• Session: X Marks the Spot

• Session: Old Structures / New Neighborhoods

Dr. Desiree Backman is the Manager of the California 5 a Day—for Better Health! Campaign. She directs program planning, implementation, and evaluation of comprehensive community-based interventions designed to increase fruit and vegetable consumption and physical activity among Californians. The programs under Dr. Backman’s direction focus on outreach to children through the Children’s 5 a Day—Power Play! Campaign, Latino adults through the Latino 5 a Day Campaign, African American adults through the African American 5 a Day Campaign, and low-income Californians through the 5 a Day Retail Program and the 5 a Day Worksite Program. Dr. Backman works closely with research experts to design and implement formative, process, and outcome evaluations and was awarded a grant from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and National Cancer Institute to formally evaluate the Latino 5 a Day Campaign. Dr. Backman has presented 5 a Day research and programmatic activities, as well as her doctoral dissertation research at numerous national conferences. She has also published scientific articles related to cancer prevention and health promotion and has served on a variety of expert panels at Yale University and the National Cancer Institute. Prior to joining the California 5 a Day Campaign, Dr. Backman worked in nutrition marketing, education, and research.

• Session: Community Wellness and Fresh Food

Obadiah Bartholomy is a Graduate Researcher at UC Davis' Institute of Transportation Studies in the Hydrogen Pathways program with a focus on the production of hydrogen from wind energy. He also works as a Mechanical Engineer for the Sacramento Municipal Utility District's Renewable Generation Assets program. His primary areas of work there are in photovoltaics and greenhouse gas inventory and policy. He is a graduate of Cal Poly's Mechanical Engineering program in 2002, with a focus on renewable energy production technologies. Obadiah grew up in Hawaii in a solar-powered home.

• Session: Hydrogen--Hype or Hope Part II

Shannon Baxter, Ph.D. is presently employed as the Hydrogen and Alternative Energy Advisor to Secretary Alan Lloyd at the California Environmental Protection Agency. She is presently charged with leading the implementation of Executive Order S-7-04 that outlines the Governor’s vision for hydrogen in California and working with the Green Building Initiative that was announced in the Governors State of the State in January 2004. Shannon was previously with the California Air Resources Board (ARB) in the Chairman’s Office of Science and Advanced Technology during which time she served as ARB’s representative on the California Fuel Cell Partnership’s Working Group for four years. Before coming to California she worked as the Director of Special Projects at Fuel Cells 2000 and was awarded research appointments at E. I. Du Pont de Nemours, WESTVACO, and Argonne National Laboratory. Shannon received her Ph.D. in chemical engineering from the University of South Carolina in 1999. Her graduate work emphasized applying electrochemical techniques to technical issues affecting the environment, namely fuel cells as a source of clean power and electrolyzing hazardous waste streams.

• Session: Hydrogen--Hype or Hope Part I

Robert Benedetti is the Executive Director of the Jacoby Center for Community and Regional Studies at the University of the Pacific. He served thirteen years as Dean of the College at Pacific and was faculty and member and Provost of New College in Florida. Benedetti has served on the board of the American Conference of Academic Deans and was president of the Northern California and the Florida Political Science Associations. He also chaired the California Council for the Humanities and the Florida Endowment for the Humanities. Benedetti received his baccalaureate from Amherst College and his masters and doctorate from the University of Pennsylvania.

• Session: Across Cultures and Generations

Tracie Billington manages the Special Projects Section within DWR’s Division of Planning and Local Assistance, Conjunctive Water Management Branch. Her responsibilities include implementation of the Proposition 50 Integrated Regional Water Management Grant Program and the Local Groundwater Assistance Grant Program. Ms. Billington has a Bachelor of Science degree in Environmental Resources Engineer from Humboldt State University.

• Session: California Water Update 2005

• Session: Hydrogen--Hype or Hope Part I

Jim Boren has been the editorial page editor of The Fresno Bee for 10 years and has been a journalist with The Bee for more than three decades. In addition to overseeing the editorial pages, he also writes a weekly column that appears in the Sunday Vision section, and is distributed by two newspaper syndicates.

Boren covered politics for The Bee for 15 years prior to moving to the editorial pages. He has covered every level of politics, including city council elections, governor races and presidential campaigns. He also covered six national political conventions during his tenure as The Bee's political writer.

Boren's current column focuses on politics and government policy, but he also writes on personal issues. He has won a variety of journalism awards, including an investigative reporting award from the Society of Professional Journalists and has been honored by the California Teachers Association for his coverage of education. The Fresno chapter of the NAACP recently honored him for his even-handed coverage of issues related to its members.

Boren is a native of Fresno and graduated from California State University, Fresno, with a degree in journalism in 1972.

• Session: Air Quality affects Everyone

Eileen Brady is Vice President of the Food and Farm Program at Ecotrust, a non-profit organization based in Portland, Oregon providing conservation and economic development leadership from Alaska to California. She has twenty years experience in the natural foods retail grocery industry, developing human resources and sustainability-based marketing programs. Eileen is currently coordinating the Vivid Picture initiative, a project envisioning a sustainable food system for the State of California. Eileen sits on the Governor’s Steering Committee for Oregon Solutions, a statewide effort to develop sustainable solutions to economic issues. She is a board member of Zenger Farm, the first urban agricultural park in the nation. Eileen serves on the Board of Celilo Group Media, publisher of the Sustainable Industries Journal. She is a member of the Ag-of-the-middle Task Force, a WK Kellogg Foundation and USDA SARE sponsored project working to protect family farms. She speaks regularly on “Building Regional Food Economies” and is an owner of New Seasons Market, a retail grocery chain in Portland, Oregon. Contact information: eileen@ecotrust.org.

• Session: The Vivid Picture: A Valley Sustainable Food System

Ms. Brickey became Executive Director of the Protected Harvest in January, 2002. Protected Harvest promotes the development and use of eco-labeling for sustainably grown food and certifies Healthy Grown potatoes for the Wisconsin Potato & Vegetable Growers Association.

In another effort, she is working with Arizona's Special Master for Water as Project Administrator of "Dividing the Waters: A Dialog for Judges and Masters", a Hewlett Foundation project designed to further the resolution of general stream adjudications in the western United States.

Ms. Brickey is Executive Director of the Institute for Environment and Agriculture which is focused on sustainable agriculture and environmental protection. For seven years Ms. Brickey directed The National Campaign for Pesticide Policy Reform which helped to spearhead the enactment of the “Food Quality Protection Act of 1996”, a new law designed to protect children from exposure to harmful pesticides.

Of special expertise and experience are governmental policy-making in water, environmental toxins, food safety, drug law, and the regulatory process. Ms. Brickey is currently serving on the EPA Pesticide Policy Dialogue Committee, the EPA Committee to Advise on Risk Assessment and Transition, and, until recently, the USDA Advisory Committee on Agricultural Biotechnology. She serves on the Dow Agro-Sciences Global Stewardship Council.

Previously, Ms. Brickey chaired the National Organic Standards Board, an advisory board that assists the Secretary of Agriculture in the implementation of the national organic program. Clients have included the World Wildlife Fund, the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Natural Resources Defense Council, Environmental Defense, and the Gerber Food Company.

Ms. Brickey served as Senior Counsel to the Chairman of the U.S. Senate Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry Committee until May, 1992. In that capacity she specialized in environmental issues and managed legal and policy strategy for Chairman Patrick Leahy. She helped draft the 1990 Farm Bill, and was the lead drafter of the pioneering Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act of 1988. She obtained her law degree from Georgetown University Law Center in 1979.

