MEET OUR DIRECTOR'S CIRCLE
Director’s Circle members are community leaders who demonstrate a commitment to reversing climate change and to honoring the voices of those most impacted by it. They support Regeneración’s Executive Director, staff, and board through networking, mentorship, advising, and partnership.
Azucena Sandoval
Azucena Sandoval is a graduate of Watsonville High School who is enrolled at Stanford University with a planned major in Civil engineering (with an environmental concentration) and Data Science and Social Systems. She is passionate about leveraging advocacy, technology, and engineering to cultivate just, equitable solutions for agricultural communities like the Pajaro Valley. In her free time, she enjoys reading, running, and learning as much as she can about the world around her.
Erica Padilla-Chavez
Erica Padilla-Chavez joined the Food Bank in 2022 as CEO. Her career embodies a commitment to the improvement of health and wellness for all people. With over two decades of experience in the health and human services field, Erica has a history of facilitating collaborations that impact positive change. She has a deep understanding of health equity and is well versed in the social determinants of health, the conditions that affect a wide range of health and quality of life outcomes for people. During her career she has served as the Department Manager for UCSC’s Latin American and Latino Studies Department, the first Health Equity and Policy Manager for the Monterey County Health Department and CEO of Pajaro Valley Prevention & Student Assistance, Inc. Erica is a member of Dominican Hospital’s Community Board, a member of the RISE Together Santa Cruz County Initiative, former President of the Hartnell College Board of Trustees, and has held several additional board positions. Erica attended the University of California, Berkeley where she received her Bachelor of Arts Degree in Sociology and Master of Public Administration from Golden Gate University in San Francisco. She is also an alum of the California/Hawaii Public Health Leadership Institute, a leadership program designed to advance health practices to improve health equity. Erica currently serves on the Board of Directors for the California Association of Food Banks (CAFB), contributing her leadership and experience to support food banks across California.
Jasmine Nájera
Jasmine Nájera is a lifelong Santa Cruz County resident who is committed to serving her community as a Licensed Clinical Social Worker. Jasmine currently serves as the CEO at Pajaro Valley Prevention and Student Assistance, where she continues to support and develop staff in delivering high-quality Behavioral Health services in the Pajaro Valley. Jasmine is passionate about mentoring and coaching staff in ongoing professional development and creating workforce development pathways for staff to gain professional degrees to become behavioral health clinicians in our community. This empowers them to deliver excellent, quality programs and services to our youth and families. She is a proud champion, ensuring that all youth, children, and families have access to treatment, services, and programs they need. Jasmine has served as the Board Secretary of the Pajaro Valley Health Care District, Board Chair of Monarch Services and contracted with the City of Watsonville to help co-create and establish the Trauma-Response Multi-Disciplinary Team led by the Watsonville Police Department. She also supervised master's in social work students in their clinical placement. She is proud to have worked as a civil servant with Santa Cruz County Health Services Agency for over 20 years. She worked in both the Children’s and Adult Behavioral Health divisions, specializing in Forensic Services where she handled collaborations and partnerships with local law enforcement jurisdictions, probation, jails, and the court system. She helped develop and implement the Mental Health Liaisons to Law Enforcement Team, and the Crisis Intervention Team Training and Behavioral Health Court. She is married and a proud mother of two children who keep her and her husband busy, with full hearts and excitement as they see them grow.
Michael McCormick
Michael McCormick is the Founder and President of Farallon Strategies, a B Corp sociocratic consultancy working at the bridge between the public, private, and non-profit sectors with a focus on building capacity in communities for climate resilience. Michael is a social entrpreneur and has worked on climate change, sustainability, and resilience throughout his 25 year career. The central coast awakening his passion for working on climate change and resilience which has taken him from working on hyperlocal initiatives to globally impactful programs.
Michael Mendez
Dr. Michael Méndez is an Associate Professor of Environmental Planning/Policy and Chancellor's Fellow at the University of California, Irvine, whose new research focuses on climate-induced disasters and social vulnerability. He is currently an Andrew Carnegie Fellow and a Visiting Scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). Michael has over a decade of senior-level experience in both the public and private sectors, where he has consulted and actively engaged in the policymaking process. Dr. Méndez’s award-winning book, “Climate Change from the Streets,” published by Yale University Press, provides an urgent and timely analysis of the contentious politics of incorporating environmental justice into global climate change policy. Michael's experience as a teenager working in his parents' Rudy's Bike Shop in Pacoima -- the first Latino-owned bike shop in the San Fernando Valley (a region of over 1 million people) -- influenced his worldview. For more than 25 years, Michael's parents struggled to keep the shop afloat, supporting sustainable and affordable transportation options for low-income immigrant families in Pacoima. Through this work, he saw first-hand the structural inequities and adversities in the built environments for people of color.
Sarah Newkirk
Sarah Newkirk is a conservation leader focused on advancing large-scale, community-centered solutions to climate resilience and land stewardship. As Executive Director of the Land Trust of Santa Cruz County, she leads one of California’s most innovative land trusts, driving efforts in wildlife connectivity, sustainable agriculture, and public access to nature. Sarah has raised over $90 million for conservation through a combination of philanthropy, public funding, and policy innovation—including leading the successful Measure Q campaign to secure dedicated funding for open space stewardship. Previously, she held leadership roles at The Nature Conservancy, where she helped pioneer nature-based solutions for coastal resilience now embedded in state and national policy.
Stan Rushworth
Stan Rushworth is Faculty Emeritus at Cabrillo College, in Aptos/Watsonville, California, where he taught Native American Literature for thirty years. He also taught as a Lecturer at UCSC, at Oakes College and in American Studies in the 1990s. As a major part of his career’s focus, he worked for eighteen years at Cabrillo’s Watsonville Center teaching basic skills, multicultural literature, and critical thinking surrounding Indigenous peoples’ issues, including six years as Co-Director/Instructor of Cabrillo’s early Puente Program, an educational project focused in the Chicano community. He currently works in collaborative communities addressing Indigenous interests involving both land and education, and writes about issues concerning Indigenous peo-ples local to his area and beyond. He authored Sam Woods: American Healing in 1992; Going to Water: The Journal of Beginning Rain in 2014, and Diaspora’s Children in 2020. His current publication is co-edited with Dahr Jamail, We Are The Middle of Forever: Indigenous Voices From Turtle Island on the Changing Earth, which received the American Library Association’s Notable Book Award in 2023.
Victoria Derr
Tori Derr is a Professor at California State University Monterey Bay, where she focuses on environmental education and fostering healthy and sustainable communities. Fundamentally, she is interested in work that celebrates and cares for people and the planet. For more than 30 years, she has engaged children, youth and communities in participatory research and projects in both rural and urban settings. Her recent research has focused on children, nature, and environmental care in the U.S., Mexico, and Latin America. Prior to CSUMB, she was a faculty coordinator for Growing Up Boulder at the University of Colorado, where she facilitated children and youth participation in design and planning of child-friendly cities, including parks, open space, transportation, resilience, and neighborhood projects. This work led to the publication Placemaking with Children and Youth: Participatory Practices for Planning Sustainable Communities. Prior to Growing Up Boulder, she ran Crane Collaborations, which focused on youth engagement, environmental education, and community forestry in New Mexican communities. She has also been a professional textile artist, and will travel anywhere there are beautiful textiles, nature and culture intertwined. She carries her textile interests forward through participation in the slow fiber movement, which seeks to increase sustainability of the textile industry and mindfulness to textile practice.