Frank Gornick is Chancellor of the Wests Hills Community College District, where he has been the Chief Executive Officer since 1994. The District is comprised of WHC Coalinga and WHC Lemoore, as well as the North District Center, Firebaugh. Dr. Gornick has served as past Chair of the Central Valley Higher Education Consortium and as the Governor’s appointee for higher education on the California Partnership for the San Joaquin Valley. In 2009 he was appointed as a public representative for the Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges of the Western Association of Schools and Colleges. Dr. Gornick grew up in Chicago. He earned an A.A. degree at West Hills College Coalinga and came back 28 years later as CEO.
Jim Mayer is President and CEO of California Forward, a bipartisan public interest effort to bolster democracy and improve the performance of government in California. Jim was part of the team that developed and launched California Forward in 2008. Jim was the executive director of the Little Hoover Commission, an independent and bipartisan state panel that reviews state programs and policies for efficiency and effectiveness. Jim joined the Commission’s staff in 1994 as a project manager and served as deputy executive director prior to being appointed executive director in January 1999.
Jackson R. Gualco is the President/CEO of The Gualco Group, Inc., a government relations and public affairs consulting firm based in Sacramento, California. His firm represents a wide array of clients from agriculture, business, and the public sector. He served as Special Assistant to Assembly Speaker Willie L. Brown, Jr. He received a master’s degree in Pastoral Studies from Loyola University and an MBA in management from Golden Gate University. He has a certificate in management from the UC Davis. His undergraduate degrees are from the UC Davis and Sacramento City College. He participated in executive level programs sponsored by the University of California, Harvard University, and Boston University. He is a member of the Deans’ Advisory Council of the UC Davis College of Letters and Science and is a trustee emeritus of the UCD Foundation. He is the immediate past president of the Institute of Governmental Advocates, the association of state-level lobbyists. He sits on the Advisory Council of the State Legislative Leaders Foundation. He is continues to serve on various search and advisory committees at UCD. His firm received the Outstanding Contribution to Agriculture award from the California Association of Pest Control Advisers.
Joe L. Del Bosque is a farmer from Firebaugh, California. He has been involved in farming all his life on the irrigated westside of the San Joaquin Valley where his family settled after years of migrant farm work. He graduated from CSU Fresno in 1975, and began his own farm in 1985. Today his farm produces melons, organic and conventional, almonds, asparagus, processing tomatoes, and cherries. He is a member of the California Latino Water Coalition, Western Growers Association, California Melon Research Board, and California Farm Bureau. He is Past Chair of AgSafe. He formerly served as a director of the Pacheco Water District and the San Joaquin Valley Drainage Authority. He has served on the California Water Commission since 2010, and was reappointed by Governor Jerry Brown in 2014. He was featured in national and international news, including NPR, CBS, NBC, Univision, LA Times, and many others. In February of 2014, President Obama and Governor Brown visited Del Bosque Farms to focus on, and better understand, California’s drought.
Lance Donny Founder & CEO, OnFarm is the Founder and CEO of OnFarm, the first IoT focused agriculture data platform and a market leader in cloud based farm management software. OnFarm enables plug-n-play adoption of hardware and data solutions from a broad spectrum of industry leading companies that enables better farm management. Lance is the former CFO and VP of Business Development at PureSense and a 20+ year software executive. Lance and OnFarm have won numerous awards including IBM’s NA Entrepreneur of the Year, Connected World’s Best M2M Technology in Agriculture, TiE’s 50 Best Global Startups, and SARTA’s Ag-Tech Innovator of the Year. He grew up on his family’s vineyard in Fresno and graduated from CSU Fresno.
Art Sponseller has served as the president/chief executive officer of the Hospital Council since March 2005. He previously served as the Senior Vice President/Chief Operating Officer at California Hospital Association (CHA). He has over thirty-six years of health care experience, including 31 years with California’s hospital associations. A frequent lecturer and speaker, he was an adjunct faculty member at USC for six years, and the University of LaVerne for 14 years. He received his B.B.A. degree from Eastern Michigan University in 1972, and his J.D. from the Detroit College of Law at Michigan State University in 1983. He is a member of the State Bar of California, now inactive.
Lynda Resnick, Vice Chair & Co-Owner, The Wonderful Company along with her husband Stewart This privately held, multi-billion dollar global company is dedicated to harvesting health and happiness around the world through its iconic brands, including Wonderful Pistachios, Wonderful Almonds, Wonderful Halos, POM Wonderful, Wonderful Sweet Scarletts, FIJI Water, JUSTIN and Landmark Wines, and Teleflora. She runs worldwide marketing and product development for The Wonderful Company, and is renowned as the creative spirit behind such innovative and inspiring campaigns as Teleflora’s “Flowers in a Gift”; for making POM Wonderful, the antioxidant-rich pomegranate juice, a national sensation; and for producing the iconic Wonderful Pistachios commercials. She authored the best-selling book on marketing, Rubies in the Orchard, and in 2015, she ranked #11 among Forbes’ inaugural Top 50 Most Successful Self-Made Women in America.