• Session: Seeds of Success

Californians for GE-Free Agriculture is a coalition committed to ecologically responsible and economically viable agriculture. The coalition provides education, training and resources in support of the rights of farmers and communities to protect themselves from the environmental, human health and economic risks of genetic engineering in agriculture. For the past nine years, Renata has worked on Bay Area sustainable food systems projects in a variety of capacities. She has been the Food Systems Program Director and the Communications Director for the Occidental Arts and Ecology Center. She also established farmers’ market salad bars at schools in the Davis Unified School District, and worked as the Operations Director of Slide Ranch, a farm-based environmental education center. She was also a member of the Marin Food Policy Council, and served on the founding steering committee of the California Food and Justice Coalition. She serves as a Steering Committee member of the national Genetic Engineering Action Network.

• Session: Framing the GMO Issue

After working on San Francisco’s successful $100 million solar bond campaign in 2001, Adam co-founded the Vote Solar Initiative with David Hochschild in 2002, and has been working to replicate the measure’s success in other cities and states since then. By helping city and state governments build large-scale and cost-effective solar projects, Vote Solar is working to bring solar into the mainstream.

Previously, Adam ran the Toxics Release Inventory Program for the US EPA’s San Francisco office, winning the Agency’s top pollution prevention award for developing an innovative program that resulted in annual reductions of approximately 7,000 pounds of mercury air emissions from Nevada gold mines. A native of Miami, Adam graduated from Swarthmore College in 1992, and was a Peace Corps volunteer in Guinea-Bissau.

• Session: Here comes the Sun

A 5th generation California Rancher, Bill Burrows’ family migrated to Northern California in 1848 and the family has continued to be active in the agriculture and natural resources of this area since that time.

After completing a Master’s Degree from UC Davis, he devoted 35 years to developing the Agriculture and Natural Resources Program at Shasta College.

He and his wife, Kay, operate their 3500 acre family ranch west of Red Bluff, California.

Bill is the Coordinator for a 40,000 acre Coordinated Resource Management Plan (CRMP) in which 65 landowners and agency personnel have come together to develop a goal in making the 40,000 acre chaparral belt land and associated areas more productive and safe for the social, financial, and environmental needs of the temporary stewards of the land.

Trained in Holistic Management, Bill has been a keynote speaker and has given seminars throughout the Western United States and three countries in Africa. Many of these presentations have incorporated his grandchildren, who are involved on the family ranch.

• Session: Fueling Regional Economies through the Web

• Session: Metaphors of Leadership

Farmer and artist Paul Buxman has been farming and painting the San Joaquin Valley for over forty years. His dedication to discovering clean, sustainable farming methods have influenced people world wide. His farm has been the subject of many documentaries including National Geographic, PBS, Sixty Minutes, Bill Moyer, CBS Nightly News, California Heartland, Canadian Public Broadcasting, and many local news broadcasts.

Paul's art has also had a strong impact on many people in America; not just collectors, but on other painters as well. He teaches and "preaches" simplicity and honesty as key to great art. He encourages others to paint what they know. "Paintings should be a visual autobiography. Paint those subjects with which you are most intimately acquainted."

This has been the guiding force in Paul's life as a painter. Having grown up on a small farm and being a farmer for most of his adult life, small farm settings are his subject of choice.

Paul works primarily in oil, but he also works in pastel.

Paul has held exhibits at the Fresno Art Center, the Hanford Art Center, the Haggin Museum in Stockton, the Bakersfield Art Museum, the Francis Schaeffer Institute in St. Louis, Missouri, the Davis Art Museum, the Modesto Art Museum, the Great Valley Center in Modesto, and the beautiful Villa del Sol d'Oro in Sierra Madre, California.

His works have been displayed in the Senate Chambers both in California and nationally in Washington, D.C. His works are in small and large, public and private collections throughout the United States of America.

• Session: Ag-Muse-Ments

Tony Caetano is the Vice President of Human Resources for Ruiz Foods in Dinuba, California. Ruiz Foods is the largest Mexican Frozen Food manufacturer in the nation. Ruiz Foods manufactures more than 185 different products under the El Monterey brand, and employees over 1900 Team Members. Prior to Ruiz Foods Tony served as Division Human Resources Manager for Foster Poultry Farms with HR responsibilities in multiple facilities. During this time Tony was the principal HR representative in the acquisition and transition teams on the purchase of Zacky Farms and played a significant role in negotiating three union contracts. Tony also severed as Human Resources Director for Nestle USA, David & Sons Division. Tony’s 18-year HR professional career has included duties in recruitment, employment, employee/labor relations, labor law, OSHA requirements, benefits & retirement plan communications, and employee training and development. Tony’s educational background includes a BA in Business Administration from CSU Stanislaus, MBA in Management from Golden Gate University, San Francisco; and Senior Professional in Human Resource (SPHR) certification.

• Session: Good Corporate Citizens

Terranova’s growth and success is primarily due to its General Manager, Don J. Cameron. Don has a sincere passion for farming, which has strengthened his dedication to being a voice for agriculture in California. Don’s credentials include the following:

* Bachelor of Science Degree in Biology, 1975 – California State University Fresno * Licensed Pest Control Advisor (PCA), 1976-1981 – TMT Chemical Co. * Vineyard Manager, 1981-1988 – FFM * General Manager, VP, Sec, CFO, 1988-Present – Terranova Ranch, Inc., et al * Chairman of the Board (1990-Present) – California Planting Cotton Seed Distributors * Licensed Pest Control Advisor (PCA), 1981-Present – Grower/Farm Manager * Owner/Member, 1996-Present, Celtic Farms, LLC * California Producer Delegate (1997-2005) – National Cotton Council * Director (1998-Present) – San Joaquin Valley Quality Cotton Growers Association * Secretary/Treasurer (2001-2002) – California Cotton Growers Association * California Chairman (2002-Present) – American Cotton Producers • Past President & Chairman of the Board (2002 / 2004) – The Cotton Foundation * Director (2002-Present) – Supima Association * Chairman of the Board (2003-Present) – California Tomato Growers Association * 2nd Vice-Chairman (2003-Present) – California Cotton Growers Association

• Session: Framing the GMO Issue

Allen Carden, executive director of the Central Valley Higher Education Consortium, said his organization, a presidentially led partnership of the community colleges, two private universities, California State University campuses, and University of California sites in the San Joaquin Valley, is committed to getting the word out to students and parents that “college is possible” and “an important next step for many in our valley who are not currently thinking about further education.” He has been a professor and administrator in higher education since 1971. He holds a Ph.D. in history from the University of California, Irvine. His experience has included teaching history, and serving as an administrator in Southern California, Michigan, and now in Fresno, California.

• Session: The Old College Try: Opportunity or Crisis

Michael Carroll is the Director of Fannie Mae’s Central Valley Partnership Office in Sacramento, California. As Director, Carroll works with state and local housing partners to make affordable housing and homeownership opportunities available to people in 31 counties in Central and Northern California.

Prior to joining Fannie Mae, Carroll served as Real Estate Debt Product Executive for Bank of America’s Community Development Banking Group. In this capacity, he developed and managed lending products and programs in support of the bank’s affordable housing lending group, which generated over $1 Billion annually in construction and term loans and tax exempt bonds for multifamily developments. His group also managed the bank’s Affordable Housing Program through the Federal Home Loan Bank. He was also responsible for loan portfolio sales, and was a Lending Manager and Account Officer during his 8 years with Bank of America.

