Leadership - Los Angeles LGBT Center

Lorri L. Jean is nationally recognized as one of the most seasoned and effective leaders in the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) civil rights movement. OUT magazine has twice listed her as one of the 50 most powerful gay and lesbian people in the nation. In 2006, Los Angeles Magazine named her as one of the 100 most influential people in Los Angeles, and in 2014 it named her one of the ten most inspiring women in Los Angeles. Jean currently serves as CEO of the Los Angeles LGBT Center, the world's largest provider of programs and services for LGBT people.

Jean has been an activist on LGBT issues since 1979. She served as the lead plaintiff in the successful landmark lawsuit against Georgetown University to prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. She also was the first openly gay or lesbian person in history to receive a top secret security clearance from the Central Intelligence Agency. In 1989, with her appointment as Deputy Regional Director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), she became the highest-ranking openly gay or lesbian person in the Federal government (a distinction she held until 1993 when President Clinton appointed Roberta Achtenberg).

In 1993, Jean began her first six-year tenure at the helm of the Center (to which she returned in June 2003). She led the Center through a period of unprecedented expansion, dramatically increasing the number of clients and volunteers, the diversity and volume of services, the number of staff, and the size of the budget. She also oversaw the purchase and renovation of a $7 million facility and built the nation's first $10 million dollar LGBT organization endowment fund. During her second tenure, Jean has returned the Center to financial stability, dramatically expanded programming to 10 locations across Los Angeles while more than quadrupling the revenue budget to $141 million.  She also led the Center's historic capital campaign for the $142 million Anita May Rosenstein Campus, which opened in April 2019.

From 2001 to 2003, Jean served as executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, leading an organizational turnaround that brought the Task Force to financial solvency and increased the annual revenues to what was then an all-time high. Among other program accomplishments, she focused the organization's political efforts at the state and local level by building a field organizing department which orchestrated the defeat of nearly all anti-LGBT ballot measures in the 2001 and 2002 election cycles.

Prior to 1993, Jean spent 10 years as an attorney with FEMA, including three years overseeing the disaster response and recovery operations of its largest region, where she was responsible for the management of a staff of 1,000 and a budget of more than $1 billion. Jean holds a Juris Doctorate degree from Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., and a Bachelor of Science degree in communication from Arizona State University, and is a member of the bar in California and Washington, D.C. She and her wife, attorney Gina M. Calvelli, live in Hollywood and were legally married in September 2008.

Joe joined the Los Angeles LGBT Center team in July 2021 as the Executive Director and will officially take the helm as CEO on July 1, 2022 when current CEO, Lorri L. Jean, retires. Joe is the former CEO of the San Francisco AIDS Foundation (SFAF), and before that he was chief of staff and first deputy commissioner at the Chicago Department of Public Health (CDPH), the nation’s third largest health department.

Joe has been part of the LGBTQ movement since coming out as gay at the age of 16. With more than 25 years of movement leadership, he has proven himself to be a trusted collaborator and ally to all members of the LGBTQ community.

During Joe’s tenure at SFAF, he spearheaded the adoption of a five-year strategic plan that prioritized the expansion of health and social services and established racial justice as a fundamental principle to guide the organization’s growth. In addition, Joe grew revenue by 84 percent and significantly increased corporate and private donations to support the organization’s life-saving services.

Prior to SFAF, Joe served in leadership roles at the CDPH and managed the department's operations and strategic initiatives to advance the city's public health agenda and improve the health of Chicago residents. During his tenure, CDPH was named "Health Department of the Year" and was the first large health department to receive accreditation by the Public Health Accreditation Board. Prior to his work in the public sector, Joe was in executive leadership roles at Chicago's two largest private HIV services providers: as senior vice president at AIDS Foundation of Chicago and as vice president / chief program officer at Howard Brown Health Center.

In 2004, Joe was the founding director of the Broadway Youth Center (BYC) the first center of its kind for LGBTQ youth experiencing homelessness. In 2010, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation named him a Community Health Leader for his leadership in the creation of the BYC.

Joe earned his bachelor's and master's degrees in social work from the University of Illinois at Chicago with a focus in community development, public policy and organizational leadership. He continued his postgraduate education by completing public health independent coursework at DePaul University and is a 2016 fellow of the University of Chicago's Civic Leadership Academy.

Joe comes to the Center - and Southern California - with his husband, Bill, and their two dogs, Thor and Bolt.

Alan Acosta is responsible for spearheading implementation of key elements of the Center’s strategic plan. He also oversees Legal Services, Senior Services and Cultural Arts & Education.

Acosta came to the Center from Stanford University, where he served as Associate Vice President and Director of University Communications. As associate vice president, Acosta was the chief university spokesperson and oversaw the Stanford website, news and media relations, external and internal communications and video production. Acosta also served as a resident fellow at Stanford’s Chicano/Latino theme dorm, Casa Zapata, and worked closely with the senior executive staff on a wide array of strategic management and communications issues.

Prior to his tenure at Stanford, Acosta was the deputy city editor of the Los Angeles Times; during his tenure at the Times, he shared in two Pulitzer Prizes awarded to the staff for coverage of the Los Angeles riots and the Northridge earthquake. He also worked as an editor and reporter at the Orange County Register, the Dallas Times Herald and the Hartford Courant.

Acosta has taught journalism at the University of Southern California and creative nonfiction writing at Stanford. He has co-chaired the board of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and has served on the executive boards of numerous other organizations, including the National Association of Hispanic Journalists, the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists' Association and Kitchen Sisters Productions. He also served on the Center’s board from 1991 to 1996.

