| Edward Moncrief,
Chairman
Mr. Moncrief is the Executive Director and Vice President
of Real Estate of Neighborhood Housing Services Silicon Valley,
located in San José. He is a long-time resident of
Salinas. His career reflects thirty-five years of experience
in the fields of non-profit housing, economic, and community
development. Among his many accomplishments, he was the founding
President and Executive Director of Community Housing Systems
and Planning Association, Inc. (CHISPA), a public benefit
housing and community development corporation operating in
Monterey and Santa Cruz Counties that earned the 1988 HUD
Award for Outstanding Achievement in Neighborhood Improvement.
During his 15-year tenure with that organization, he obtained
over one hundred eighty million dollars in construction and
take-out financing to develop nearly one thousand units of
low- and moderate-income housing.
From 1973 through late 1979, Mr. Moncrief acted as the Director
of Community Development for Central Coast Counties Development
Corporation. In 1972, CCCDC purchased and developed the land
that is today known as the ALBA Rural Development Center.
That organization initiated farmworker training programs at
the RDC site. In his position with CCCDC, Mr. Moncrief was
for the development and administration of various training
program designed to assist farmworkers in learning cooperative
farming practices. Also during the Seventies with CCCDC, Mr.
Moncrief developed number farmworker housing projects in the
Salinas Valley.
Mr. Moncrief earned a Master’s degree in Community Development
from California State University San Diego (1970). In addition,
he has completed numerous courses in real estate, finance,
and law. He has completed courses toward a Masters in Business
Administration through Golden Gate University. He also holds
a Real Estate Broker’s License under the California
Department of Real Estate, and is the Broker of Record for
NHSSV lending and real estate activities.
Herb Aarons
Herb Aarons serves as the President of the California Coastal
Rural Development Corporation, a position he has held the
since 1982. Cal Coastal, a small business and farm lender
located in the Salinas Valley, serves the Central Coast region
from Ventura to Morgan Hill. Additionally, Herb serves as
a member of the California Economic Development Lending Initiative
and on the Advisory Board for the Gavilan College Small Business
Development Center in Gilroy.
Herb is a graduate of Pacific Coast Banking School and holds
a Bachelor of Arts degree from Clark University with an emphasis
in geography. Previous employment experience includes marketing
specialist for an agricultural cooperative and manager of
an agricultural cooling operation.
Jose Luis Fernandez
Bio coming soon...
Hank Herrera
Hank founded The Center for Popular Research, Education and Policy, devoted to participatory action research, capacity-building and policy development with communities seeking to achieve self-reliance. Through C-PREP Hank provides management services for the New York Sustainable Agriculture Working Group and the Rooted in Community Network of youth engaged in community food security projects. Previously he did neighborhood revitalization work in the predominantly African American and Puerto Rican neighborhoods in the northeast quadrant of Rochester, New York. He co-founded the NorthEast Neighborhood Alliance and Greater Rochester Urban Bounty, an urban agriculture and regional food system infrastructure project funded by the Kellogg Foundation Food and Society Initiative. Hank serves on the Board of FoodRoutes Network, a national organization that provides marketing infrastructure for local food systems; the Institute for Food and Development Policy – Food First, devoted to the elimination of the injustices that cause hunger; the Center for Whole Communities, dedicated to nurturing the relationship between people and the land; and the Agriculture and Land-Based Training Association (ALBA), an innovative organization that trains farmworkers and aspiring farmers in sustainable farming practices and business development. Hank is a psychiatrist, a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholar and a Kellogg National Fellow. He maintains a part-time private practice of psychiatry in Rochester.
Krysten Hommel
Krysten Hommel is principal of two tons per acre, a
consulting practice focused
on strategic and creative marketing for entrepreneurial
clients in the
agriculture and food & beverage industries.
Krysten has eighteen years experience in marketing, market
research,
brand development and creative strategy in the food &
beverage and
agriculture industries. She began her career at Leo J.
Shapiro &
Associates, a retail market research consultancy in Chicago,
Illinois.
After moving to California, she handled foodservice
marketing for a
culinary herb company and in 1998 joined the marketing team
at Artisans
& Estates, the fine wine division of Kendall-Jackson. At
A&E, she became
director of creative strategy, responsible for brand
strategy and all
facets of its implementation-from positioning and packaging
to
communications. Most recently, Krysten worked in marketing
for Markon
Cooperative, Inc., a Salinas-based purchasing, marketing,
and logistics
cooperative.
Krysten has a B.A. in English from Columbia University, and
received her
M.A. in History from the University of Chicago.
Paul Moncrief
A 1989 graduate of Salinas High School, Paul attended the
University of California, Santa Barbara, where he obtained
bachelor’s degrees in Spanish and Law and Society. He
also obtained a master’s degree from UCSB in Latin American
Studies, with emphases in Mexican history and political science.
While in graduate school Paul studied politics in the Mexican
state of Guanajuato, focusing on the administration of then-governor
Vicente Fox. His master’s thesis, published in 1997,
predicted Fox’s victory in the 2000 Mexican presidential
election.
Paul earned his law degree from UC Davis in 1999. During
law school, he clerked in the legal department of the California
Department of Food & Agriculture and served as Editor
in Chief of the UC Davis Journal of International Law &
Policy and as a member of the UC Davis Law Review. Following
law school, he clerked for Judge Michael S. McManus in the
U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Eastern District of California, before
returning to Salinas.
Paul is a partner in the law firm of Johnson & Moncrief,
where his practice emphasizes business and agricultural law.
Paul is a member of the Salinas Rotary and an advisor to the
Hartnell College Ag Program.
Nicolás Sandoval, Jr.
A son of farm workers, Nick began working with farm workers as an organizer for La Unión del Pueblo Entero (LUPE), an offshoot of the United Farm Workers (UFW). He currently coordinates the Poder Popular para la Salud del Pueblo program in Gonzales. Nick attended Salinas area public schools, is a former marine, and graduated from Hartnell Community College and the University of California at Santa Cruz, earning a BA in Politics. A Salinas resident, Nick enjoys reading, coffee and basketball in his free time.
Vivian L. Soffa
Vivian served on the Association for Community Based Education's
(ACBE) Advisory Board to the Rural Development Center since
1995, the precursory organization to ALBA. She currently oversees
USDA Farm Service Agency in Salinas as the County Executive
Director, a position she has held since 1990. This office
is responsible for providing financial assistance to farmers
in the Monterey, Santa Cruz, and San Mateo county area. Much
of her time in the last five years has been spent reaching
out to farmers that are historically underserved by the USDA.
The underserved groups in this area include Latino, Asian,
Native American, women and organic farmers. Her work has assisted
USDA policy makers to recognize that there are diverse needs
of farmers on the Central Coast (and within the State of California)
that require new approaches to traditional farm program policy
and implementation.
Vivian received her Masters of Public Administration from
Golden Gate University and her Bachelor's of Science in Agricultural
& Managerial Economics from UC Davis. She is a supporting
member of California Certified Organic Farmers, California
Women in Agriculture, and served as ALBA's Board Chair during
the transition of administration from ACBE to ALBA.
Born in Los Angeles, California, Vivian has lived and worked
in both urban and rural environments. Her love of land and
farming has enabled her to operate a small farm, shear sheep,
and live/work overseas on a farm. She has traveled extensively
and has lived and worked in the Salinas area since 1990. |