Mr. Carroll also managed a number of affordable housing loan and grant programs for the State of California Department of Housing and Community Development, where he worked for six years. He began his community development career at Self-Help Enterprises (SHE), the oldest and largest rural self-help housing organization in the country. During his eight years at SHE, he worked as a Housing Counselor, Rehab Program Coordinator, Community Development Specialist and VISTA volunteer.

Carroll is on the Board of Directors of the California Coalition for Rural Housing, the California Community Reinvestment Corporation and the National Rural Housing Coalition.

• Session: There's No Place Like Home

Ruth Coleman currently serves as Director of California State Parks.

She was appointed Chief Deputy for California State Parks in January 2002, after having joined the department in December 1999 as Deputy Director for Legislation.

Before coming to State Parks, Ms. Coleman worked as Policy Director for Assemblywoman Helen Thomson for one year, responsible for legislative issues relating to water, agriculture and land use. Prior to that she was Legislative Director for State Senator Mike Thompson, coordinating his legislative agenda and providing staff leadership on major environmental legislation such as a park bond, salmon and steelhead restoration; and the protection of the Headwaters Forest.

Ms. Coleman also has worked for the Air Resources Board in the electric vehicle program and the Office of the Legislative Analyst, focusing on fiscal and policy issues in the natural resources area, particularly the Department of Parks and Recreation and the Department of Fish and Game. Prior to her work in Sacramento, she spent three years teaching mathematics as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Swaziland, Southern Africa.

Ms. Coleman received her Master in Public Administration from Harvard University, and a B.A. in Economics from Occidental College.

• Session: A Park Plan for the Valley

Born: 01/14/69, Bradford-on-Avon, England

Education: B.A. (Hons.) in Urban Geography, Durham University, England, June 1990 Minor in European Studies (University of Tubingen, Germany)

Occupation: Planning Manager, City of Turlock – supervises the Land Use Planning Division of the City of Turlock’s Community Development Department. Turlock’s Planning Division has five full-time employees; its duties include current planning, advanced planning and environmental review (CEQA and NEPA).

Professional Associations: Member American Institute of Certified Planners (AICP), Member Association of Environmental Professionals (AEP).

Career Accomplishments: Managed the preparation and implementation of the North Turlock Master Plan, an innovative residential land use plan for approximately 900 new homes in northwest Turlock. The Plan incorporated Turlock’s second high school, Pitman High, an elementary school, a regional sports complex, and a comprehensive bike / pedestrian greenway system (paseos). The North Turlock Master Plan won an award from the local section of the California Chapter of the American Planning Association (CCAPA). Other important projects: the approval and development of Monte Vista Crossings, a 500,000 square foot regional commercial shopping center in Northwest Turlock.

Personal: Married to Monica, a graduate of Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, for eleven years. We met as exchange students in Tubingen, Germany in 1998. Two children: Will and Aidan. Hobbies: just completed first Marathon.

• Session: Neighborhood Master Planning: Raising the Bar in the Valley !

• Session: New Ideas for Sustainable Communities

• Session: Air Quality affects Everyone

• Session: The Total Package

I am an artist-naturalist who grew up in the Bay Area and often explored the Central Valley and surrounding ranges studying the natural history of the region. I have a degree in Paleintology from UC Berkeley and completed the Natural Science Illustration Program at UC Santa Cruz. I am currently working as a paleoartist seeking to render paintings that reconstruct the landscapes and ecology of California back in time. I now live on an old cattle ranch just across the border in Nevada.

• Session: Art and the Natural Landscape

Appointed August 1999 by Governor Gray Davis as the law member to the Air Resources Board (Board). Ms. D'Adamo also serves as chair of the Board's Agriculture Advisory Committee for Air Quality and as a member of the Board's Northern District Regional Coordination Committee.

Ms. D'Adamo is a graduate of the University of California at Davis (B.A. 1982- Political Science/Public Service) and of the University of the Pacific, McGeorge School of Law (J.D. 1986).

Following law school, Ms. D'Adamo joined a Modesto, California, law firm as an associate, where she practiced juvenile delinquency and dependency law and criminal law. Ms. D'Adamo has served in a variety of roles within California's criminal justice system. She was appointed as the Assistant Director to the California Department of the Youth Authority (1988-90), served as Legal Counsel to the California State Assembly Committee on Public Safety (1986-88), and served as Consultant to the State Legislative Joint Committee on Prison Construction and Operations (1986).

As a visiting lecturer for the California State University, Stanislaus from 1992-1998, Ms. D'Adamo has taught courses for their Department of Politics, ranging from U.S. and California government, environmental policy and land use policy.

Ms. D'Adamo currently serves as Senior Policy Advisor to U.S. House Representative, Dennis Cardoza (California's 18th Congressional District). In this capacity, Ms. D'Adamo has worked extensively on environmental, water and agricultural legal, legislative and regulatory policy issues.

• Session: Air Quality affects Everyone

Jane L. Delgado, Ph.D., is the President and Chief Executive Officer of the National Alliance for Hispanic Health (the Alliance), the nation’s largest and oldest organization of health and human service providers to Hispanics. Alliance members provide services to over 12 million consumers annually. In 2000, the Ladies Home Journal named Dr. Delgado as one of seven “Women to Watch…unsung heroines who are forging ahead to improve our health.” Dr. Delgado serves as a trustee of the Kresge Foundation (Chair, Audit; Chair, Special Opportunities), Patient Safety Institute (Secretary and Treasurer), Lovelace Respiratory Research Institute (Executive Committee), and the Ocean Awareness Project. She is a member of the Advisory Panel on Medicare Education (2002- ongoing), National Advisory Council for Mrs. Rosalyn Carter's Task Force on Mental Health, EPA's Clean Air Act Advisory Council, and the honorary board of the Alaska Native Heritage Center in Anchorage. She is also an advisor to the American Academy of Family Physicians and to the March of Dimes. Dr. Delgado is the recipient of numerous awards and honors, e.g., 2004 National Hispanic Woman of the Year Award, 2003 Florence Kelley Consumer Leadership Award, National Consumer League; 2002 Hispanic Business, 100 Most Influential Hispanics in the U.S., 1996 Community Leadership Award Puerto Rican Family Institute, 1995 Dr. Harvey Wiley Award - FDA Commissioner’s Special Citation, 1995 Carter-Bumpers Award, and in 1994 Las Primeras Award from MANA. In her position at the Alliance, Dr. Delgado oversees a national staff of 25 professionals as well as field operations throughout the United States, Puerto Rico, and the District of Columbia dedicated to improving the health and well-being of Hispanics. Dr. Delgado came to her position at the Alliance after serving in the Immediate Office of the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS). Working under then DHHS Secretary Margaret Heckler, she was a key force in the development of the landmark “Report of the Secretary’s Task Force on Black and Minority Health.” She served in DHHS from 1979-1985. Prior to working for DHHS she held a variety of positions including Children’s Talent Coordinator for Sesame Street from 1973 to 1975. A practicing clinical psychologist, Dr. Delgado is also the author of the award winning (Library Journal, best health books for 2002) ¡SALUD! A Latina’s Guide to Total Health (Rayo/HarperCollins Publishers, 2002 edition), the first health book written by and for Latinas. SALUD in the words of one reviewer, “breaks the silence, calls the medical world to task, and breaks the legacy of modesty—all of which have kept Latinas in ignorance and at risk.” Innovation and foresight have marked Dr. Delgado’s career. In 1988, in addition to women’s health, Dr. Delgado made environmental health a major program effort for the Alliance. In 1991 she initiated the first technology program for community-based organizations. In 2002 she made philanthropy in the Hispanic community a focus for the Alliance. Today the Alliance is at the forefront of covering the uninsured, redefining health to be comprehensive, and promoting cultural proficiency. The Alliance operates many programs including a national bilingual family health information service, a Center for Technology, and front-line community-based programs. In 1975 Dr. Delgado received her M.A. in Psychology from New York University. In 1981 she was awarded a Ph.D. in clinical psychology from SUNY Stony Brook and an M.S. in Urban and Policy Sciences from the W. Averell Harriman School of Urban and Policy Sciences. Dr. Delgado lives in Washington, D.C. with her husband Mark and daughter Elizabeth.