Dr. Glenda Humiston was appointed by President Obama in 2009 to serve as California State Director for USDA Rural Development – administering $6+ billion portfolio and 47 programs. Her career has focused on public policy development and program implementation supporting sustainability; prior experience includes Peace Corps in Tunisia, nonprofit Executive advocating farmland preservation and value-added agriculture development, and several years as a consultant on environmental and agricultural issues throughout the western states. She served President Clinton 1998 – 2001 as Deputy under Secretary for Natural Resources and Environment at USDA and managed the Sustainable Development Institute at the 2002 World Summit for Sustainable Development in South Africa and the 2006 World Water Forum in Mexico. Humiston’s Ph.D. from UC Berkeley looked at sustainability and farm policy; she has a Master’s from UC Davis in International Agricultural Development and Bachelors from Colorado State in Animal Science. Recently she produced a widely acclaimed guidebook on Access to Capital.
Jim Houston, Deputy Secretary for Legislation, California Department of Food and Agriculture was appointed by Governor Brown as deputy secretary for legislation and public engagement for the California Department of Food and Agriculture. He worked for the California Assembly serving as Legislative Director for Assembly Member Simon Salinas from 2001-2004 and has served as a representative for the Sacramento-based BGS Group since 2004. During that time he represented numerous entities involved in agriculture. He received a law degree from McGeorge School of Law in 2009.
Peter Davis, Director/SN of the Advanced Transportation Renewable Energy Sector (ATRE), DWM, Economic and Workforce Development Program, CCC is a native of California. He attended California Community Colleges receiving multiple degrees. He also completed multiple degrees at San Diego State University and he received his Master’s Degree from University of Phoenix. He uses his 20 years of experience with public, private, industry, and agency stakeholders to align resources needed by the Workforce to keep California competitive in the ATRE global marketplace. He currently directs the efforts of 4 California Community College ATRE Deputy Sector Navigators, strategically located throughout the state, which provide training in the areas of alternative fuels, alternative fueled vehicles (AFV), intelligent transportation systems, Renewable Energy and newly emerging technologies
Michael Marks is best known as “Your Produce Man” on his weekly visits on CBS13 News at Noon and on the #1 morning show in Sacramento, “Good Day Sacramento” on CW31. He celebrates 25 years at CBS13 this year. Your Produce Man was also a regular favorite on DIY network’s top show, “Home Grown Cooking with Paul James.” He has been in the produce industry since 1977, starting his career in a “mom and pop” grocery store in Sutter Hill, California. He eventually became a sales manager for a small produce distributor in Northern California, becoming marketing director for one of the California’s largest independent produce distributors, and eventually providing produce marketing expertise to Sysco, North America’s largest distributor of fresh fruits and vegetables to the foodservice industry. Your Produce Man’s weekly newspaper column is read by thousands in the San Jose Mercury News, Oakland Tribune and the San Diego Union-Tribune. He has been called “the most quoted man in produce” and is called “the next Joe Carcione, the Green Grocer.” He has also been called the “Sherlock Holmes of Produce,” taking the mystery out of produce for consumers. He has been called a “walking produce concordance and encyclopedia.”
Robert Tse creates and implements innovative strategies to benefit California’s regional and rural economies. He integrates policies, resources and initiatives through federal, state, local government and public-private partnerships. He is the USDA lead for the Strong Cities – Strong Communities (SC2) White House pilot initiative in Fresno. He is driving strategies for urban-rural broadband infrastructure and development of regional agriculture technology economic clusters in areas such as Fresno and Sacramento. His broad strategic reach also includes goods movement, international trade, health-food-agriculture systems, veterans and farming, water, and energy.
Davena Witcher was asked to serve as the Executive Director of Alliance for Medical Outreach and Relief (AMOR) in 2013 after serving on the Board from 2008 when the organization was founded. Davena is a nurse by training and is specialized in Neonatal and Pediatrics. She practiced for many years at Valley Children’s Hospital and worked on the team that transported the sickest infant’s and children from remote areas of the Valley back to the hospital for medical care. She has a passion for giving a hand up to the underserved, and expresses her compassion for the less fortunate through programs that empower both the individual and the community. Davena served as the lead in opening a neonatal nursery in Kabul Afghanistan that now sets the standard of care in the country and has been replicated by UNICEF. Under Davena’s supervision AMOR is now planning to open a multi-structure, eco-friendly facility in Mendota in 2017 that will address the medical, social service, and youth needs of West Fresno County. Davena received an AS degree in Respiratory Care from Fresno City College, and BS in Nursing from Excelsior College, NY.
