BCLI Featured Speakers

Sophia Lanza-Weil, Community Organizer, Congregations Organizing for Renewal. Sophia is the lead organizer with Congregations Organized for Renewal in South Alameda County, an affiliate of PICO (People Improving Communities through Organizing). Sophia has worked as an organizer for 14 years, addressing issues of social justice through leadership development and building the power of communities.  She has worked with a variety of organizations on community and labor issues across the country, including UFCW International, Unite Here!, Basic Rights Oregon, the AIDS Action Committee of MA, the Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network, and Bend the Arc.  Sophia is proud to represent the efforts of leaders in South Alameda County working for greater economic prosperity and opportunity in our region, and beyond.

Jonel Seon, Student Services Manager, Laney College Green Jobs Programs. Jonel facilitates the implementation of the solar photovoltaic and energy efficiency training programs through student recruitment, case management, administrative support for faculty, and building organizational partnerships through broadened community outreach. Over the last 5 years, Jonel has worked with distinguished businesses and non-profit organizations, including the Institute for Environmental Entrepreneurship and Alameda Unified School District, to support implementation of sustainability initiatives that address social, economic, and environmental complexities in urban communities.  A graduate from the GreenMBA program at Dominican University of California, Jonel currently serves as a Board Secretary for United Roots and is dedicated to promoting social enterprise that uplifts and empowers working-class individuals of all backgrounds.

Please listen to his presentation at the BCLI Issues and Advocates Speakers Series, Working Together: Collaborative Strategies Supporting Economic Prosperity for Low- and Moderate-Income Communities in the Bay Area.

Ken Nim, Workforce Compliance Manager, San Francisco Office of Economic and Workforce Development. Ken has ten years of workforce development experience that includes program development, compliance monitoring, job development, and implementation of various City workforce policies such as San Francisco’s First Source and Local Hiring Programs. As part of the CityBuild team, a construction sector training and employment initiative, he has collaborated with contractors, labor representatives, community based organizations, city department heads, and community stakeholders to maximize employment opportunities for economically disadvantaged San Francisco residents. Ken is a graduate of the University of California, Berkeley and is currently working towards a Masters Degree in Organizational Development at the University of San Francisco. He started his career in workforce development in the nonprofit sector providing direct services to economically disadvantaged communities of San Francisco. Ken believes in the dignity of work and that meaningful employment opportunities help sustain community vitality and connects individuals to a more purposeful life.

Please listen to his presentation at the BCLI Issues and Advocates Speakers Series, Working Together: Collaborative Strategies Supporting Economic Prosperity for Low- and Moderate-Income Communities in the Bay Area.

Kirsten Snow Spalding, Esq., Principal, Spalding Consulting. Kirsten is a policy consultant working for non-profit organizations whose mission is to build sustainable communities that provide good jobs, affordable housing, public transportation, cleaner and greener public spaces. Her consulting practice focuses on building community coalitions that can imagine new opportunities for low-income people and realize those visions by strategic organizing, advocacy, and investments. Her areas of policy expertise include workforce and economic development, access to health care, sustainable investing and infrastructure finance, labor rights, and community development. Kirsten brings to her work her skills as a lawyer, pastor, government official, and educator. Her current clients include Ceres and its Investor Network on Climate Risk, the San Mateo County Union Community Alliance, the Career Ladders Project, and the San Francisco Labor Foundation. Prior to starting her consulting practice, Kirsten served as Chief Deputy Treasurer under California Treasurer Phil Angelides and Director of the Treasurer’s environmental financing authorities. Prior to her government service, Kirsten worked in the labor movement as Chief of Staff for the California Labor Federation, AFL-CIO. For six years, she chaired the Center for Labor Research and Education at University of California, Berkeley and taught at Boalt Hall School of Law. As a lawyer with the firm of Beeson, Tayer and Bodine she represented unions and their pension plans.  In her early career she worked as a community and cultural organizer in Durban, South Africa. Kirsten holds a BA from Yale College in music, a JD from Hastings College of Law and an M.Div. from Church Divinity School of the Pacific.

