President and CEO

Dr. Kitty Harris Wilkes serves as President of NLW Partners, which is dedicated to consulting, education, science, and research for addiction recovery. She is a noted author and public speaker and presents at national conferences, workshops, and seminars on topics including adolescence; collegiate addiction and recovery; and communication, civility, and leadership. 

She served for twelve years as the Director of the Center for the Study of Addiction and Recovery (CSAR) at Texas Tech University. Under her leadership, the CSAR gained national attention, appearing in the Wall Street Journal, on the NBC Today Show, CNN, and featured in The Chronicle of Higher Education, Inside Higher Ed, and The New York Times. Dr. Harris is the author of Women and Recovery-Finding Hope, published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. and co-editor of Substance Abuse Recovery in College, published by Springer.

Chief Scientist

Jared P. Dempsey, Ph.D. serves as Chief Scientist at NLW Partners.  Dr. Dempsey is actively involved in neurological and physiological research in addiction. Recent publications include preliminary evidence for a biological marker of addiction recovery, non-conscious emotional response to drug stimuli, and the influence of social anxiety on addiction treatment. Dr. Dempsey has also served as an expert reviewer for the Journal of Motivation and Emotion, Psychopharmacology, Journal of Psychopathology and Behavioral Assessment, American Journal on Addictions, Addiction, Psychiatry Research, European Psychiatry, Nicotine and Tobacco Research, and the Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs. Dr. Dempsey was also actively involved in the development of a comprehensive symptom tracking and outcome data collection tool for addiction treatment, Trac9.

Clinical Director

Dr. Young is an experienced substance abuse therapist with a Doctoral Degree in Marriage and Family Therapy. In Addition to his role as clinical director, Dr. Young works in private practice providing counseling for individuals, couples, and families who are struggling with addiction, anxiety, depression, relationship challenges, and stress. Dr. Young has over ten years’ experience working with adults and adolescents with life changing events, recovery, and behavioral/emotional issues.

Panel Member

Allie is an internationally recognized subject matter expert, trainer, consultant, and speaker on policing and the opioid epidemic. In her role as Executive Director, Allie provides training, technical assistance, and strategic guidance to police to help them create non-arrest pathways to treatment and recovery.

With over 14 years of experience in nonprofit leadership, Allie came to PAARI following her role as the Deputy Director of the Nonviolent Initiative for Democracy. She has worked at several other Boston-area nonprofit organizations, including ZUMIX and Bikes Not Bombs, and has aided various nonprofits with fundraising efforts, event planning, and coaching emerging leaders.

Allie holds a bachelor’s degree in politics and international relations from Ursinus College and a master’s degree in international development from Ohio University, where she focused on community health and behavior change. She also has a certificate in nonprofit management and leadership from the Institute for Nonprofit Practice at Boston University’s Questrom School of Business.

In spring 2017, Allie received a Nonprofit Excellence Award and was named young professional of the year by the Massachusetts Nonprofit Network and in fall 2018, Allie accepted an AmeriCorps Excellence Award for PAARI’s first-of-its-kind program that embeds national service members in police departments to address the opioid epidemic. Allie was also recently selected as the Lead Innovator for the Social Innovation Forum’s 2020 Social Innovator Accelerator program.

Allie is based in Massachusetts and spends much of her time traveling to support current and prospective law enforcement partners nationwide. Like many, she has been personally touched by the disease of addiction and has a close family member who is in recovery from an opioid use disorder.

Panel Member

Dr. Kelly is the Elizabeth R. Spallin Professor of Psychiatry in Addiction Medicine at Harvard Medical School – the first endowed professor in addiction medicine at Harvard. He is also the Founder and Director of the Recovery Research Institute at the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), the Associate Director of the Center for Addiction Medicine (CAM) at MGH, and the Program Director of the Addiction Recovery Management Service (ARMS). Dr. Kelly is a former President of the American Psychological Association’s (APA) Society of Addiction Psychology and is a Fellow of the APA and a Diplomate of the American Board of Professional Psychology. He has served as a consultant to U.S. federal agencies and non-federal institutions, as well as foreign governments and the United Nations. Dr. Kelly has published over 200 peer-reviewed articles, reviews, chapters, and books in the field of addiction medicine, and was an author on the U.S. Surgeon General’s Report on Alcohol, Drugs, and Health. His clinical and research work has focused on addiction treatment and the recovery process, mechanisms of behavior change, and reducing stigma and discrimination among individuals suffering from addiction.