• Session: It's about Body, Mind and Spirit

• Session: The Vivid Picture: A Valley Sustainable Food System

PAULA DONNELLY, a second generation Los Angeleno, has been working in theater her whole life. As a professional stage manager she has worked with LA¹s Taper, Too, Shakespeare Santa Cruz, Milwaukee Repertory Theater, the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, PCPA TheaterFest, and other regional theaters. She has lived in Santa Barbara, Santa Maria, Pismo Beach, Santa Cruz, Gainseville, Florida, and Ashland, Oregon. In 1998 Paula began working with Los Angeles-based Cornerstone Theater Company, and became a member of their Ensemble in 2000. Cornerstone has been producing high quality community-based theater for 19 years. Some of the community-collaborative productions she did with Cornerstone include Los Biombos in Boyle Heights, AKA in Beverly Hills, For Here or To Go?(a City-wide Bridge Show) at the Mark Taper Forum, Peter Pan in Cleveland, and Crossings :journeys of Catholic immigrants at St Vibiana¹s Cathedral in downtown Los Angeles. In 2003 Paula became the first Institute Director for Cornerstone Theater Company, designing and administrating the company¹s new Institute. Cornerstone Institute offers multi-disciplinary professional training in community-based theater using Cornerstone¹s unique collaborative methodology. Students are individuals interested in the intersection of theater and community who seek to study and collaborate with professionals well versed in ensemble, community-based theater. Cornerstone Institute is particularly interested in working with small communities in California¹s Central Valley to create interesting and engaging theater. http://www.CornerstoneTheater.org

• Session: Mariachis, Polka and Football

• Session: Hydrogen--Hype or Hope Part II

• Session: Community Wellness and Fresh Food

• Session: The Power of Community Connections

• Session: Hydrogen--Hype or Hope Part II

Susan currently serves as the Chief Executive Officer of Valley Vision, a Sacramento nonprofit committed to building civic engagement while addressing quality of life issues in the six-county Capitol region. Susan has led Valley Vision since 2001, and has played an instrumental role in the organizations many successes -including the Blueprint project, an effort that engages citizens in a 50-year land use planning project for the six-county region; the Quality of Life report, a bi-annual project that highlights more than 45 economic, social and environmental indicators that gauge the quality of life of the region; the beehivesacramento.org project, an internet information referral service for low income residents; and Leveraging Our Diversity – A Multi Cultural Business Forum and now the current Partnership for Prosperity, a regional economic development strategy.

Prior to Valley Vision, Susan worked in the private sector serving in executive roles primarily in the utility industry and associated subsidiaries. Most notably she served as general manager for a Midwest utility providing electric, gas, and water services, and as CEO of a start up subsidiary, growing an entrepreneurial business from the ground up. She changed careers following a move from the Midwest to California. br>
In addition to her prior professional roles, Susan has served on numerous non-profit Boards and Committees and led a variety of significant community projects as a volunteer, prior to pursuing a long held dream of making community work her profession. br>
Susan holds an MBA from the College of St Scholastica, has extensive training and experience in organizational development, and is the graduate of three intensive community leadership programs, including the American Leadership Forum in Sacramento.

• Session: Sacramento Blueprint Project

Isao Fujimoto is project facilitator for the Central Valley Partnership for Citizenship(CVP) . The CVP is a learning collaborative of community based organizations supporting an enlightened and empowered citizenry among emerging immigrant, refugee and worker groups throughout California's Central Valley. Former director of Asian American Studies and founder of the graduate program in Community Development at UCDavis, Fujimoto is academic coordinator of the Rural Development Leadership Network Institute, director of the UCDavis-Kyoto summer program and Board President of Food First-the Institute for Food and Development Policy. His involvement with community development and social justice issues include being on the boards or staff of Global Exchange, The Data Center, American Friends Service Committee, California Institute of Rural Studies, Rural America, Japan US Community Education and Exchange and the National Center for Appropriate Technology.

• Session: Down the Road and Around the Globe

• Session: The New Townhall

Jim is the Director of Communications for the Center for Urban Forest Research in Davis, CA - a USDA Forest Service, Pacific Southwest Research Station. He has administered the Center’s outreach, education, training, and public relations since August, 2000. Prior to joining the Center, Jim spent 22 years with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. From 1978 to 1993 he was the Urban Forestry Program Manager, and from 1993 to 2000 he was the Landowner Assistance Program Manager. Jim came to California from the City of Chicago where he spent three years as a city forester. Jim received his undergraduate degree in Forest Management from the University of Wisconsin – Stevens Point and his Masters degree in Organization Development from the University of San Francisco.

• Session: Growing Cleaner Air--The Tree Factor

Anne Geraghty is Executive Director of WALKSacramento –working to create and sustain walkable communities in the Sacramento Region. WALKSacramento has succeeded in getting plans and projects changed to support increased walking in the Sacramento area.

Anne is project director for the Partnership for Active Communities -- one of 25 recipients of the Robert Wood Johnson “Active Living by Design” grants. The Partnership includes over 30 community groups working together to increase physical activity through programs and through community design.

Anne is also Vice President of Membership Development for America Walks, the national coalition of independent pedestrian advocacy groups (www.americawalks.org).

Anne received her B.A. from San Jose State and Master of Urban Planning from the University of Pittsburgh. For many years, Anne was the Manager, of the Transportation Strategies Group of the California Air Resources Board. In that position, she directed a staff aimed at reducing the impact of transportation related emissions on air quality and sponsored research projects aimed at quantifying the relationship of transportation and land use and transportation pricing.

• Session: Walk on By

Angela Glover Blackwell, Founder and Chief Executive Officer, founded PolicyLink in 1999. A renowned community building activist and advocate, Blackwell served as senior vice president of the Rockefeller Foundation where she oversaw the Foundation's Domestic and Cultural divisions. Blackwell also developed Rockefeller's Building Democracy division, which focused on race and policy, and created the Next Generation Leadership program. A lawyer by training, she gained national recognition as founder of the Oakland (CA) Urban Strategies Council, where she pioneered new approaches to neighborhood revitalization. From 1977 to 1987, Blackwell was a partner at Public Advocates, a nationally known public interest law firm. She is the co-author of Searching for the Uncommon Common Ground: New Dimensions on Race in America published in 2002 by W.W. Norton & Co.

• Session: Leadership for Policy Change

• Session: A Nation of Immigrants

During his 27 years with DWR, Kamyar Guivetchi has worked on over 20 projects with the Central District, Bay-Delta Office, the Division of Environmental Services, and most recently the Division of Planning and Local Assistance.