Please listen to her presentation at the BCLI Issues and Advocates Speakers Series, Working Together: Collaborative Strategies Supporting Economic Prosperity for Low- and Moderate-Income Communities in the Bay Area.

Evelyn Stivers, Field Director, Non-Profit Housing of Northern California (NPH). Evelyn has rejoined Non-Profit Housing of Northern California to coordinate regional initiatives including the Zone for Homes campaign and the Great Communities Collaborative as their new Field Director. She also works with housing and land use advocates, including NPH’s nine-county network, to advocate for affordable housing, carry out research and issue analysis, develop new advocacy tools, and provide technical assistance and organizing training. Evelyn is an experienced political organizer who has worked on campaigns at the local, state and national level. She prefers work at the local level though, where the impact is the most immediate. She spent the last six months working on political campaigns for local government offices. Prior to that she spent six months on an incredible travel adventure. She and her partner purchased a boat in Brisbane, Australia and explored the Great Barrier reef.

Please listen to her presentation at the BCLI Issues and Advocates Speakers Series, Protecting Communities, Securing Benefits: Lessons Learned in Silicon Valley.

Richard Marcantonio, Managing Attorney, Public Advocates, Inc. Richard received his A.B. from Princeton University in 1982 and graduated cum laude and Order of the Coif from New York University School of Law in 1987. After clerking for the Hon. Robert L. Carter, U.S. District Judge for the Southern District of New York, Richard practiced civil and appellate litigation for five years at the Howard, Rice law firm in San Francisco. He then served as director of litigation at Legal Aid of the North Bay for nine years, specializing in housing issues in Marin and Napa Counties. Richard was lead counsel for intervenors in Home Builders Association of Northern California v. City of Napa, 90 Cal. App. 4th 188 (2001), cert. denied 535 U.S. 954 (2002), which established the validity of “inclusionary zoning.” He was also lead counsel in Marin Family Action v. Town of Corte Madera, a challenge to the housing element of the Town of Corte Madera, and in a suit against a Napa slumlord for equitable relief and damages on behalf of nearly 500 Napa farmworkers and families. Richard joined Public Advocates as a managing attorney in June 2003, where he works on civil rights issues, primarily in the areas of affordable housing, transportation equity and insurance redlining. He has served as lead counsel for the plaintiffs in a number of affordable housing cases, including Osorio v. City of Pittsburg, Fonseca v. City of Gilroy, 148 Cal. App. 4th 1174 (2007), and Urban Habitat Program v. City of Pleasanton, 164 Cal. App. 4th 1561 (2008). In the area of transportation justice, he is currently co-counsel in Darensburg v. Metropolitan Transportation Commission, 611 F. Supp. 2nd 994 (N.D. Cal. 2009), a pending federal civil rights class action on behalf of minority bus riders who have seen service cut as a result of inadequate funding, and represented the Los Angeles Bus Riders Union in Labor/Community Strategy Center v. Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportation Authority, 564 F.3d 1115 (9th Cir. 2009). He is also co-counsel in Willams v. City of Antioch, a challenge to discriminatory policing of African-American families who participate in the federal Section 8 housing subsidy program.

Please listen to his presentation at the BCLI Issues and Advocates Speakers Series, Protecting Communities, Securing Benefits: Lessons Learned in Silicon Valley.

