Board of Directors
William Seo
Founder and President
William has been involved with different organizations since 1986 to volunteer in community outreach projects in different parts of the world, such as South Korea, Philippines, Mexico, and North America.
William founded HEMEfund Worldwide, formerly known as Project Help Afghanistan (PHA), while he was deployed to Afghanistan with U.S. Army in 2009. What started to get a pair of shoes to a local Afghan national worker developed in to multiple projects, helping more than 3,000 Afghans by the end of the deployment with the support of many individuals, churches, and non-profit organizations from U.S. and other parts of the world. William immigrated to U.S. in 1984 with his family. He dropped out of St. Matthews University School of Medicine and served as the President and CEO of BioMedical26, inc. for 6 years. He has received Military Outstanding Volunteer Service Medal (MOVSM) for the humanitarian effort in Afghanistan.
His vision is to provide Home(H), Education(E), Medical(M), and Employment(E) to overcome poverty in Afghanistan and different parts of the world.
Melvyn Lopez
Vice-President
Born in Puerto Rico, Melvyn has been in the United States Army for nearly 19 years serving at various positions. He also participated in numerous deployments and peace-keeping missions such as Egypt, Bosnia, Kosovo, Iraq, and Afghanistan.
Given this opportunity to see various locations around five continents he realized that there was much need and suffering in the world. Soon, he decided to become involved in his community as much as possible.
Melvyn’s community involvement history includes volunteering at the local Roman Catholic Church; volunteering at Habitat for Humanity; being a tutor for the Machine Tool Technology department at Columbus Technical College (Columbus, GA) for over 300 hours, where he received the Military Outstanding Volunteer Service Medal (MOVSM) for his efforts; and assisting members of the Peace Corps in Vicenza, Italy with the acquisition of equipment for the St. Joseph Children’s Hospital in Ghana.
He met William during his deployment to Afghanistan and offered help with HEMEfund Worldwide. His Civilian Education includes a Bachelors of Science in Industrial Design from SUNY Empire State College, a Master of Business Administration in Global Management from the University of Phoenix, and is currently working on his dissertation for a Ph. D. in Management from North-Central University.
Dustin Cannon
Vice President of Marketing and Operations
Dustin has provided online marketing to more than 8,000 clients worldwide including global hotel brands, law firms, medical providers, an Internationally known Christian ministry and television evangelist, wedding planners, online retailers and thousands more.
Seong-Yoon Kang
Vice President of Programs & Public Relations in Korean Department
He was born in South Korea, and thanks to his parents’ full involvement in church ministry spent his childhood full of church-based activities . He served the Korean army for three years as a chaplain assistant in charge of church choir, worship band, and youth ministry. He is working on a Ph.D. degree in Curriculum, Instruction, and Media Technology with specialization in Language Education at Indiana State University.
He met William while helping him make promotional video clips for HEMEfund Worldwide and was deeply impressed by his passion and dedication to the Afghanistan ministry. Also the miraculous, heartwarming stories William shared with him touched his heart and he joined HEMEFund Worldwide.
Kevin Chung, MD
Adviser to the Board
Kevin grew up in the Washington DC area, went to college in New York and later received a medical degree from Georgetown University School of Medicine. He is currently a medical intensivist serving at the Institute of Surgical Research Burn Center in San Antonio, Texas. He was inspired by William and his story during an evening dinner party in the summer of 2011 and decided to join the HEMEfund team as an advisor.
He lives in San Antonio with his wife and three children.
Asadullah Subhanullah
Administrator in Afghanistan
Asadullah Subhanullah (Asad) was born in Kabul, Afghanistan in May 5, 1986. Due to the civil war, his family moved to Peshwar, Pakistan where he attended primary and secondary schools.
Asadullah is fluent in both English and Pashto and is educated and certified in Microsoft Office, MCSE, Photoshop, Ulead, and Operating systems troubleshooting.
He taught Microsoft Office and other software, as well as English at the Compro Institute of IT. Asadullah met William Seo while working as an Afghan Linguist with U.S. Army and started working for HEMEfund Worldwide.
Richard Johnson
Secretary
Richard Johnson was born on 12 March, 1969 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He attended the Pittsburgh High School for the Creative and Performing Arts where he majored in music performance and minored in music composition. He entered the United States Army on 13 June 1988; upon the completion of Basic Combat Training at Fort Bliss, Texas; he attended the United States Army Medical Department Center & School at Fort Sam Houston, Texas for training as a Combat Medic. Richard served on several assignments throughout his almost 22-year military career:
1.560th Medical Company, Camp Humphreys, Korea (1988-89)
2.1-34 Armor Battalion, 1st Infantry Division, Fort Riley, Kansas (1989-1992)
3.554th Military Police Company, Patch Barracks, Germany (1992-1996)
4.Stuttgart Health Clinic, Vaihingen, Germany (1992-1996)
5.690th Medical Company, Fort Benning, Georgia (1996-99)
6.Friedberg Health Clinic, Friedberg, Germany (1999-2003)
7.1-87 Infantry Battalion, 10th Mountain Division, Fort Drum, New York (2003-2005)
8.4-25 Field Artillery Battalion, 10th Mountain Division, Fort Drum, New York (2005)
9.3rd Brigade Special Troops Battalion, 10th Mountain Division, Fort Drum, New York (2005-08)
10.1-32 Infantry Battalion, 10th Mountain Division, Fort Drum, New York (2008-Present)
During my recent combat tour in Afghanistan (2009-10), he’s often noticed several its natives were without the basic necessities of which we Americans so much take for granted; simple clothing items, like shoes. Along with William, he’s had to treat some Afghans; due to the simple fact that they simply could not afford simple everyday items like shoes; so that was what very much inspired him to join William in his quest to do all (and anything) possible to render assistance to what he strongly feels was once (and still to some great extent) a much abused, if not neglected, (war-torn) nation.