Staff
Olga Talamante
Executive Director, Chicana/Latina Foundation
Olga Talamante became the first Executive Director of the Chicana Latina Foundation in January 2003. Prior to this position, she was the Western Region Vice President of INROADS, a career and leadership development organization aimed at Latino, African American and Native American college students pursuing careers in business and engineering. In that position, she supervised the organization's 12 regional offices located throughout the western United States and in Mexico.
Ms. Talamante is well known for her community activism and has worked with several service-providing and public advocacy agencies, including Head Start, the YMCA, the American Friends Service Committee, and the Argentine Commission for Human Rights.
Some of her awards include: "Most Influential Latinos in the San Francisco Bay Area", from the SF Business Times and SF Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, "Heroes and Heroines of the Latino Community", from KQED-TV, the Diversity Award from Hispanic Magazine, the San Francisco Bay Girl Scout Council DAISY Award, and the "Women Making History Award" from the San Francisco Commission on the Status of Women.
Currently she serves on the boards of the National Center for Lesbian Rights; El Concilio of San Mateo County, and the Friends of the Commission on the Status of Women. She is also active with GELAAM, a Latino LGBT organization in San Mateo County and with the Latino Forum of the San Francisco LGBT Center.
Ms. Talamante's family came from Mexico to Gilroy in the early 1960's and worked as farmworkers in the Santa Clara Valley. She received her B.A. in Latin American Studies from the University of California at Santa Cruz.
Claudia León
Staff, Program Coordinator
Claudia León joined the staff of Chicana Latina Foundation in June 2006 as Program Coordinator. She is honored to be a part of the work that has been established by the Chicana Latina Foundation.
Claudia León has worked in San Francisco's Mission District for the last 10 years. The focus of her work has been as a program coordinator, case manager and job developer/vocational trainer. Her work has been primarily focused on helping youth and families become self-sufficient and in supporting them in positive change. She has been an active supporter of many organizations that have organized around gentrification and immigrant rights. In 2004 she joined the Board of Directors for Instituto Familiar de la Raza.
She earned a Bachelor's Degree from San Francisco State University with a double major in Urban Studies and La Raza Studies, with an emphasis on Community Development and Policy.