SeniorBeat is an online magazine whose goal is to share the lives of San Francisco’s older adults – in all their diversity. Our stories relate their experiences and wisdom as well as challenges and opportunities in later life. In ways small and large, they have all contributed to the community life of this world-famous city. SeniorBeat is an initiative of the San Francisco Community Living Campaign. Our writers are from its SF ReServe program. We aspire to a society in which people of all ages see, hear, and benefit from one another. – Robin Evans, Editor
The Staff
Editor/Website Manager Robin Evans has had a long career as a reporter, editor, and newsroom manager. In recent years, she added graphic and web design to her repertoire. She spent nine years at the San Jose Mercury News, including as San Francisco Bureau Chief and Religion Writer/Editor. Her previous positions include editor of the West County Times in Richmond, Calif., editorial writer for the Contra Costa Times, and online content developer for Yahoo and Redwood Age. She retired in 2016 after six years as marketing manager and graphic designer for the JSK (John S. Knight) Journalism Fellowships program at Stanford.
Contact her at robinevans@sfseniorbeat.com.
Writer/Associate Editor Bill Snyder is a longtime San Francisco freelance journalist and educator. He’s worked as a reporter, editor, and columnist for newspapers, national magazines, and websites. He’s written about a wide variety of issues related to technology, business, and more recently, the lives of Bay Area seniors. He’s an editor and mentor at Bay News Rising, an internship program for journalism students sponsored by the Pacific Media Workers Guild. He was the lead writer for SeniorBeat’s Reframing Aging Project.
Contact him at billsnyder@sfseniorbeat.com
Writer Jan Robbins helped start the first rape crisis center in Marin County in the 1970s. In 1985, she founded one of the first on-site, corporate chair massage companies, which was recognized in Time magazine. With degrees in sociology and psychology, she remains ever fascinated by the complexities of the human condition. She taught mind-body health for 17 years for the Older Adults Department at City College San Francisco. She has written for the San Francisco Examiner and Vistas & Byways.
Contact her at janrobbins@sfseniorbeat.com.
Writer Myra Krieger started “Success Story,” a business and creative writing service, with the intention of bringing out the best in people. She wrote resumes, proposals, and marketing materials and co-wrote memoirs, scripts and nonfiction. Concurrently, she was a consumer counselor for 18 years at a local television station, where she problem-solved complaints and assisted reporters in driving stories to broadcast. She has also worked for nonprofits and played an instrumental role in helping low-income seniors get unsubsidized employment.
Contact her at myrakrieger@sfseniorbeat.com
Writer Judy Goddess, who had a long career writing grants for small, community-based nonprofits in Chicago and the Bay Area, has been profiling older adults for Senior Beat since its inception. She brings a passion for life and lifelong learning to that work as well as Drama with Friends. In this program she started several years ago under the auspices of the Community Living Campaign, older actors present a monthly evening of short plays on Zoom.
Writer Naomi Marcus has spent more than 20 years working with refugees, immigrants, welfare recipients, prisoners re-entering public life and the mentally ill. She has worked in senior vocational rehabilitation in UCSF’s Department of Psychiatry, employment counseling in a City College/SF State program for foreign-trained health workers, and vocational counseling in the Jewish Vocational Services’ refugee resettlement program. She has a master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University and worked as a producer on the public affairs radio program Forum on KQED-FM.
Contact her at naomimarcus@sfseniorbeat.com
Photographer Colin Campbell started out capturing images of construction works for engineers, builders and preservation architects after the 1989 earthquake. Working closely with preservationists, he documented the devastation and building failures then the reconstruction of the Civic Center area, including City Hall and the Customs House building on Sansome Street. He has also done feature photography for the Scholastic magazine group and is a contributing photographer to Getty Images. His photos of the Nov. 9, 1989, fall of the Berlin Wall have been widely exhibited.
Writer Tom Carter has a bachelor’s degree in journalism from San Francisco State and has worked for the San Francisco Examiner, Copley News Service, where he covered the Senate and other governmental departments, and the Wall Street Journal’s San Francisco bureau, for which he wrote news and features. He freelanced over the years for a variety of media, including the Associated Press, Reuters, the Saturday Evening Post, Readers Digest, and the Chronicle Sunday magazine. From 2004-2016, he wrote for Central City Extra in San Francisco.
Contact him at tomcarter@sfseniorbeat.com.
Writer Mary Anne Lewis has decades of experience as a radio reporter, anchor, and talk show host at stations in Pennsylvania, Texas, and Florida. She was a reporter for the Pittsburg Post-Gazette and Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. She has a degree in journalism and communications from Point Park University in Pittsburgh, and a Master of Science in Telecommunications from Syracuse University. She also was an adjunct professor in English, journalism, and public relations at several universities in the Pittsburg area.
Contact her at maryannelewis@sfseniorbeat.com.