Joseph I. Castro, President, California State University, Fresno was appointed as the eighth president of California State University, Fresno on August 1, 2013. Dr. Castro also serves as Professor of Educational Leadership in the Kremen School of Education and Human Development. Prior to his appointment he served as Vice Chancellor, Student Academic Affairs, and Professor of Family and Community Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco for seven years. He has a B.A. in political science and M.P.P. in public policy from UC Berkeley and Ph.D. in higher education policy and leadership from Stanford. Dr. Castro is the grandson of farmworkers from Mexico and members of the San Carlos Apache Tribe. Born and raised in Hanford, CA he is the first person in his family to graduate from a university.
Robert Casamento co-leads Deloitte’s Water, Energy and Environment Practice; he has been providing water, energy and sustainability consulting services to private-and public-sector enterprises for more than two decades. His experience includes three years as the Director of Environmental Initiatives at the World Economic Forum, Co-chair of the European Commission’s Emissions Trading Market Liquidity Working Group, and Senior Advisor to the UK Treasury and GLOBE International on market based mechanisms in support of climate change and alternative energy finance initiatives. His current focus is working with organizations to address water data management and analytics, the water-energy nexus, and aligning action to improve watershed stewardship.
Marisa Mitchell is a Senior Manager of Site Development at Recurrent Energy, a leading solar developer with utility-scale projects up and down the Central Valley. Marisa has been working in the renewables industry in California for ten years, focusing on the land use and environmental aspects of utility-scale projects from early stage siting through construction. At Recurrent Energy, she focuses on elements that are critical for successful project development: smart land use policy, responsible siting, community engagement, local job generation, local economic benefits, and global climate benefits of Recurrent Energy’s Central Valley projects.
Jeff Dahlberg is currently the Director of the University of California, Agricultural and Natural Resources, Kearney Agricultural Research and Extension (KARE) Center and was formally Research Director for the United Sorghum Checkoff Program and the National Sorghum Producers and is an international expert on sorghum germplasm and research. He also served as a Research Geneticist for the USDA-ARS in Mayaguez, Puerto Rico. He received his BA from Occidental College and then served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in the West African republic of Niger. His MS was from the University of Arizona and his Ph.D. from Texas A&M University. He has worked and published in the fields of renewable fuels, sorghum genetics and germplasm, and nutrition. He has over 25+ years experience working with sorghum and sorghum researchers. His current position as Director of KARE entails leadership and direction of the largest Research Extension Center in the UC-ANR system and he has oversight of 330 acres of research land that hosts over 80 research projects on 45 different crops.
Jim Mayer is President and CEO of California Forward, a bipartisan public interest effort to bolster democracy and improve the performance of government in California. Jim was part of the team that developed and launched California Forward in 2008. Jim was the executive director of the Little Hoover Commission, an independent and bipartisan state panel that reviews state programs and policies for efficiency and effectiveness. Jim joined the Commission’s staff in 1994 as a project manager and served as deputy executive director prior to being appointed executive director in January 1999.
Art Sponseller has served as the president/chief executive officer of the Hospital Council since March 2005. He previously served as the Senior Vice President/Chief Operating Officer at California Hospital Association (CHA). He has over thirty-six years of health care experience, including 31 years with California’s hospital associations. A frequent lecturer and speaker, he was an adjunct faculty member at USC for six years, and the University of LaVerne for 14 years. He received his B.B.A. degree from Eastern Michigan University in 1972, and his J.D. from the Detroit College of Law at Michigan State University in 1983. He is a member of the State Bar of California, now inactive.
Russell Teall is the founder and president of BIODICO. Under Dr. Teall’s leadership, BIODICO has successfully evolved patented biorefinery production techniques for a wide variety of feedstocks. Beginning with laboratory-scale demonstrations, these technologies eventually led to full-scale commercial operations in California, Nevada, Colorado, Texas and Australia. These plants utilized his patented process with capacities of 3-10 million gallons per year and produced biodiesel predominantly from recycled fryer oils, with the capability of using a wide variety of other feedstocks, including crude vegetable oils and animal fats. BIODICO is continuing to actively develop improvements to the bioenergy system platform in conjunction with the U.S. Navy at the Naval Facilities Engineering Expeditionary Warfare Center at Naval Base Ventura County in Port Hueneme, Calif.