Nelson, Karen
Karen Nelson serves as the California Asian Pacific Chamber of Commerce’s Director of Supplier Diversity and will oversee all supplier diversity efforts on behalf of the chamber. Prior to this role, she served as chief impact officer at the American Leadership Forum – Mountain Valley Chapter headquartered in Sacramento, CA. She was responsible for the strategic design, implementation, and management of the organization. Nelson has over 15 years of experience engaging with small businesses, corporations, and nonprofit organizations within the greater Sacramento region. From 2017 to 2019, Nelson served as assistant deputy director at the State of California’s Department of Consumer Affairs, an appointee under Governor Brown’s administration, where she served as the Department’s liaison for 37 boards and bureaus. She was director of youth and community engagement at PRO Youth and Families in 2014, where she led the organization's youth and community programs. Nelson held several positions at the Sacramento Asian Pacific Chamber of Commerce from 2005 to 2011, including director of events, director of events and sponsorship and director of events, sponsorship and foundation. She earned her masters degree in Business Administration at Drexel University, and bachelors degree in Communications and Psychology at the University of California, Davis. She has had a long career in the greater Sacramento region and is passionate about performing work that impacts the broader community.
Fong, Ryan
Ryan currently serves as the Director of Finance of the CalAsian Chamber. He joined the organization in October 2012 as an administrative intern before being brought on as the Administration Manager. During his time at the chamber, Ryan has previously served as Administration Manager and Operations & Finance Manager before advancing to his current position. Prior to working at the chamber, Ryan attended the University of California, Berkeley, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in Integrative Biology.
Oto, Lauren
Lauren is the Vice President of Communications & Membership at the California Asian Pacific Chamber of Commerce.
Louie, Frank
Frank Louie brings a very diverse business background to the chamber’s management team. He led a very successful 22-year career in management leadership positions in sales and operations for Xerox Corporation. Most recently, Louie served as General Manager for the Public Sector Northwest Region focusing on the state, local and education markets. He also has extensive experience working for start-up technology companies in the Internet payment and billing space, and the Alternative Energy industry.
Kushida, Pat Fong
Pat is the President/CEO of the Sacramento Asian-Pacific Chamber of Commerce (SACC) serving in this capacity since 1998, and President/CEO of the California Asian Pacific Chamber of Commerce (CAPCC) formed in 2010.This combined entity represents the largest ethnic chamber in California today.
Pat is a known as a visionary, entrepreneurial leader who has applied these skills to help build programs that strengthen California’s ethnically diverse business community and create economic development opportunities for this community to prosper. Through her leadership, CAPCC has established two federal centers that help minority small businesses. The Sacramento Export Center, funded by the Department of Commerce’s Minority Business Development Agency serving the southwest region, and the Small Business Transportation Resource Center funded by the Department of Transportation serving California, Arizona, Hawaii and Nevada.
Pat has established relationships that link the most prominent API business organization to opportunities that provide advocacy, education and outreach to a significant portion of this state’s demographics, the over 600,000 Asian Pacific owned businesses in California. Through her efforts, the Chamber has developed partnerships throughout the State with over 53 community-based organizations. She created a separate Foundation to house each chamber’s economic and workforce development, leadership, and education programs. Through this effort, the chamber won a significant contract with Covered California to sign up over 50,000 API business in California.
Pat’s strength is forming collaborations with many community-based organizations on issues related to regional economic development to advance her community’s interests. She has advocated on behalf of the chamber at the local, state and federal levels, and developed successful ongoing fund development programs to ensure chamber viability. Most recently, she formed the Sacramento Inclusive Development Collaborative (Sac IEDC), which is a group of regional chambers and local P-Bids that advocate for the diverse and underserved small business community in the Sacramento Region.
Pat firmly believes in giving back to her community and serves on numerous boards and commissions.Pat is a Senior Fellow, American Leadership Forum; Advisory Board Member, Sac State’s Carlsen Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship; Advisory Board Member, Sac State’s College of Business Advisory Council; Board Member, Align Capital Region Board; and Member, Aggie Square Joint Advisory Board Committee.
Prior to her work in the non-profit arena, Pat worked in procurement management for major retail corporations for 15 years. Pat graduated from California State University, Sacramento in 1985 with a B.S. in Business Administration, concentration, Marketing, and a minor in Communications.