Leadership Team

Laura ValdéZ, Executive Director

Laura Valdéz was born and grew up in El Paso, Texas on the U.S./Mexico border. Her social justice framework is rooted in the struggles she witnessed growing up as a daughter of Mexican immigrants and queer Xicana.

Laura brings over 20 years of leadership experience in nonprofit administration, public health, public policy and grassroots organizing. As a human rights activist, she has led several social justice organizations including organizations working for immigrant and LGBTQ rights. As a National Urban Fellow, she earned a Master of Public Administration degree from Bernard M. Baruch College, School of Public Affairs in New York City and is a LeaderSpring Fellow alumni.

Laura believes that long-term social change in this country requires sustained commitment and leadership from those most closely impacted by pervasive inequity and injustice and is looking forward to grounding this work at Dolores Street.

SAÚL HIDALGO L., DEPUTY DIRECTOR

Saúl has over 25 years of nonprofit experience – most of which has taken place in the Mission. His previous experience includes being a deputy director, therapist, program developer, and university lecturer. Most recently, Saúl was the agency’s Director of Housing & Shelter Programs, a role he held for over 4 years and combined his passion for program management, organizational leadership, staff development, and anti-gentrification work.

NOLIA YULAN LAI, DIRECTOR OF HUMAN RESOURCES

Nolia Yulan Lai has over 15 years of human resources management experience. She holds a Masters in Public Administration and an undergraduate degree in Business Administration. She has worked in the non-profit, business, education, and health sectors in both union and non-union environments. She has extensive experience in employee relations and engagement, benefits and compensation, staff development and performance management, staff recruitment and retention, and has considerable knowledge of labor and employment law. She has demonstrated experience of her mastery in strategic and policy-making aspects of HR as she is certified as both a Senior Professional in Human Resources (SPHR), as well as a Senior Certified Professional by The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM-SCP). As an immigrant from China, she values our organization’s mission and the many services and programming we offer the immigrant community and is excited to be grounding her work at Dolores Street.

Lessy Benedith, DIRECTOR OF HOUSING & SHELTER PROGRAMS

MARIA RINALDI, DIRECTOR OF COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT & ORGANIZING

Kate mahoney, Legal director, Deportation Defense & Legal Advocacy Program

Kate brings over a decade of experience in nonprofits and federal and immigration courts to her work as Legal Program Director. She oversees the day-to-day operations of our program and mentors our team in complex deportation defense cases on behalf of low-income clients in the Bay Area. Kate works closely with our partners in the San Francisco Immigrant Legal and Education Network (SFILEN) and the San Francisco Immigrant Legal Defense Collaborative (SFILDC) to coordinate and expand legal services for local residents facing deportation and immigration detention. Kate believes that the movement for immigrants’ liberation must be led by those most impacted, and she is humbled and constantly learning from the courageous individuals she represents.

In addition to direct representation, Kate also previously served as the Court-Appointed Special Monitor in Franco Gonzalez v. Holder, Case No. 10-2211 (C.D. Cal. 2010), and as a law clerk to the Honorable Dolly M. Gee in the Central District of California and at the San Francisco Immigration Court. Kate received her law degree from U.C. Hastings College of the Law and holds a Bachelor of Arts from Columbia University. She is admitted to practice in California, immigration courts and the Board of Immigration Appeals, the Northern District of California, and the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. She speaks Spanish and English.

Administration

Eliana Coria, Accounting supervisor

Manuel piña, operations director

Housing & Shelter Programs

Casa Quezada

DIANA ALONZO, PROGRAM MANAGER

As of 2020, Diana Alonzo has served as the Program Manager for Casa Quezada. Diana previously served as MSROC Program Manager. She brings a wealth of experience, knowledge and commitment to the work. She is a first generation native San Franciscan, who has contributed her passion and talent to tenant advocacy work and community organizing. Diana was a Tenant Rights Counselor & Organizer at Causa Justa-Just Cause where her worked focused on rights-based services, policy campaigns, civic engagement, base building, and direct action. She had the opportunity to work very closely with the Department of Building Inspection and the Department of Public Health to resolve habitability issues. While at SF Rising, she created civic engagement programs, set-up administrative systems for the statewide coalition and had an opportunity to work on some of the most pressing issues in SF including health care access, Proposition F for common sense regulations for AirBnB, Proposition I for pausing luxury condo development in the Mission, Proposition J which increased minimum wage in SF, and local and regional candidate work like Aaron Peskin for SF Board of Supervisors and David Campos for State Assembly. Core to her work is the guiding principle that it is possible for our community to reach self-determination and change the conditions that create oppression.