Kamyar was appointed Manager of DWR’s Statewide Water Planning Branch in November 2000. In his current assignment, he is managing DWR staff work and collaborative public process to update the California Water Plan (Bulletin 160).

Kamyar has a Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering and has completed post graduate work in Environmental Engineering at the University of California, Davis.

• Session: California Water Update 2005

• Session: Working Together to get the San Joaquin Valley its Fair Share

Steve Hallam is Community Development Director for the City of Oakdale where he oversees all aspects of the community planning activities for the City including land use, advance planning, building inspection and safety, and economic development activities. Steve has worked in urban planning for 25 years, previously working for El Dorado County and the cities of Merced, Salinas, and Auburn. Steve served as Community Development Director for the City of Turlock from 1990 to 1998 and worked as a private consultant for three years before assuming his current position with the City of Oakdale in 2001. Steve was born and raised in Fresno and earned his bachelor and masters degree in city planning from CSU, Fresno.

• Session: Neighborhood Master Planning: Raising the Bar in the Valley !

• Session: Mariachis, Polka and Football

CAROL HOOD,

Deputy Director, Systems of Care

Department of Mental Health

Functions:

Managing the Department of Mental Health Division that is responsible for public community mental health policy. Lead in implementation of some components of the new Mental Health Services Act (Proposition 63).

• Session: Tax the Millionaires for Mental Health

http://www.saveourlandsaveourtowns.org/tomhylton.html

• Session: Save our Land, Save our Towns

Gladys Ikeda is Assistant Director, California Council for Humanities Stockton Stories Project, University of the Pacific Harold Jacoby Center. Together with a co-assistant director and the project director, organizing, coordinating and administering a CCH funded collection of three-generation family stories from nine ethnic communities in Stockton. At project completion, the stories compilation will be orally presented throughout the community and published as a collection. Gladys has had an eclectic career since graduation from college. In brief, she has been a Probation officer, director of the Stockton Volunteer Bureau, and pre-school teacher at Jack and Jill Parent Cooperative Nursery School. Since moving to Stockton in 1963, Gladys has been an active participant in a variety of political campaigns, beginning with an early state-wide fair housing initiative in the late 1960s and thereafter a variety of issue-oriented and candidate political campaigns from city council up to President. Along with Barbara Walker, the current League of Women Voters president, Gladys wrote the League’s position on Boards and Commissions in the 1970s and was instrumental in getting better public notification of City and County vacancies. However, she is probably best known in the community as an aide to Senator John Garamendi, for whom she worked both in his district office and later in his capitol office as a Senate committee consultant. She later joined Mr. Garamendi when he became California’s first elected Insurance Commissioner in 1991 and served as his Assistant Insurance Commissioner regulating Workers’ Compensation Insurance. She retired from state service at the end of his first term in 1995, and since them has devoted some time to various community activities as well as enjoying her family and traveling. Currently, Gladys is in her second term on the San Joaquin Civil Service Commission, is a board member of the Jene Wah Senior Service Agency, Chinese Cultural Society, and Friends of the Fox Theatre. She is also actively involved in monitoring the progress of a development proposal in the Morada area of Stockton where she lives.

• Session: Across Cultures and Generations

Dr. Richard Jackson, a native of Newark, New Jersey, is a graduate of the University of California School of Medicine at San Francisco, where he began his residency as a pediatrician. During his residency he took time off for a 2-year stint with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) as an officer in the Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS). After his term as an EIS officer, Dr. Jackson obtained a Master of Public Health degree from the University of California at Berkeley and then began work as a public health medical officer with the California Department of Health Services. Selected to be Director of the CDC’s National Center for Environmental Health in 1994, Dr. Jackson worked tirelessly to study and address issues such as cancer, asthma, radiation effects, pesticide exposure, and toxicology, especially lead poisoning in children. In recent years, Dr. Jackson has become convinced that a critically important and under-appreciated environmental health issue is that of the “built environment.” To help educate people about the role of the built environment in health, Dr. Jackson collaborated with other professionals to create an important new Web site, Designing and Building Healthy Places, at http://www.cdc.gov/healthyplaces. In August 2003, CDC Director Dr. Julie Gerberding asked Dr. Jackson to serve as the CDC Director’s Senior Advisor and to be the co-lead on CDC’s Strategic Planning process areas related to Health Systems. In March 2004, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger appointed Dr. Jackson to the California Department of Health Services as State Public Health Officer. His responsibilities include direct leadership and oversight of the department's public health related activities. His major priorities are Emergency Preparedness, especially as it relates to terrorism, reversing the Obesity Epidemic in California, and Revitalizing the State’s Public Health Workforce.

• Session: Growing Healthy Communities
• Session: Up Close with Dr. Jackson

• Session: Moving from Dot to Destination

• Session: Working Together to get the San Joaquin Valley its Fair Share

• Session: Half Full or Half Empty

Jonathan Kaplan is currently the Director of the Sustainable Agriculture Project at the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC). He leads NRDC's efforts to create and implement innovative strategies for promoting more sustainable agricultural systems in California. Prior to joining NRDC, Jonathan directed programs at San Francisco BayKeeper and Environment California (formerly the California Public Interest Research Group), where he coordinated a variety of campaigns to protect public health and the environment from pesticides and other pollutants. Jonathan serves on the Board of Directors of the California Coalition for Food and Farming, Environment California, the San Francisco Estuary Institute and on the Dean's Advisory Council of the UC Davis College of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences.

• Session: The Vivid Picture: A Valley Sustainable Food System

Dana Karcher is the Kern County Tree Foundation and Scenic California Executive Director as well as President of the California Urban Forests Council . She previously worked in marketing in the private sector and was Public Relations Coordinator for the Kern County Museum. She previously was on the Board of Directors for the California Urban Forest Council and the Keep Bakersfield Beautiful Committee. She holds a BS degree in political science from CSU Hayward. Dana is a native Californian and has lived in the Central Valley for the past 15 years and is a Great Valley Center IDEAL Alumni.

• Session: Growing Cleaner Air--The Tree Factor

Ryan Kelly is the Economic Development Coordinator for Congressman Dennis Cardoza. Ryan is a lifelong resident of the Central Valley. He grew up in Stockton, graduated from UC Davis, and has worked for Congressman Cardoza in Merced and Modesto. He has been with the Congressman’s office for the past three years.

• Session: Working Together to get the San Joaquin Valley its Fair Share

Mary is the Director for the Center for Land-Based Learning, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to providing experiential opportunities for high school students statewide in sustainable agriculture and natural resources conservation. Together with Craig McNamara, the President of the Center for Land-Based Learning, they formed the non-profit in late 2000, and it has been growing steadily ever since. Mary oversees the three major programs of CLBL – the FARMS Leadership Program, the SLEWS Program, and the Farm and Nature Center. There are eleven FARMS Leadership Programs statewide from Chico to San Diego, three SLEWS Program sites, Chico, Stockton, and Sacramento-Yolo, and the Farm and Nature Center, located on Putah Creek Road near Winters. The two high school education programs take students out of the classroom and onto farms and ranches to participate in hands-on, local watershed, community-based activities. The Farm and Nature Center serves as an educational hub for all ages in the Sacramento and Bay Areas, and is especially focused on providing a model site for farmers and ranchers interested in implementing conservation practices to learn the critical steps in such endeavors, as well as finding cost-share funds and technical assistance. Since 1998, the CLBL programs has grown from one site and 30 students to ten sites and over 2,000 students statewide, and from a budget of $60,000 in 1998 to almost $850,000 in 2004.