Panel Member

Gil Kerlikowske was nominated by President Obama and sworn in on March 7, 2014 as Commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection taking the helm of the 60,000-employee agency with a budget of $12.4 billion. Mr. Kerlikowske oversees the dual U.S. Customs and Border Protection mission of protecting national security objectives while promoting economic prosperity and security. As Commissioner, he runs the largest federal law enforcement agency and second largest revenue collecting source in the federal government. Most recently, he served as Director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy. Mr. Kerlikowske brings four decades of law enforcement and drug policy experience to the position. He formerly served nine years as the Chief of Police for Seattle, Washington. When he left, crime was at its lowest point in 40 years. Previously, he was Deputy Director for the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Community Oriented Policing Services, where he was responsible for more than $6 billion in federal assets. Mr. Kerlikowske was also Police Commissioner of Buffalo, New York. The majority of his law enforcement career was in Florida where he served in the St. Petersburg Police Department. He was elected twice to be President of the Major Cities Chiefs, which represents the largest city and county law enforcement agencies in the United States and Canada. He has received numerous awards and recognition for leadership, innovation, and community service. He served in the U.S. Army where he was awarded the Presidential Service Badge. Mr. Kerlikowske holds a B.A. and a M.A. in criminal justice from the University of South Florida.

Panel Member

Dr. Randy Hickle has spent the last twenty years managing organizations focused on inventing medical technology and developing innovative healthcare services. After graduating with a degree in accounting from the University of Texas at Austin, he received his medical degree from Harvard medical School. Dr. Hickle completed his residency and fellowship training in anesthesiology at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, and since then, he has been an anesthesiologist in Lubbock, Texas.

At the core of Dr. Hickle’s career as a physician and inventor lies a personal commitment to improving healthcare access, quality and affordability. He has developed a methodology for assembling and leading multidisciplinary teams to deliver innovative solutions to important health care problems. His first major project was the invention of Warmtouch®, a patient warming system designed to treat postoperative hypothermia. Warmtouch was developed and sold to a division of Tyco where it achieved a 40% global share of the patient warming market and continues to be distributed worldwide. Dr. Hickle and his team at Scott Laboratories developed Sedasys®, a system for managing pain and anxiety during medical procedures. The company successfully licensed the device along with more than 50 patents for Sedasys to a division of Johnson & Johnson.

For the most recent decade of his career, Dr. Hickle founded and led the growth of Lubbock’s Grace Clinic® and Grace Medical Center®. His passion for improving quality of care, delivering excellent patient experience, and providing greater value are shared with his committed leadership team. In February 2018, Covenant acquired Grace Health System. Dr. Hickle remains active in the strategic activities of the health system, including the development and construction of a new destination short-stay surgical hospital, one of Lubbock’s next landmarks.

Dr. Hickle will focus the next decade of his career on innovative entrepreneurial activities in the fields of weight loss and risk management services.

Panel Member

Dr. Shawn Ryan originally trained as an emergency physician at the University of Cincinnati and simultaneously obtained his MBA while completing his residency. For over 13 years, Dr. Ryan has practiced in the Greater Cincinnati area, and for part of that period, he functioned as a hospital administrator (Department Chairman of Quality and Patient Safety).  During this time, he became acutely aware of the issue of heroin/opioid abuse in the region and for the past 7 years has been working tirelessly to make a difference in his community. Dr. Ryan serves on many regional, state, and national committees/workgroups focused on turning the tide of this epidemic.  He is currently the Chief Medical Officer of BrightView Health, one of the largest provider of addiction treatment services in the Midwest.  He is also the immediate-past president of the Ohio Society of Addiction Medicine, immediate-past Chair Payer Relations for ASAM, and the current Chair – Legislative Advocacy for ASAM.