Hector Ramirez has served as Chair of First 5 California since March 2006 when he was appointed to the State Commission by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.  Ramirez is currently an executive management consultant working with a variety of non-profit and public sector organizations in strategic planning, organizational restructuring, program design and service integration.  Prior to this, he served as the Chief Strategic Officer at Para Los Niños, a nationally accredited community-based family services agency headquartered in Los Angeles, California.

Ramirez’s professional experience also includes working for the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services, the Los Angeles County Department of Public Social Services, the Child Welfare League of America (CWLA) and other community-based agencies.  He serves on several local, national and international committees including the National Council of La Raza (NCLR) – California Region Education Committee (Co-Chair), CWLA International Advisory Committee (Co-Chair), International Child Welfare Forum (Agency Delegate), and CWLA National Childcare and Development Advisory Committee (Member).  Ramirez is also a board member with SPIN-USA, a non-profit national organization based in Massachusetts that trains and certifies managers, principals, teachers and staff who work in education and social services.

Mr. Kears serves as Director of the Alameda County Health Care Services Agency. He provides overall direction, consultation, and trouble-shooting to the agency’s four major departments: Indigent Care; Public Health Department, including Emergency Medical Services; Environmental Health Services; and Behavioral Health Care Services, including Mental Health and Alcohol and Drug Services. From 1993 to 1998, Mr. Kears assumed the additional responsibility of developing a public/private Medi-Cal managed care program, the Alameda Alliance for Health, pursuant to State of California Department of Health Services directives. The Alliance is now a fully licensed HMO composed of traditional Medi-Cal and safety net county and community providers.

Current major program responsibilities include coordinating the county's Indigent Medical Care System and monitoring contracts with the Alameda County Medical Center (three hospital facilities and non-hospital and hospital-based outpatient clinics) and a broad network of community-based primary care providers.

Since 1996, Mr. Kears has chaired Alameda County's Interagency Children's Policy Council. Mr. Kears also completed the development of an alternative governance structure for the County's Medical Care System and the transition of both governance and hospital employees to a separate, public hospital authority in 1999. With the passage of Proposition 10, Mr. Kears led the development and provided initial funding support for Every Child Counts/First 5 Alameda County. Mr. Kears is also Chair of Safe Passages, a Robert Wood Johnson decade-long initiative to improve outcomes for children and youth.

He graduated from the University of California, Berkeley with a major in Sociology and a Masters in Social Welfare with a Psychiatric Casework Specialty. He also holds a Clinical Social Work license.

Mr. Kears was born in Oakland, where he resides with his wife and family.

Carla Dartis is Vice President for Community Investment at the East Bay Community Foundation, headquartered in Oakland. The Foundation manages 400 charitable funds valued at almost $270 million for individuals, families, corporations and other organizations. It also makes grants from its own endowment and leads civic initiatives focused on education reform and sustainable communities. Ms. Dartis is responsible for managing the Foundation’s grant making and community leadership initiatives in the Foundation’s service area of Alameda and Contra Costa counties.

Before joining the East Bay Community Foundation, Ms. Dartis served at the David and Lucile Packard Foundation as program officer for Early Childhood Education field building issues. She was responsible for designing and launching the Affordable Buildings for Children’s Development initiative, a statewide systems change effort in financing and expanding the supply of child-centered facilities. While at Packard, she also designed and funded the Foundation’s statewide initiative to support best practice models of preschool curriculum, pedagogy, and community partnerships. 

Prior to her career in philanthropy, Ms. Dartis' experiences spanned leadership roles in community and economic development in local government and non-profit management in the city and county of Los Angeles and Bank of America’s Community Development Bank. She is an Annie E. Casey Foundation 2000 Children and Families Leadership Fellow.

Ms. Dartis has completed Stanford University’s Executive Education program in Philanthropy Management. She has a Bachelor’s degree in Public Administration from the University of Southern California (USC) and has completed graduate work in public policy and administration at USC, California State University at Long Beach and in real estate development at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Lusk Center.

Dr. Maria E. Minon, a native of Buenos Aires, Argentina currently serves as Vice President of Medical Affairs and Chief Medical Officer for Children's Hospital of Orange County (CHOC), a position she has held since 1998. In this capacity, Dr. Minon works to facilitate and oversee the activities of the medical staff, medical quality and patient safety, Psychology Training Program, Graduate and Continuing Medical Education, CHOC's Heart, Neuroscience, Orthopaedic and Cancer Institutes and Clinical and Basic Science Research departments. Dr. Minon also served on the CHOC Board of Directors for three years. 

Dr. Minon has made a strong commitment to helping the community. Dr. Minon is the current Chair of the Orange County Children and Families Commission. She served the Orange County Medical Association (OCMA) as President for the 2000-2001 term. She has also served as OCMA's Treasurer and member of the Board of Directors. Dr. Minon is a Vice Chair for the Orange County Ronald McDonald House Board of Trustees as well as serving as Director for the Ronald McDonald House of Southern California Charities Board of Directors. She participates on the Latino Health Access Board of Directors. Dr. Minon is a diligent advocate for Health Care in Orange County as evidenced by her service on the California Medical Association Board of Trustees, Finance Committee, Nominating Committee and House of Delegates. She has served as President of the California Chapter IV of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) and participated for six years on the AAP's Committee on Child Health Finances. 

Honors awarded to Dr. Minon include the 2007 OCMA Physician of the Year, the Charlie Hester Philanthropy Award, Outstanding Pediatric Student by the Orange Pediatric Society and Cum laude Honors from the UCI School of Humanities.

Dr. Minon earned her Medical Degree at University of California, Irvine . She conducted her post-graduate training at UCI Medical Center and Children's Hospital of Orange County, where she was appointed Chief Resident. UCI College of Medicine appointed Dr. Minon a faculty position as Associate Clinical Professor of Pediatrics. Dr. Minon worked in private practice for general pediatrics and adolescent medicine from 1979 to 1998.