss and structural racism impacting Black farmers.

Dr. Edwards holds degrees from Purdue University Northwest, DePaul University, and National Louis University. In 2023, she received the Community Psychology Graduate Student Award for Anti-Racist Praxis, was recognized as one of Northwest Indiana’s Women on the Rise by the Purdue Northwest Leadership Institute and the Society of Innovators, was an inaugural BMO Fellow with the Watson Institute in 2024, and received the Strengthening Communities the United Way Award in 2025.

Katie Sarver

Katie Sarver is the Manager of Community Programs and Wellness Outreach at Northwest Health – La Porte. With 15 years of experience in this role, she has dedicated her career to making wellness accessible, sustainable, impactful, and personal. Katie believes that health is the foundation of a thriving community, and her approach is rooted in a unique intersection of clinical expertise and behavioral modification. With dual degrees in Dietetics and Nutrition and Fitness and Health, as well as being a Certified Intrinsic Coach, Katie creates environments that tap into an individual’s internal motivation to drive lasting change. She has helped engage employees in achieving their health and wellness goals and launched Northwest Health’s internal wellness program and the “HealthyU” community engagement series, both of which have grown into robust, self-sustaining programs.

Mental Health & Substance Use

Toni Osowski

Toni Osowski is a dedicated social work professional with more than ten years of experience supporting youth and families through prevention, advocacy, and community-based programming. She is the Director of Programs for Youth Service Bureau of La Porte County, where she works closely with courts, law enforcement, schools, and local partners to provide youth with an opportunity to take responsibilty for their actions while learning skills that support positive decision making and long-term success.

In her role, Toni coordinates Teen Court hearings, provides ongoing case management, and connects youth and families to mental health and community resources. She is passionate about creating programs that are both accountable and supportive, using restorative and trauma-informed approaches to help youth learn, grow, and move forward. Toni also enjoys engaging with the community through child abuse prevention education and collaborative training initiatives focused on identifying and supporting vulnerable youth.

Toni holds a Bachelor’s degree in Social Work and is a Certified Child and Youth Care Practitioner.

Ted Perzanowski

Thaddeus (Ted) Perzanowski was born in Chicago, Illinois and lived his early life on the Northwest Side of that city. He and his spouse of 39 years, Lawrence Zimmer, have made Michigan City, Indiana their full-time home since 2003. 

For more than 47 years, Ted has worked in social services, corporate America, and in private practice. For seven of these 47 years—while maintaining his counseling practice during evenings and on weekends—he managed a global team of 65 corporate trainers based in the US, the UK, Ireland, Guernsey, and India who provided both job-specific training and coaching and counseling skills for managers. 

Ted identifies his private practice as “an effective alternative to counseling and psychotherapy for individuals, couples, and families”. Early in his career, Ted made the conscious choice to stay non-licensed in his career to allow for more latitude in his work with each individual client. He is fully transparent about this with each client and on his website www.talktotedinc.com. 

In addition to his full-time private practice, Ted serves on the Board of Directors of Dunebrook—our area’s multi-county not-for-profit agency dedicated to the physical and emotional health of families and to the prevention of child abuse—and has done so for nearly 15 years. He also serves on the Green Burial Sub-committee for the Michigan City Board of Cemetery Trustees.