Valentin Mendoza

Mr.Valentin Mendoza, born and raised in South Los Angeles to Mexican immigrants, knows firsthand the uncertainty of employment opportunities, the fear of deportation, and homelessness. These vulnerable realities were met with support from local Community-Based Organizations, the community, and the school district. These personal experiences led him to volunteer and eventually developed an entire career within the non-profit sector.

At age 20, Valentin began his non-profit career in 2004 with the Catholic Charities of Los Angeles. Here, he developed an understanding of program design, grant management, and fund development. As a result, he led initiatives to foster cross-sector partnerships with food shelters to establish local food pantries, mainly serving individuals who would not otherwise have access to basic needs like food. He also engaged with local colleges and universities to coordinate tutoring opportunities for college students to support local youth. Valentin continued his desire to support education advocacy as the Site Coordinator for an after-school program led by the Youth Policy Institute at Camino Nuevo Charter Academy. His leadership role engaging school administration to develop a co-sponsored Advisory Board, comprised of students and parents, proved to be a critical approach to establishing rapport between learning institutions and community members. This experience enabled him to develop professional development workshops on facilitating cross-sectoral partnerships to meet local youth and community needs.

Valentin’s non-profit management experienced continued to expand into data management and compliance. He assessed and monitored data to ensure Key Performance Indicators (KPI’s) were compliant for over 50 schools’ sites and 110 after-school service grants. Given his understanding of grant management, data management, and reporting, he created an original comprehensive data system to meet all needs of the program department. In 2011, the agency capitalized on his technical skills and data-driven expertise to develop and implement an agency-wide longitudinal data system. This comprehensive data system is recognized— nationally and internationally—for its ability to report on multi-service, multi-tiered, multi-million dollar grants and data management. Valentin’s contribution to this architecture set the critical foundation to pursue one of the first Obama Administration’s signature anti-poverty initiatives, Promise Neighborhoods — modeled after The Harlem Children’s Zone in New York. As a result, this comprehensive data system enabled the agency to adequately monitor data for over 100,000 unduplicated youth and over 30,000 adult participants in the Los Angeles Promise Neighborhood (LAPN) service areas of Hollywood and Pacoima in the San Fernando Valley. This longitudinal data architecture continues to be seen as a data model and informs other non-profit organizations to visualize and implement critical data repositories across the country.

In 2019, Valentin joined the Skid Row Housing Trust, bringing almost two decades of non-profit service and management experience, including ten years of data collection, technical development of information systems, and critical evaluation in reporting and compliance. As the VP of Data Analytics and Compliance, he provides vital information for monitoring program operation and compliance and positive outcomes to address the needs of the agency’s target population.

He resides in Whittier with his partner, three young daughters, and their dog Oliver.