Annie Loya, Executive Director, Youth United for Community Action (YUCA). Annie has over 11 years of experience with YUCA. She volunteered at 13 and joined the Higher Learning Core at 14. Since then, Annie has been a key youth organizer within the Environmental Justice Accountability Campaign. Annie then transitioned into staff at 18 years old as Assistant HL Coordinator, where she then supported young people’s development into HL. She drew from her myriad of experiences as a youth to then restructure the HL program as Program Coordinator to add more components that addressed the holistic development of youth, expand the membership to offer more opportunities for young people to get involved, and expand the number of campaigns at YUCA to address both environmental and economic justice issues in the community. Annie was a crucial lead in the campaign that led to the historic shutdown of Romic, a negligent toxic waste facility in East Palo Alto. Annie has taken on a leadership role in her community and in the larger movement for environmental and social justice. At 25, Annie is an experienced organizer, trainer, and speaker. She has developed and led workshops for YUCA, spoken on panels, given keynote speeches, and led various community campaigns around issues affecting youth. She sat on the Ad Hoc Committee that led to the structure of the Funders Collaborative on Youth Organizing, was a representative to the Environmental Justice Air Quality Coalition, the East Palo Alto Air Resource Team, the Community Advisory Group, Environmental Justice Group, and the Ravenswood Business District Coalition. She brings years of experience as a previous HL Staff and core member to the Director’s position. Her passion for community change is evident in her commitment to the work. Annie also sits on the board of Greenaction.

Please listen to her presentation at the BCLI Issues and Advocates Speakers Series, Protecting Communities, Securing Benefits: Lessons Learned in Silicon Valley.

Vu-Bang Nguyen, Land Use Program Coordinator, Urban Habitat. Vu-Bang began his journey into the world of land use planning after studying Architecture at the University of California (UC) - Berkeley with an emphasis on City and Regional Planning and Design in the Third World while also working for the City Planning Departments of San Jose, Oakland and Berkeley, CA. He continued his studies at UC - Berkeley and completed a Masters in City and Regional Planning with an emphasis on Community Development and Land Use Planning. His research included working with the San Jose Redevelopment Agency on increasing community engagement in the City’s Strong Neighborhoods Initiative, especially among San Jose’s Vietnamese American population. After City Planning positions for the City of Berkeley and Town of Los Gatos, Vu-Bang switched to the private development side as a Project Manager for a real estate development company in San Jose, CA. He is Urban Habitat's site coordinator for the Great Communities Collaborative, working in several planning efforts throughout the Bay Area including Sunnyvale and East Palo Alto. Vu-Bang is a member of the American Planning Association (APA) and the American Institute of Certified Planners (AICP).

Please listen to his presentation at the BCLI Issues and Advocates Speakers Series, Protecting Communities, Securing Benefits: Lessons Learned in Silicon Valley.

Connie Galambos Malloy, Director of Programs, Urban Habitat Low-income communities and communities of color have always been disproportionately impacted by pollution, but much of the inequities we see today have been significantly perpetuated by land-use decisions and transportation investments made over the past 50 years.  "How We Got Here: Climate Injustice in the Bay Area," an interview with Connie Galambos Malloy, aims to provide some historical context as to how such decisions have helped perpetuate the inequitable distribution of pollution in the nine-county Bay Area region, the inequitable impacts it has had on low-income communities and communities of color, and, more importantly, how despite our best intentions and efforts, the climate policies and efforts we’re pursuing today will be limited in success if we do not address the systemic racial and economic factors that drive pollution throughout the region. 

 

Prerana Reddy, Director of Public Events, Queens Museum of Art Prerana Reddy has been the Director of Public Events for Queens Museum of Art in New York City since 2005, where she also spearheads the Museum's community engagement initiatives combining arts and culture with social development goals in nearby neighborhoods predominately comprised of new immigrants. She was one of four inaugural Douglas Redd Fellows for emerging leaders in Arts and Community Development awarded by the Ford Foundation. Currently she is overseeing Corona Studio, a series of long-term socially-engaged artist residencies in the neighborhood where the Museum is located. She is also developing a new Critical Social Practice concentration for the MFA program at Queens College (CUNY) in Spring, 2012. She recently returned from a semester-long Asian Pacific Leadership fellowship at the East-West Center at the University of Hawaii-Manoa that links advanced and interdisciplinary analysis of emergent Asian Pacific regional issues with experiential leadership learning.

Please listen to her presentation at the BCLI Issues and Advocates Speakers Series, Fresh Thinking about Community and Anchor Partnerships: Creating Shared Value for More Equitable Communities