Our People

Brenda is a forty-six year old married mother of three children. Brenda and her family

currently live in Great Falls, MT. She has held a position of PTA president for the last

three years and a dual job of Treasurer within two of those years. She cares about

the children in her community in her role as crossing-guard and teacher's aide for Roosevelt

Elementary School.

She has been married to her husband, Mark, for twenty-three years.

She has three horses and likes to cross-stitch & needlepoint. Recently she has gotten

into scrapbooking. A great pastime for someone with a lot of time on her hands!

Brenda is a Christian and one of the many Aunts to Anthony and Sharon's oldest sister.

Her goal for the Anthony Bates Foundation: " to keep things simple and organized

and manageable while saving young people one heart at a time."

Mike is also the Secretary of the Arizona Society of Echocardiography. He has been

a trained and certified sonographer for 36 years. Mike has worked in the medical field

for 40 years.

Mike met Sharon through the ASE in early 2001. Mike has always dreamed of setting

up heart screening events in his community. Until recently, there had not been a vehicle

in place to manifest his dreams. He is very grateful to be a part of the Anthony Bates

Foundation and the efforts put forth to save young lives with early detection of heart conditions.

Mike is married and lives in Scottsdale, AZ.

Joy has accounting and business experience for over 29 years. Joy hopes to offer technical knowledge to the Anthony Bates Foundation. Her background in public accounting, experience as a consultant, and work in many different industries will provide the Anthony Bates Foundation practical business solutions, tax filing assistance and financial reporting.

Joy was born in Phoenix in 1961 but left in 1980 to live and work in Seattle. Joy and Sharon Bates (Anthony’s mom) met after returning to Phoenix in 1999.

Currently, Joy works for Starwood Hotels & Resorts, and volunteer's as a Big Sister, recently graduated from University of Phoenix, and lives in Gilbert with her boyfriend, 2 dogs, cat and an iguana.

Sharon has been a computer programmer for over 20 years. During that time she has been a project manager, programming manager and most recently an independent consultant for the last 11 years. Sharon received a Bachelor's degree in Business Administration/Management and minor in Marketing. She was a Cub Scout Leader for 4 years, a PTA President for 3 years, a Highschool Football Booster President for 2 years. Leading organizations that promote the well-being of children has always been a great passion for Sharon.

The organizational skills and fund-raising experiences have allowed Sharon to create the Anthony Bates Foundation after the un-timely death of her only child, Anthony.

Her main goal for the Anthony Bates Foundation is to bring awareness of Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy, HCM, into communities throughout the country. By providing heart screening events and community heart screening event training, Sharon and the Anthony Bates Foundation will assist in the prevention of sudden cardiac death in young athletes. With early detection of HCM, young people will have a choice to live life. A choice that Anthony was not given.