Julian Lines, President & East Coast Co-ordinator

Julian Lines spent the summer of '72 in upstate New York with Bob and Deborah Lawlor, Marjorie Spalding, Robert McDermott, Adm. Rutledge Tompkins, Prof. Jehangir Chubb and others learning about Auroville and Integral Yoga. He has been involved in helping Auroville ever since. He currently also serves as a Board Member of Auroville International and Matagiri Sri Aurobindo Center. He and his wife, Wendy own a retail shop called Pondicherry in Woodstock, NY which features many Auroville handicrafts. He is also part of the team dealing with daily operations of AVIUSA, focusing on the monthly newsletter and other media relating to Auroville.

Ed Giordano, Vice President

Ed Giordano, an AVIUSA board member since 1996 is the current Vice President. He was a resident of Auroville for 18 years, living in the community of Forecomers. While in Auroville Ed worked on a number of projects dealing with alternative energy. However, his main energies were devoted to environmental work in and around Auroville. Here in the USA he has his own building contracting business.

Constance (David Walker) was a member of Haridas Chauduri's Cultural Integration Fellowship (CIF) in San Francisco before moving to Auroville in 1968. He returned to the United States in 1978. He has been a board member of AVIUSA since 1982. For the past 22 years Constance, together with his wife Iris, has been managing Talisman - a business in Santa Cruz specializing in the cleaning and conservation of Oriental rugs and rare textiles. Talisman was also the physical location of the AVIUSA office for several years.

Chandresh Patel was a student at the Sri Aurobindo International Centre Of Education in Pondicherry, India. Over the past few years he been actively involved with California's Integral Yoga related activities. He is currently a board member of Auroville International, Auroville International USA and a member of the Sri Aurobindo Association of California. Although he works on information technology in Silicon Valley, his main work is in helping realize the vision of Auroville as put forth by the Mother.

Bill Leon is President of AVIUSA and an ex officio member of AVI. He has been a member of AVIUSA since 1992. He is a professional geographer, educator and community developer. He has developed and managed programs to bring university students to Auroville and assists many Auroville units with development projects. He is a senior associate with Organizational Research Services in Seattle, where he evaluates health, education, environmental, and other types of programs and trains and coaches staff in nonprofits, government agencies, and foundations. He also teaches evaluation at the University of Washington and is President of Geo Education.

Paula first visited Auroville and met Mother in 1971. Since that time she has been a frequent visitor and wholehearted supporter of Auroville. She has intermittently been a member of the AVIUSA Board from its early years as the Auroville Association. She also serves on the Board of the Foundation for World Education. She is a midwife and women's health practitioner in La Crosse, Wisconsin where she lives with her husband, Jim. They are the parents of three grown children.

Mary Alexander lived in Auroville during its early years, and later moved to the USA, where she headed AVIUSA's operations as Vice President with her husband Jack Alexander for many years. She has recently helped organize several Auroville reunions, and joined the Board again in 2005.

Nilauro Markus was born in Auroville and lived there for 18 years. While completing his degree in Marine Biology at the University of California, Santa Cruz, he served on the the board of AVIUSA, and for 4 years from 2001 -2004 served as its full-time Executive Director. A great deal was accomplished under his stewardship, enabling critical support for the Auroville Land purchase and estate planning to take a big step forward. In 2005 he once again joined the Board.

Bryan was approved by the Mother as a resident of Auroville in 1972, where he helped start Fraternity, a handicraft training and employment project that benefited hundreds of villagers, including children. In 1980 he left Auroville with his wife, Fanou, and their two Auroville-born children. They settled in rural Wisconsin near Spring Green, and became part of the community Willow Gold/Global View.

Bryan currently is retired, but works summer and fall part-time as a docent at Taliesin Preservation, giving tours of Frank Lloyd Wright's home, studio, theater and estate.

Bryan and Fanou cherish many deep friendships in Auroville and feel very excited about the growth and progress they see. They feel very connected there and have recently been visiting every couple of years. They feel that the Mother's vision is indeed being realized!

Current Facilitators:

Previous Board Members, Faciliators and Staff:

June Maher met the Mother in 1971 and was asked by her to take up the work of of helping support Auroville. With a group of 4 others, June Maher founded the Auroville Association in California, which, once Auroville International was founded, became Auroville International USA. Since 1971 June has made 13 trips to Auroville, and has lived there for 1 year. She is currently Treasurer of AVIUSA and serves on the boards of the Foundation for World Education, the New Consciousness Foundation and the Sri Aurobindo Learning Center. In line with her commitment to the art and science of aromatherapy, she is a founder and member of the advisory council of the College of Botanical Healing Arts in Santa Cruz. Due to health reasons, June has stepped down from the Board as of February 2004, but her heart will always be closely tied to Auroville's work.

Megan Thomas learned of Auroville in 1981, when she met some prominent Aurovilians during the "Learning Exchange" program between Auroville, Findhorn and Arcosanti. She first traveled to Auroville in 1988 and has returned a number of times to work with Village Action, a community development organization working with the Tamil villages which surround Auroville. Megan, formerly a staff member at the California Institute of Integral Studies, has been an AVIUSA board member since 1995. She lives in Washington, DC, where she works with the US Agency for International Development on HIV/AIDS and Education in Africa. In January 2003 Megan resigned from the AVIUSA Board because she moved to Africa to continue her work there.
Megan has resigned from the Board because she has just moved to Africa for a couple of years of social work.

Renu Neogy spent most of her childhood in Auroville before coming to the United States. She joined the board of AVIUSA in 2000, and has recently returned to Auroville with her family. Renu's work in overseeing the construction of the first phases of the USA Pavilion was invaluable.

Aurotaranti Maiolini was born in Auroville and has always considered it her home. For two years, starting in 1998, she worked as part-time Executive Director for Auroville International USA and served as a board member of Auroville International. In 2000 she returned to her studies and, focusing entirely on school, withdrew from her work at AVIUSA. Her heart is still with Auroville and she continues to volunteer her services from time to time. We thank her for the great initiative, dedication and perseverance she showed in her work for Auroville International USA.

Jill Navarre has lived in Auroville since 1990. Her work in Auroville has been as English teacher, gardener, member of the Interim Development Council, Student Group Programs facilitator, theater director/actor, and, most recently, AVIUSA liaison. Working as liaison, Jill has helped to coordinate the USA Pavilion's Student Guest House construction project, the first building of the US in the Americas area of the International Zone. Jill is also project holder of the Unity Pavilion project, which will offer a space to all those working in the International Zone on Pavilion projects.