Garrett Blaize

Treasurer, Southern Appalachian Mountain Stewards, Appalachian VA

Garrett Blaize is a 24-year-old community organizer and administrator from the Appalachian Mountains. They serve as the staff lead for grantmaking and philanthropic partnerships at the Appalachian Community Fund (ACF), a regional funding intermediary and movement support fund. As a representative of ACF, Garrett sits on the Steering Committee of the Appalachian Funders Network, where they also serve as Co-Chair. Ex officio, through his work with the Appalachian Community Fund, Garrett supports the Waymakers Collective, an Assembly of radical arts grantmakers serving artists and culture-bearers across Appalachia.

Garrett serves on the Coordinating Committee of Alliance for Appalachia and as a volunteer leader of their local affiliate Southern Appalachian Mountain Stewards, a local organizing collective dedicated to building deep democracy, accelerating a just transition, and remediating the harm caused by the historic extraction of labor, capital, and natural resources from the Appalachian region.