Julia Spann, MSW, is CEO at The SAFE Alliance, generally referred to as SAFE, which stands for Stop Abuse For Everyone.  SAFE is a merger of Austin Children’s Shelter and SafePlace, both long-standing and respected human service agencies in Austin, Texas.  As both a social service and social change agency, SAFE addresses the issues of child abuse, sexual assault and exploitation, and domestic violence.Julia provides leadership for SAFE programs, human resources, compliance, operations and administration, and major community initiatives for SAFE. She has more than 30 years of experience in the human services field, including 23 years cumulatively with SAFE. Julia has expertise with women and children's issues, poverty, basic needs, victimization, homelessness, and more. She has served in various leadership capacities for Austin nonprofit agencies, including as Co-CEO, Executive Director, Chief Program Officer, Associate Vice President, and Director of Social Services. Julia has a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology from Texas A&M University, and a Master’s degree in Social Work from The University of Texas in Arlington.  She is passionate about recognizing the intersections of poverty, abuse, oppression, and violence and yearns for a time when all humans are safe and have opportunity to thrive. 

Movetia oversees the SAFE Human Resources department and is responsible overseeing administration, talent acquisition, compliance, and training . Movetia is an accomplished Human Resources professional with over 24 years of experience in the not-for-profit and in the public sector.

She previously served as Chief Human Resources Officer for the Alameda County Office of Education, as Human Resources Director for the Camden City School District and as the Human Resources Director for the Greater San Antonio Area American Red Cross. Movetia has a Bachelors degree in Human Resources Management from Park University, and a Masters degree in Human Resources Management from Troy State University. Movetia is a proud Texas veteran who served in the United States Air Force, Arizona Air National Guard and Air Force Reserves.

As the Sr. Director of Family and Community shelter, I get to work with a diverse group of people who represent and look like the clients we serve. Our program is very individualized in that we are meeting clients where they are at and embrace client’s choice in our programs. This has a huge impact on underrepresented communities that may not be apprehensive about taking the step to come to shelter.

The shelter empowers the clients by giving them insights, tools, and strategies to help them on their journey to being SAFE. They have opportunities to work with caring staff who are effective at problem solving, pushing through challenges alongside the clients and helping clients leading to clients becoming resilient after experiencing violence. The best part of SAFE is that we never stop learning. We continue to tailor our services to the needs of those that we serve which allows the team to be creative through their service delivery. The work requires passion, empathy, and self-care. There is never a dull time in shelter, as we build one another up through appreciation activities and plenty of opportunities to connect with your team members.

Data shows us that children and young adults who are involved in the child welfare system experience homelessness, exploitation, systemic, and carceral violence at significantly higher rates than their same aged peers. Data also shows us that what improves outcomes for youth in foster care more than any other single variable is connection to others. Youth in care have experienced complex loss, saying goodbye to home, family, school, pets, friends…upon removal and with every placement change. The majority of youth that we serve have had 7 or more. Imagine the number of connections lost. Our programs aim to be a place where youth establish belonging and are supported to feel like “who I am matters”, “what I want to do matters”, and “who I want to be in my life matters”. From there we start out advocacy that their voice be heard. We stand as buffers from harms youth continue to experience as a result of being in foster care. We build bridges to extend support outside of folx with badges who may go away with the next placement.  We celebrate the wins, and we stick by during the hard times. Each day the youth we serve are waiting for us to show up for them and it is such a privilege to do so.

I choose to work at SAFE because it is a survivor led agency and that translates to those we serve. SAFE has the energy to challenge harmful systems, bias, legislature and where we as an agency can grow and learn to better serve the community.