Prior to working as the Director for the Center for Land-Based Learning, Mary was the Hedgerow Project Manager for the Yolo County Resource Conservation District from 1997-1999. The Hedgerow Project worked with farmers in Yolo County to assist them with implementing native plant hedgerows for use as buffers and to harbor beneficial insects and other wildlife. This project served as the catalyst for Yolo County’s farmers to utilize hedgerows as a part of their farming practices, and is the highest-utilized conservation practice cost-shared by the Woodland Field Office of the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS).

Currently, Mary is active in many local organizations and community efforts; She is a Board Member of the Yolo Land Trust, Member of the Valuing Agriculture Committee of Valley Vision, Board Member of the River City Rowing Club, and a member of the Education Committee for California Foundation for Agriculture in the Classroom. She is a Class XXXII graduate of the California Agricultural Leadership Program.

Raised on a farm west of the town of Yolo, Mary is a 1987 graduate of Woodland High School. Mary holds a Master’s Degree in Human and Community Development from the Ohio State University (1996), and a B.S. Degree from the University of California at Davis in Agriculture Science and Management, Plant Science Option (1992).

• Session: The Total Package

As President of Innovative Business Technologies Group, Inc. (IBT Group), Rick Krepelka is responsible for managing a diverse group of technology consultants that specialize in accounting software, systems and networking, Web development and executive-level technology consulting. He has a broad range of programming, system implementation and consulting experience. Since 1984, he has worked with thousands of businesses and agencies in a wide variety of industries. His areas of expertise include strategic planning for management information systems, technology planning and Web integration of key business processes.

Rick began his career in technology before graduating from college. He started a small custom accounting software programming business and then formed a partnership to provide accounting, tax and computer consulting services to North State businesses. He managed a retail computer operation for a short time before accepting a computer consulting position for a large regional accounting firm (Matson and Isom Accountancy Corporation). Here, he managed the internal technology needs of the parent corporation as well as developed and incorporated a technology consulting arm that grew to employ twenty people with annual revenues of $2.4 million.

He left this firm in March of 2002, to begin his own corporation – IBT Group (www.ibtg.com) – a successful technology consulting company in Chico, California.

Rick has Bachelor degrees in English and Computer Science from California State University, Chico.

He is a former member of the Technology Committee of the California Society of Certified Public Accountants (1998-2000), former Chair of the Technology Committee of the Western Association of Accounting Firms (WAAF) (1998-2001), and member and speaker at State conferences of the California Association of Joint Powers Authorities (CAJPA) and the California Association of School Business Officials (CASBO).

Locally, he has served on the Board of Directors of the Chico Chamber of Commerce and as the Executive Director of the Orland Chamber of Commerce. He is a member and Past-President of the Orland Kiwanis Club, a member and Board Member-elect (2005-2007) of the Chico Rotary Club, serves on the Board of Directors (2002-current) of the Butte College Foundation and was recently a Commissioner on the City of Orland Planning Commission. Also, until recently, he was the longtime President of the Orland Softball Association, Board Member and Umpire-in-Chief for Orland Little League, and still actively supports the technology needs of the Butte County Big Brothers Big Sisters organization.

• Session: Fueling Regional Economies through the Web

A team player with principles at RRM Design Group for over 15 years, Debbie has extensive experience working on projects from the early visioning and policy stages through the construction stages. She is a Principal of the firm, Manager of Planning Services in the San Luis Obispo office and a leader of our Urban Revitalization team. Debbie shapes design with a realistic approach. Her passion for innovative design with realistic solutions translates visions into user-friendly urban design plans and documents.

• Session: Planning for Cultural Diversity - Your Roadmap

Jack Laws interest in natural history and art developed as he started birding and keeping detailed illustrated journals. He began working in environmental education while in high school and college. While earning his B.S. at UC Berkeley in Conservation and Resource Studies, he worked as an interpretive aid at a regional park in Berkeley, worked summers at the Teton Science School and started leading adult education classes at the California Academy of Sciences.

He then served as a naturalist at Walker Creek environmental education center, where he refined techniques for incorporating field journaling into the science curriculum. After getting his Masters in Wildlife Biology at University of Montana, he returned to California Academy of Sciences as an environmental educator, then manager of field studies.

A few years ago, he began working on creating a truly portable and accessible field guide to the He earned a scientific illustration degree at UC Santa Cruz. He then headed off into the mountains to create a fully illustrated naturalists’ field guide to the Sierra. In the summer of 2004 he published Sierra Birds: a Hiker's Guide. In addition to working on his field guides, he also leads field sketching groups from the Bay area, teacher-training workshops, and contributes regularly to Bay Nature magazine with his “Naturalists Notebook" column.

• Session: Art and the Natural Landscape

Nancy serves as general counsel to a number of California corporations, both for profit and nonprofit. Her advice to nonprofits, principally trade associations and charitable organizations, focuses on formation, governance, tax-exemption and compliance matters, and relationships between affiliated for profit and nonprofit entities.

Nancy’s transactional practice also emphasizes business, commercial and health care law, particularly acquisitions and sales of businesses, business counseling, corporate mergers and reorganizations, joint ventures and secured financing transactions.

She is an AV-rated lawyer (the highest rating given by Martindale-Hubbell for legal ability and ethical standards).

• Session: Nonprofit Integrity: The Spirit and the Letter

Dr. Lemaux has an active outreach program designed to increase public understanding of agricultural practices, food production and the impact of new technologies on food and agriculture. She is also involved in helping link university research to farmers' needs. She has worked on the development of numerous educational programs and materials aimed at agricultural issues. These include an informational website, ucbiotech.org, that is intended to provide scientifically based information and resources to educators regarding a wide range of issues related to agriculture and its practices. She has given numerous lectures in local, state, national and international venues and served on a number of local, state and national committees relating to biotechnology and agriculture.

Dr. Lemaux also has an active research laboratory, which is involved in the genetic engineering of cereals crops, primarily wheat, barley, rice and sorghum. Some basic research efforts focus on studying plant development during in vitro culture in order to understand and improve plant transformation technologies. Other projects are more applied and include a project to develop a wheat variety that has reduced allergy potential, intended for people who are allergic to wheat products, and a project aimed at improving the nutritional quality and digestibility of sorghum for Africa.

• Session: Framing the GMO Issue

• Session: Planning for Cultural Diversity - Your Roadmap

I am dedicated to regional landscape painting in the Central Valley. In this land I find inspiration, content and spirituality for painting and for life. I believe the landscape more than any other signifier reflects the soul of place by revealing the path of human impact upon it’s surface. It’s this process of discovering and revealing the layers of our environment that sparks my interest.

• Session: Ag-Muse-Ments

Linda Lopez is currently the Executive Director of the Firebaugh Computer Learning Center, a community technology center located in the local Housing Authority’s Famile Education Center. She is also employed part-time as a Community Developer with the Relational-Culture Institute, a faith-based nonprofit organizing people to create social change in rural communities.

Linda was the former Site Manager for the Great Valley Center’s technology program, Central Valley Digital Network supporting and monitoring the service learning experience of AmeriCorps*VISTA members in this regional technology project.

