Our Team

Our amazing volunteers bring the Safe Families movement to life in the community, guided by a devoted staff pouring their hearts into supporting isolated families, training and vetting volunteers, and partnering with local agencies to help keep families together!

Our Volunteers

The heart and soul of Safe Families for Children are our volunteers! By opening their hearts and homes to host children and support families, volunteers live out our core values of radical hospitality, disruptive generosity, and intentional compassion. We are fueled by an incredible army of dedicated volunteers, and happily welcome you to join our team! Volunteers serve a variety of roles from hosting children for a temporary period of time to providing services such as transportation, parent mentoring, respite care, and supplying tangible items such as diapers, car seats, and meals.

Our Staff

Russ Hightower

Family Coach Supervisor

Russ serves as the Family Coach Supervisor for the KC Metro region, joining Safe Families for Children in March 2021. He began his work in Intake, Church & Community Engagement, and Family Coaching—roles that brought together his deep compassion for families and his desire to see children safe and parents supported.

A graduate of Kansas State University, Russ spent much of his career in Corporate Human Resources before transitioning into roles that shaped his heart for this ministry: middle school educator, behavioral interventionist, and foster/adoptive parent. These experiences gave him a firsthand understanding of the challenges families face and the power of community support.

Russ and his wife, Tiffany, live in Shawnee and are parents to two young adults they adopted from foster care—and now proud grandparents. They attend Westside Family Church in Lenexa, where they helped launch and grow a thriving foster and adoption ministry.

Russ’s “happy place” is the kitchen, where he loves cooking for others and creating space for connection. Known for his compassion and sense of humor, he brings joy and encouragement everywhere he goes. One of his favorite scriptures is Colossians 3:12, a reminder to “clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience.”

Grant Roesner

Community & Church Engagement Coordinator

Grant serves as the Church & Community Engagement Coordinator for the KC Metro Chapter. Originally from Overland Park, Kansas, Grant is a graduate of Baker University in Baldwin City, where he competed on the cross-country and track teams. His background in athletics reflects his steady commitment, teamwork, and perseverance—qualities he now brings into ministry.

Grant has a deep passion for helping churches discover meaningful ways to support vulnerable children and families. His heart for ministry and community engagement drives him to build strong partnerships, mobilize volunteers, and create pathways for people to live out the love of Christ in practical, relational ways.

He is committed to being a source of hope, healing, and tangible support for those in need, and he counts it a privilege to walk alongside churches and volunteers who help keep children safe and families together.

Amber Marrs

Family Coach

Amber Marrs joined the Safe Families for Children KC Metro team as a Family Coach in July 2026 after previously serving as a Family Friend volunteer in our Southeast Kansas region. Her passion for keeping children safe and families together is deeply personal: Amber entered foster care as a kindergartner and aged out as a young adult.

For 14 years, Amber worked at the Youth Crisis Center in Parsons, Kansas—the same center where she had once been placed during her own time in foster care. She spent seven years working one-on-one with youth before transitioning into an administrative role in 2019.

Now settled in Shawnee, Amber is passionate about sharing the hope and restoration she has experienced through Jesus. After experiencing profound healing in 2023, she looks forward to using her story to encourage the families she serves. Her message to others is simple: “You are never too broken for God to use you. What the enemy meant for evil, God will turn for His good!” One of the Scriptures that has especially guided her journey is 1 Peter 2:9, reminding her that God calls us out of darkness and into His wonderful light.

Amber is happiest when she is with her family. She is the proud mother of two adult children and especially treasures being “Aunt Amber” to her two goddaughters and her many nieces and nephews.