Dolores Shelter Program

Yesenia Lacayo, Program senior manager

Yesenia has been involved in the non-profit sector from a young age. She was a participant in the Mission Area Federal Credit Union- Youth Credit Union Program which empowered low income youth to be financially independent and responsible with an emphasis on higher education. She was a board member for YLI for 2 years, a program that provided grants to youth created projects, and was also a Senior Youth Advocate for Mission Dignity, where her mission was to empower youth in the Mission to finish their high school diploma, and continue into higher education or vocational training. She was a shelter case manager with Dolores Street for 2 years and transitioned to the Program Manager role in the winter of 2015. She continues to grow and plans to continue advocating for the neighborhood she was born and raised in.

Community Services

JACQUi PORTILLO, PROGRAM DIRECTOR

Jacqui Portillo has over 20 years of experience in the social service sector and family support movement. Most recently she worked for East Bay Agency for Children (EBAC) where she started and operated Oakland Unified School District’s Central Family Resource Center. She was involved in EBAC’s Trauma Transformed Program and brings a wealth of knowledge and wisdom about strategies to deliver trauma informed services and creating healing spaces for our community. She lived in the Mission District 15 years ago and is very familiar with nonprofit organizations in the Mission. Jacqui was the Founder and Coordinator of Casa Corazon at Instituto Familiar de La Raza. She has a deep commitment to immigrant families and social justice work.

Richard M. Cohen Residence

Enrique Roldan, Program Sr. manager

Enrique Roldan was promoted as Program Director of Cohen Residence in 2020. Enrique worked for 5 years as the Dolores Shelter Program Manager and additionally served, for almost 5 years, as the Casa Quezada Program Manager. Enrique is a proud San Francisco native, born and raised in the Mission District. He is passionate about the work DSCS does and believes in making a difference both on the individual level and as part of larger whole. Enrique takes pride in being able to give back to a community that helped him develop into the person he is today. He demonstrates a high level of customer service by interacting with tenants in a respectful manner that allows him to build relationships and also embraces his connections with staff, leading to an environment that helps the program thrive with positivity.

Workers' Rights Program

San Francisco Day Labor Program and Women’s Collective

Guillermina Castellanos, C0-Senior manager of Workers’ Rights Program: Women's Collective and the San Francisco Day Labor Program

As co-founder of La Colectiva de Mujeres in 2001, Guillermina has supported hundreds of women to discover and develop dignity, leadership and skills. She is a strong leader in local, regional, national, and international movements to win workplace rights for domestic workers and day laborers. She was given the honor to represent US domestic workers at the International Labor Organization in Geneva for the United Nations’ Convention on Domestic Work, and helped found the National Domestic Worker’s Alliance. She is a member of the board for ENLACE, a nonprofit that supports low-wage worker centers, unions, and community organizations in Mexico and the U.S. through capacity building trainings and strategic campaigning. She is also a board member of the San Francisco branch of Jobs with Justice, an alliance of labor, community, faith-based, and student organizations that strives to build a movement for economic and social justice locally and nationally. She is deeply committed to social, political and economic transformation because it is nourishing for her, and this is where she finds her happiness.

FRANCISCO HERRERA, co-senior manager of Workers’ Rights Program: Women's Collective and the San Francisco Day Labor Program

Francisco Herrera grew up in the border town of Calexico. A long-time community organizer, Francisco served as as the chair of the advisory board of the San Francisco Day Labor Program. He is a cultural worker and song writer who has devoted his life to elevating social justice issues through his music.

Immigrant Rights Program

Deportation Defense and Legal Advocacy Program (DDLAP)

Aradhana Tiwari, Associate director

Aradhana speaks Spanish, Hindi and Urdu and has worked directly with immigrant survivors of violence for over 10 years. Upon completing law school in 2014, she joined Dolores Street Community Services (DSCS) as a Legal Fellow. She then began her own solo immigration practice where she provided low-bono legal services to both detained and non-detained immigrants.

In 2019, she returned to DSCS to launch the Anti-Trafficking Project which has been geared towards empowering immigrants through education and outreach, as well as expanding legal aid to immigrant survivors of trafficking who are unjustly incarcerated. As a first-generation immigrant, Aradhana believes our immigration system is intentionally designed to facilitate the availability of a working class which can be easily manipulated, exploited, and abused.

Based on her personal and professional experiences, Aradhana has witnessed how those closest to systemic violence are also those closest to the solutions -- She is increasingly committed to advocacy efforts which are informed by directly impacted communities and are aimed at exposing and challenging the systems and individuals which profit from the dehumanization and trauma of our immigrant communities.

LeadershiP TEAM | Administration | Housing & Shelter | Workers' Rights | Immigrant Rights