Linda lives in Merced and has been very active with nonprofit, public sector and business communities. She served on the Board of Directors for Central Valley Opportunity Center from 1996-2000 (an organization she co-founded in 1978). She served on the Planning Commission for the City of Merced from 1999-2004, and Redevelopment Agency Gateways Project Area Committee (1996-1999). Linda was the Executive Director for the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce of the City and County of Merced from 1993-1998. She also made a recent bid for Merced County Board of Supervisors – although not the winning candidate, she did make people think about their vote in the primary election.

Linda has participated in several leadership development programs including: Leadership Merced, Class 11 (1996); Hispanas Organized for Political Equality (HOPE, 1999-2000); Great Valley Center, Institute for the Development of Emerging Area Leaders (IDEAL, 1999-2000); and the Community Technology Foundation of California Zero Divide Fellowship (2001-present).

Linda has served on the State Department of Transportation Environmental Justice Advisory Panel (2000-2001), Merced City Schools Citizens Strategic Planning Committee (1999-2001), and has contributed to the recent California Department of Parks and Recreation Report and Project California town hall meeting with Attorney General Bill Lockyer.

Raised in Madera, Linda and her family worked in the fields in Madera and Fresno counties. Linda resides with her husband Ken and their daughter Emily.

• Session: The New Townhall

• Session: X Marks the Spot

Derek Madden is a professor of biology and former Dean of Science at Modesto Junior College. He is a recipient of the Charles Spinetta Award for Excellence in Wildlife Art and the Amador Artist Guild Award.

• Session: Art and the Natural Landscape

STEPHEN MAGAGNINI has been the Sacramento Bee's “rainbow writer” since 1994. His projects, "Orphans of History" (about Hmong refugees) and "Mending The Past" (on reparations) appear in the anthologies Best Newspaper Writing 2001 and 2002. In 2001, "Orphans of History" won an ASNE Distinguished Writing award, and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism gave Magagnini a Lifetime Achievement Award for outstanding coverage of race and ethnicity in America. He also has been honored for his coverage of South Africa's free elections in 1994, the tragic modern history of California Indians and the impact of immigrants on Sacramento. Before coming to The Bee as a Sunday Magazine Writer in November 1985, he covered breaking news and investigations for The San Francisco Chronicle. In 2001-2002, he was a Stanford Knight Fellow. A graduate of Hampshire College in Amherst, MA, he still shoots hoops. Once, for a story, he played the Harlem Globetrotters. They held him scoreless.

• Session: Down the Road and Around the Globe

Preston Maring, M.D. has been a physician practicing at the Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Oakland, CA for almost 34 years. At work, he is involved in hospital administration and clinical work in the Obstetrics and Gynecology department. At home, he loves to cook. He started an all organic farmers' market at his hospital in May, 2003 in partnership with the Pacific Coast Farmers' Market Association of Concord, CA. The market has brought "produce to the people" weekly and has been appreciated by the staff, patients, hospital neighbors and farmers. By the end of 2005 there may be as many as 29 farmer's markets at Kaiser Permanente facilities on the US mainland and Hawaii.

• Session: Community Wellness and Fresh Food

David Mas Masumoto is an organic peach and grape farmer and the author of Letters to the Valley, A Harvest of Memories and Epitaph for a Peach. A third generation farmer, Masumoto grows peaches, nectarines, grapes and raisins on an organic 80 acre farm south of Fresno, Calif. Masumoto is currently a columnist for and The Fresno Bee. His writing awards include Commonwealth Club Silver medal, Julia Child Cookbook award, the James Clavell Literarcy Award and he received the “Award of Distinction” from UC Davis in 2003. He is currently a board member of the James Irvine Foundation and has served as chair of the California Council for the Humanities. Masumoto and his wife, Marcy have two children.

• Session: Ag-Muse-Ments
• Session: Metaphors of Leadership

Marcy Masumoto is an active community volunteer, and an Organizational Development specialist with more than 25 years experience in education, healthcare management and program development. She currently works as an Academic Program Coordinator for UCSF Fresno’s Latino Center for Medical Education and Research, overseeing the Junior Doctors Academy Program in four middle schools. She has worked for numerous public and non-profit health and education organizations, including Children’s Hospital Central California, and State Center Community College District.

As time permits, Ms. Masumoto serves as an organizational consultant, primarily focusing on group process facilitation, team development, planning, grant writing and organizational improvement. She is dedicated to creative capacity-building of communities, institutions and individuals of Central California, with an emphasis on education, health, multicultural and rural issues.

Masumoto holds a bachelor's degree in health education from Loma Linda University, and a Master's Degree in Community Development from UC Davis. She is completing the UCD and CSUF Joint Doctoral Program in Educational Leadership, focusing her research on issues of small and rural schools.

Marcy has lived in rural Fresno County for over 20 years where she co-owns the Masumoto Family Farm with her husband David Mas. She is the mother of two: a second year UC Berkeley student, and a seventh grade student at Sanger Academic Charter School. She enjoys community work, gardening, and gourmet cooking and entertaining at the family’s farmhouse.

• Session: Metaphors of Leadership

• Session: Engaging the Community in the Environment

John Melville is Director and Co-Founder of Collaborative Economics, Mountain View, California and an advisor to civic leaders nationwide. Over the past 20 years, John and his partners have worked with public and private leaders in over 40 communities across the U.S. and abroad, helping them launch concrete, collaborative initiatives to improve their economic vitality and quality of life.

In California, John has worked with the Great Valley Center on research projects focusing on the economic futures of the San Joaquin and Sacramento Valley regions, renewable energy as an economic and environmental opportunity for the Valley, and health services as an economic priority and source of jobs with career potential. He has also helped mobilize teams of regional and local leaders to pursue action, including a nationally-recognized effort to revitalize the Highway 99 corridor, a “civic venture capital” model called the Butte Pioneers, and an effort to promote innovation in agriculture in the Sacramento Valley.

John has worked closely with Community and other Foundations to improve regional and community civic engagement and collaboration—including The James Irvine Foundation, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, and the Heinz Endowments. He helped design and launch the Alliance for Regional Stewardship, a national peer-to-peer network of practitioners, and has provided support to the California Center for Regional Leadership.

Collaborative Economics helped design and implement Joint Venture: Silicon Valley Network, a new kind of regional collaborative organization. With his partners, John guided the strategic planning and visioning process involving more than 1,200 corporate, community, and public-sector leaders. During implementation, John was principal staff to Joint Venture’s 21st Century Education Initiative, which raised more than $32 million as a regional-local partnership to improve Silicon Valley schools. Following the Joint Venture example, John and his partners have helped launch and/or support more than 10 regional collaborative organizations across California and advised similar organizations across the country.

Based on his experiences working with civic leaders at the regional and community level, John co-authored the book, Grassroots Leaders for a New Economy: How Civic Entrepreneurs are Building Prosperous Communities (Jossey-Bass, 1997), and a just-released book called Civic Revolutionaries: Igniting the Passion for Change in America’s Communities (Wylie and Sons/Jossey-Bass, 2004). He is author of more than 20 strategic plans for regions and communities, published articles on education and benchmarking, and a report for the Presidents' Commission on Industrial Competitiveness. He is a graduate of Stanford University.

