Who is Veronica Squires?
Veronica Squires, MBA, is a nonprofit executive, author, and community leader known for her strategic fundraising expertise and commitment to strengthening underserved communities. She currently serves as Chief Philanthropy Officer at the YMCA of Metropolitan Atlanta and has previously guided major initiatives at the Boys & Girls Clubs of Metro Atlanta and the Good Samaritan Health Center. Across her career, Veronica has built sustainable revenue, led transformational campaigns, and championed programs that improve health, belonging, and opportunity for families across Atlanta.
A Life Shaped by Love, Hardship, and Purpose
Long before she became a respected nonprofit executive, author, and advocate for healthier communities, Veronica Squires was a young girl learning life’s most enduring lessons from her grandmother, Vicy Cobb. Her grandmother’s life had been defined by hardship, homelessness, early loss, mental health challenges in the family, and decades of making do with almost nothing. Yet what Veronica remembers most is not the hardship, but the love.
Gram “never met a stranger,” and she modeled a simple but profound truth: belonging is a gift you give to others long before they know they deserve it. That spirit became the foundation of Veronica’s leadership and the compass guiding every chapter of her life.
By the time she entered college at Emory University, she understood something deeper about herself: the same instinct that led her to befriend lonely kids on playgrounds was rooted in her faith and her calling. Through Emory Christian Fellowship, she discovered that social justice, racial reconciliation, and community impact were not just interests, they were her mission.
This early formation sparked a vocation that would lead her through nonprofit service, healthcare leadership, philanthropy, and community revitalization. Yet through every role, one theme held steady: she would lead with love, even when the work was hard.
Faith, Community, and the Pull Toward Service
Veronica’s upbringing and faith shaped a leadership philosophy grounded in compassion, authenticity, and quiet courage. Raised in an environment where service was lived, not just taught, she gravitated toward the vulnerable, the overlooked, and the isolated.
Her early experiences volunteering in government-owned nursing homes and afterschool programs opened her eyes to the deep disconnect between community needs and available resources. These moments planted seeds, questions about justice, equity, and the structures that keep people in cycles of disadvantage.
In college, everything came into focus. As she puts it:
“I am at my best when I am living in obedience to God’s call on my life.”
This grounding principle would travel with her into every boardroom, budget crisis, partnership negotiation, and fundraising campaign she would lead in the years ahead.
Two Decades of Transformational Leadership
Veronica’s career is defined by her ability to take organizations through challenging seasons and lead them to new levels of sustainability, visibility, and impact.
She began building momentum early, with roles at The National Society of High School Scholars, InterVarsity Christian Fellowship, and The Posse Foundation, where she consistently exceeded revenue goals, built new donor pipelines, expanded university partnerships, and set new standards for strategic fundraising.
But it was her leadership at Boys & Girls Clubs of Metro Atlanta and The Good Samaritan Health Center that cemented her reputation as a force in the nonprofit sector.
Chief Development Officer, Boys & Girls Clubs of Metro Atlanta
At BGCMA, she orchestrated one of the organization’s most ambitious philanthropic efforts: a $28M comprehensive campaign, completed ahead of schedule.
Colleagues describe her as honest, steady, inspiring, and deeply relational.
Finance Executive Victor Fioresi shared:
“Veronica’s emphasis on relationship building was evident in her ability to connect with donors, board members, and staff… She was instrumental in leading our $28M campaign and completing the fundraising ahead of schedule.”
Another colleague, Dr. Shernā “Dr. Nae” Phillips, added:
“She is a seasoned professional… a rare combination of level-headedness, humor, and kindness. Under her leadership, BGCMA secured $28M in under two years—surpassing our goals even in the face of turnover and challenges.”
These endorsements reinforce what many already know: Veronica inspires performance not through pressure, but through presence. Her leadership is calm, human, and strategic.
Chief Administrative Officer, Good Samaritan Health Center
At Good Sam, Veronica directed the 5-Year Strategic Plan and oversaw daily operations, fundraising, budgeting, human resources, and programs that served some of Atlanta’s most vulnerable residents.
She also launched the Good Sam Institute, designed to shape a new national model of healthcare, a bold step for an organization committed to holistic, community-based care.
Her book, How Neighborhoods Make Us Sick, emerged from this season, written after nine years of living in a historically disinvested southwest Atlanta community. She and her husband had moved there with the hope of supporting neighbors and contributing to long-term revitalization. The experience was transformative and humbling.
She writes about the layered challenges communities face, the toll of environmental and social determinants of health, and the need for systemic solutions, not isolated efforts.
But through hardship came clarity. As she says:
“Show up. Persist. Believe it can be better.”
These three commitments became her north star.
Chief Philanthropy Officer, YMCA of Metropolitan Atlanta
Today, Veronica serves as Chief Philanthropy Officer at the YMCA of Metropolitan Atlanta, where her impact extends across early learning centers, youth programs, public health initiatives, Head Start programs, and community development efforts.
Recent highlights reveal her leadership in action:
- Elevating awareness of shutdown impacts affecting Head Start, 21st Century afterschool, and drowning prevention programs.
- Re-launching the Y-CEO Golf Tournament Experience designed to raise funds for the East Lake Community and Teen Programs
- Through the generosity of institutional donors, launching a scholarship endowment for aspiring Y teens.
- Designing a new Parties with a Purpose initiative that enables friends of the Y to raise funds in an easy, impactful way.
- Rallying and energizing her philanthropy team through both strategy and simple joys—working hard and playing hard together.
Her work reflects a belief she lives out daily: community is built in moments of showing up.
Leadership That Changes Lives
Veronica’s most meaningful accomplishment, however, is not measured in millions raised or strategic plans executed.
It is measured in one message, one that came 10 years after she last saw a young man she once mentored.
He reached out to tell her that the time she and her husband invested in him had changed his life. He now had a steady job. His daughter was enrolled in a YMCA early learning program. The cycle was shifting.
For Veronica, it was a full-circle moment.
“That was the greatest affirmation to continue this work. God tells good, albeit long, stories of redemption.”
Her journey is a reminder that leadership is not defined by scale, but by significance.
Joy, Humor, and Staying Human
While known as a strategist and executive, Veronica keeps life grounded through humor and play.
She jokes that she could have been a stand-up comedian in another life, and stays energized by comedy, storytelling, ultimate frisbee, reading fiction, being a soccer mom, doing yoga, and spending time in nature.
Trying new things, like joining a local adult ultimate frisbee league, reminds her that growth is lifelong and fun is essential. As she put it in one of her posts:
“Most importantly, I have been reminded that you’re never too old to try something new.”
Her joy is infectious, and her authenticity is disarming.
A Legacy of Faithful, Persistent Leadership
When Veronica thinks about the next generation of purpose-driven leaders, she offers this message:
“All of this, life, work, mothering, leading—is infinitely harder than you expect. But don’t give up. ‘Let us not become weary in doing good…’”
Her vision is simple yet profound:
To build communities where everyone belongs.
To lead with integrity and love.
To strengthen organizations that strengthen people.
To walk faithfully through the long, winding stories of redemption.
Editorial Note
Veronica Squires’s story invites leaders, community builders, and changemakers to rethink what true leadership looks like. It is not found in titles, budgets, or recognition. It is found in compassion that refuses to fade, persistence that refuses to bend, and love that refuses to quit.
May her journey inspire each of us to ask:
Where can I show up?
Who can I lift up?
What story of redemption am I being called to help write?
Because as Veronica reminds us, the work of doing good is hard, but the harvest is always worth it.