Acosta earned a bachelor’s degree in politics from the University of California, Santa Cruz, and received a master’s degree in journalism, with honors, from Columbia University. He lives in Los Angeles with his longtime partner, Tom Gratz.

As Chief Human Resources Officer for the Los Angeles LGBT Center, Sharon is responsible for managing all operations of the Human Resources Department for a staff of nearly 800 employees, including organizational development, strategic planning, recruitment/hiring, benefits administration, personnel policies and organized labor relations. She has worked for the Center since 2007 and also currently serves as the President of the Board of Directors for Christopher Street West Association/LA Pride.

Sharon’s story begins in Louisiana where she grew up in the rural South in a small, one stop light town. Right out of high school she joined the United States Navy Reserves and served with honor while attending the University of Louisiana Monroe. During this time, Sharon began a journey of self-discovery freely expressing her true gender identity. Sharon graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration/Pre-Law.

Her early career included restaurant management, legal services, academia and non-profit. In 1997, she was a City Council candidate for Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, making her the first openly transgender candidate to run for public office in the state. Sharon became a national speaker on transgender rights after being terminated from Fayetteville State University, a historically black university, for being a trans-woman. Sharon was on the leading edge during her speaking engagements at colleges and universities on the importance of including gender identity and gender expression in their anti-discrimination policies.

In 2010, she co-wrote the ground-breaking recommendations for “Model Protocols – Police Interactions with Transgender Individuals” which was later adopted by the Los Angeles Police Department as policy. In 2018, Sharon Co-Chaired the Community Clinic Association of Los Angeles County HR Roundtable. Today, she serves on the Board of LA Pride and participates in LGBTQ competency trainings with various organizations on best practices in navigating change in the workplace, with a specialized focus on helping healthcare organizations improve delivery of services to the LGBTQ community.

Darrel Cummings works closely with senior management to ensure smooth day-to-day operations of the Los Angeles LGBT Center and holds final responsibility for the internal management of the organization. He also plays a leading role in directing the organization's external relations efforts, including its work in public policy advocacy, its participation in significant coalitions, its relationship with other community-based organizations, its private fund-raising initiatives and its efforts to obtain government funding.

Cummings has worked in non-profit organizations for nearly 3 decades and has held numerous paid and volunteer positions in the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community.

From 1993 to 1999, he served as the deputy executive director of the Center and in that capacity served as the senior manager for all programs and related government affairs. During his tenure as deputy executive director, he oversaw the procurement of millions of dollars annually from all branches of government, the development of many new and innovative programs, and overall internal management of the Center's program and policy efforts. Cummings also provided national advocacy leadership related to the HIV/AIDS and social service needs of the LGBT community.

Before joining the Center as chief operations officer in June 2003, Cummings served for two years as deputy executive director for the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and previously held upper-level management positions in several organizations representing the needs and rights of low-income people, women, consumers, and the LGBT community.

Prior to joining the Los Angeles LGBT Center in August 2020, Ricardo DeLeon served as Chief Operating Officer of the Hispanic Scholarship Fund (HSF), the nation’s largest non-profit organization that supports Hispanic Americans pursuing higher education. Prior to HSF, he spent more than 25 years with Procter & Gamble in senior finance positions. Born and raised in Texas, DeLeon received his undergraduate degree from Princeton University and his M.B.A. from Washington University in St. Louis.

He has served on a number of boards primarily of youth-serving nonprofits and spent three years as president of the Association of Latino Princeton Alumni.

Kari is a Los Angeles native whose passion for nonprofit healthcare started more than 25 years ago. She began her career within the Medi-Cal Mental Health division in Orange County, Calif., where she worked as a billing and compliance administrator for eight years. She has since moved on to management positions in the reproductive healthcare and nonprofit healthcare settings for the past 17 years. During her career, she has played integral roles in opening several new health centers, and managed multiple other health facilities as well.

For the two years prior to joining the Center, she worked as a private consultant within the Los Angeles FQHC community. Her focus was on using data to improve operational outcomes and support cultural change. She has presented both locally and nationally on the subject and has helped drive many different organizations to elevate their care and performance.

She has been with the Center since July 2017. Kari is excited to work in a position where her passion for healthcare and furthering the rights of the LGBTQ community intersect. She started as the Director of Health Programs and has since then moved into the role of Co-Director of Health Services.

In her spare time, Kari enjoys volunteering with Jewish Big Brothers and Big Sisters of Los Angeles and riding the big rides at theme parks with her wife, Shelby, and their two teenage daughters.

Terra Russell-Slavin is Director of Policy and Community Building at the Los Angeles LGBT Center, the world’s largest provider of programs and services for LGBT people. She works to advance LGBTQ rights in accordance with the Center's mission to build a world where LGBTQ people thrive as healthy, equal and complete members of society. Terra began her career at the Center in 2006, and was previously the Center’s Lead Staff Attorney in which she was responsible for overseeing the delivery of comprehensive and holistic legal services for LGBTQ survivors of domestic and sexual violence. Terra is also co-chair of the LGBT Subject Matter Committee of the National Taskforce to End Sexual and Domestic Violence and was a leader in the efforts to obtain, as part of the 2013 reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA), the first ever non-discrimination provisions in federal law based on sexual orientation and gender identity. Terra received the Los Angeles County Betty Fisher Award for phenomenal leadership in the field of domestic violence and has been recognized by the National LGBT Bar Association as a Best Attorney Under 40. Terra is a graduate of Pitzer College and Northeastern University School of Law.