• Session: Highway 99 / Next Exit: Opportunity

• Session: The Power of Community Connections

• Session: Increasing Civic Engagement among Immigrants

Mooney farms, a family owned business, which began in 1987 at the local Farmers Markets, the Mooney Family pioneered sun-dried tomatoes to the mass market. Mooney farms produces their Bella Sun Luci Sun Dried Tomatoes in 100% Pure Olive Oil, using tomatoes which are only dried in the sun, and a special blend of Italian herbs, rather than the traditional pungent flavor of salt. Gretchen Mooney, the family matriarch, created the original recipes that the family business began with including favorites such as Homemade Kiwi Jams and Syrups made from the kiwi grown on her 50-acre ranch in Gridley, California. When the kiwi market had an unstable future in the 1980’s and Gretchen became a newly widowed mother of four, the entire family pitched in by each contributing their individual skills to help their mother “save the ranch”. One way the family found to supplement their income and make the mortgage payment was to sell the kiwi fruit at the Bay Area Farmer’s markets. Next, at a small manufacturing site in Gridley, the family decided to venture into additional food items, particularly Sun Dried Tomatoes. Steve Mooney took a family favorite recipe and selected a California style tomato, which created a sweet-tomato basil flavor that was easily marketed to the American taste palette. Patrick Mooney who worked for Sebastiani Winery for 18 years is currently constructing a new Olive Orchard project on his mother’s ranch. Kelly Mooney runs order processing for her family’s business. With a strong belief in quality products at an affordable price, the Mooney’s’ have supplied both private label, retail, foodservice and industrial/ingredient accounts with a superior Sun Dried Tomato line for the past 13 years. Since the family is located in Northern California, the abundance of fresh produce has influenced and helped create many new and exciting products for the American public. Mary Mooney, a graduate of Chico State University, with degrees in both Marketing & Public Relations is the Director of Sales & Marketing for Mooney Farms. Keeping abreast of the issues facing the food industry today, and always on the cutting edge of new products and trends, Mary Mooney is the driving force directing the Sales Department behind the scenes at Mooney Farms.

• Session: Produced in the Valley: Successful Entrepreneurs

• Session: Engaging the Community in the Environment

William Moreno Vice President of Sales & Marketing. He has spent 5 years in the ISP field working for California based ISPs before starting at Fire2wire in 2002. His experience includes 35 years in sales & marketing in the Real Estate, mortgage investment, and retail fields. Just prior to entering the Broadband industry, he and a partner sold a business that in 10 years became a nationwide credit reporting business from a start up in the east bay area of California. He has directed the sales growth of Fire2Wire, a 20 year old ISP & Network consulting business, expanded its wireless network to cover 5500 square miles throughout the state of California, Hotspots, and hotel internet connectivity. New clients include Wells Fargo Bank, Burger King, Holiday Inn Express, Ramada Inn and Best Western Hotels. He resides in Tracy, CA.

• Session: What if the World was Wireless?

• Session: Moving from Dot to Destination

Dowell Myers is professor of urban planning and demography in the School of Policy, Planning, and Development, at the University of Southern California. He is the director of the Master of Planning program and director of the School’s Population Dynamics Research Group. Dr. Myers holds graduate degrees in urban planning from UC-Berkeley and M.I.T. Widely recognized as an expert on housing trends and urban demography, Dr. Myers’s recent research projects have focused on the upward mobility of immigrants to the US and Southern California, trajectories into homeownership, growing preferences for higher density housing, and projections for the future of the California population. In spring 2002, he received the award for best article appearing in the Journal of the American Planning Association for his 2001 article,“Demographic Futures as a Guide to Planning: California’s Latinos and the Compact City.”

More complete information and a series of downloadable publications are accessible from Dr. Myers’s web site: http://www-rcf.usc.edu/~dowell/ .

• Session: California Immigrants Turn the Corner

Former Santa Clara Mayor Judy Nadler is a Markkula Center senior fellow, with responsibility for programs in government ethics and ethical leadership. She is developing an executive program for mayors and other local government officials and is an adjunct faculty member in Santa Clara University's Political Science department.

As mayor, Nadler worked with the Ethics Center to develop a Code of Ethics and Values for Santa Clara. In 2002, the city received the Helen Putnam Award from the League of California Cities for its program, "Infusing Political Campaigns with Community Ethics and Values."

Before her two terms as mayor, Nadler served on the Santa Clara City Council and was an editor at Sunset magazine. She also served on the U.S. Conference of Mayors, the Northern California Power Agency, and the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority. A popular speaker on issues such as public contracting and city ethics, Nadler has addressed the U.S. Conference of Mayors, the League of California Cities, the National Fire Academy, and the San Jose Blue Ribbon Task Force on Ethics. She serves on the Steering Committee for the Voices of Reform Project, an initiative of the Commonwealth Club of California.

Nadler is a graduate of George Washington University and the Program for Senior Executives in State and Local Government at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government.

• Session: Doing the Right Thing when No One is Looking

Wayne Nastri, a lifelong westerner, was appointed Regional Administrator for Region 9 in October 2001. Mr. Nastri has led the Region to real progress in meeting the west's environmental challenges, especially in improving air quality in the Central Valley and Southern California and in protecting of scarce water resources throughout the arid west. Clear communication, strong enforcement and accountability to the public for a measurable "bottom line" have been the hallmarks of his tenure. A strong proponent of partnership as the best route to environmental protection, Mr. Nastri has launched many creative collaborations to protect the health and environment of all those who live in the Pacific Southwest.

Most recently, Mr Nastri partnered with EPA's Seattle region to launch the West Coast Diesel Emission Reduction Collaborative which will speed voluntary reductions of diesel emissions from ports, trucks and other federally regulated sources in a significant assault on one of the west's gravest air quality problems. Mr. Nastri also created EPA's Southern California Field Office in Los Angeles -- a major improvement in EPA's local presence for the region's largest metropolitan area.

Prior to his appointment, Mr. Nastri held various environmental leadership positions, including Board membership for California's South Coast Air Quality Management District (covering Southern California), as well as participation in advisory boards for California's state air quality and waste management agencies. His fifteen years of environmental consulting experience culminated in his presidency of Environmental Mediation Inc. before accepting his position at EPA.

• Session: Air Quality affects Everyone

Dr. Joan Ogden is Associate Professor of Environmental Science and Policy at the University of California, Davis and Co-Director of the Hydrogen Pathway Program at the campus’s Institute of Transportation Studies. Her primary research interest is technical and economic assessment of new energy technologies, especially in the areas of alternative fuels, fuel cells, renewable energy and energy conservation. Her recent work centers on the use of hydrogen as an energy carrier, hydrogen infrastructure strategies, and applications of fuel cell technology in transportation and stationary power production. She participated in the U.S. DOE Hydrogen Vision process in 2001, and headed the systems integration team for the National Hydrogen Roadmap in 2002. She is active in the H2A, a group of hydrogen analysts convened by the Department of Energy to develop a consistent framework for analyzing hydrogen systems, and serves on the Blueprint Plan advisory panel for the California Hydrogen Highway Network.

• Session: Hydrogen--Hype or Hope Part I

Eric Parfrey is a regional planner who lives in Stockton and works in the East Bay for a private consulting firm. He serves as a project manager for the preparation of environmental impact reports and other planning documents. Eric sits on the legislative committees of the American Planning Association, the Association of Environmental Professionals, and the Sierra Club. He is currently the chair of the Mother Lode Chapter of the Sierra Club, which includes 20,000 members in 24 counties stretching from Modesto to Oregon and east to Nevada. He received a Masters degree in City and Regional Planning from University of California-Berkeley in 1982, and served as senior planner for both Contra Costa County and San Joaquin County. He is active with several citizens groups in San Joaquin County who are advocating slower housing growth, economic development, and preservation of prime agricultural lands.

• Session: Mitigation is for the Birds