OUR PEOPLE
Karen Fagan – Chair
Karen has been involved in the social services sector in Hawke’s Bay for many years. During her working career she has been involved in community work, social work, and social science research, and more recently she has been a lecturer at the Eastern Institute of Technology. Being a lifelong learner, she is currently undertaking a PhD through the University of Queensland. She has two adult children, and she resides with her partner on a small orchard outside of Hastings.
John Dwyer
John worked as a teacher for four years and then trained as an educational psychologist. He has worked as a registered psychologist, team leader, supervisor and manager for the Department of Education Psychological Service, Specialist Education Services and the Ministry of Education, Special Education, for many years.
He was for some years registered with ACC as a counsellor for children and adults who were dealing with sensitive issues and he also worked in a doctors’ practice in Napier, taking referrals of adults and children for a range of clinical matters. He worked for the University of Waikato for a year lecturing on the Resource Teachers Learning and Behavior programme. He currently works as a registered psychologist in private practice providing psychological assessments for the Family Court, Oranga Tamariki, lawyers, and private clients.
John has worked in the Hawke’s Bay community for over 37 years. He has three adult children and two grandchildren and he lives with his wife in Bay View.
Trish Giddens
Trish has worked, volunteered, and governed in health and social services these past 43 years. Working largely in management, her career has been in hospital and health centre services for the older person, local government and education. Recently retired, she continues to volunteer and govern representatively at a community and regional level. She is Ngāti Kahungunu, has two adult children and one grandchild, and resides in Waipukurau, Central Hawke’s Bay.
Kelly Hall
Kelly is an accountant with over 20 years of experience in the financial and accounting aspects of working with charities and not-for-profits (among others). She has been a trustee since 2021 and had been involved in the administration of the Hawke’s Bay Children’s Holding Trust prior to this for seven years.
Kelly has lived in Hawke’s Bay since 2013 and has one school-aged child. She lives in Havelock North with her husband and daughter.
Name
Trish has worked, volunteered, and governed in health and social services these past 43 years. Working largely in management her career has been in hospital and health centre services for the older person, local government and in Education.Recently retired, she continues to volunteer and govern representatively at a community and regional level. She is Ngati Kahungunu, has two adult children and one grandchild and resides in Waipukurau, Central Hawke’s Bay.
Harriette Banks
Harriette was born and raised in Hawke’s Bay and has worked in social service agencies for the past 18 years.
Harriette has a passion for community welfare. She worked in mental health for seven years, then as a registered social worker in government and non-government sectors. She is now pursuing further training in teaching and education.
Harriette has one child and resides with her partner in Hastings.
Kezia Taylor
Kezia was born and raised in Hawke’s Bay. Kezia attended Karamu High School and then the
University of Otago where she completed a Bachelor of Laws. Kezia worked as a Regulator at the
Department of Internal Affairs, Auckland, before returning to Hawke’s Bay with her partner in 2021.
Kezia currently practices as a family lawyer in Hastings. She is passionate about advocacy and
making a positive difference in the community.
Emma Karapetyan
Administrator
Emma is originally from Armenia and moved to Hawke’s Bay three years ago, joining BWR upon her arrival. She loves accounting and enjoys helping people with their tax or finance queries.
Emma really enjoys the weather in Hawke’s Bay, and in her free time she likes watching movies, going to the beach and spending time with her border collie Enzo.
Emma takes care of administration for the Hawke’s Bay Children’s Holding Trust.
Past Trustees
Morgan Duckworth
Morgan works at a private practice law firm, currently specialising in property and private client work. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Communication Studies from Westmont College in Santa Barbara, California, and a Bachelor of Laws from Victoria University of Wellington. Over the years she has volunteered for organisations such as the Wellington Community Justice Project, the Prisoners’ Aid and Rehabilitation Society, Law For Change, Community Law and the Citizens Advice Bureau.
She was born in California and grew up in Montana, USA, before her family emigrated to New Zealand in 2004. They have a beef farm in Central Hawke’s Bay.
Morgan has a special interest in the welfare of tamariki and rangatahi and has two young children with her Kiwi husband.
Sue Burns
Ko Ngāti Kahungunu and Ngātiwai te Iwi. Omahu te rohe, Kōnei te iri Tame kārena rāua Taupiri Te Paea Pita ara oku maatua tipuna
Sue has worked in the Hawke’s Bay community for over 30 years as a volunteer, social worker, counselor, facilitator and a manager of local community and social services agencies.
She has been involved in setting up a number of services specialising in family/whānau work and child abuse prevention and for the last 15 years has worked with young people who have behaved inappropriately toward others and their family/whānau.
Sue has four adult children and six grandchildren. Whilst currently retired, Sue continues to be interested in supporting agencies to deliver best practice and the highest services to our tamariki, rangatahi and whānau.
Bryan King
Bryan was in private legal practice for 20 years and was a partner in the Hawke’s Bay firm Langley
Twigg for 15 of them. In 2010 he left Langley Twigg to follow an interest in alternative dispute
resolution.
Since then, after 18 months as Transition Manager for the Ngāti Pahauwera Development Trust,
Bryan has developed a mediation/arbitration practice helping people in conflict find ways of
resolving their disputes themselves. Bryan has continued to take Family Court appointments to
represent children and people with diminished capacity and is also a Tenancy Tribunal
adjudicator.
Bryan has had a longstanding involvement with the Hawke’s Bay Children’s Holding Trust. At the time
those organisations merged in 2004, Bryan was a Trustee of Hawke’s Bay Children’s Home and Birthright Napier. Since the merger, Bryan was also the
Chair of Birthright Hawke’s Bay Child and Family Care from 2004 to 2016.
S M (George) Speedy
George qualified as a chartered accountant in 1980 and since that time was been an employee and director of chartered accountancy practices in New Zealand and Scotland until retiring in 2019. Currently he is a consultant to a Hastings chartered accountancy practice.
From 1998 until 2019 he was the general manager of a financial institution based in Hawke’s Bay.
He is a director of various companies and trustee of numerous trusts.
Lowana Crawford
Lowana is a child advocate who has worked with children most of her life. Her formative years were with extended family in a small village in Tonga. She moved to New Zealand to be with her mother who worked with and for children. This was before the advent of general or political acceptance of solo parents.
Lowana initially trained in psychopaedic nursing. She has since raised a family, then worked as a counsellor, social worker and programme facilitator in health and social services. As the founder of Parentline Hawkes Bay, children’s needs were always paramount.
Lowana has six children and three grandchildren.