The Board Room for June 26

Announcements

▪ McCaffrey Homes has awarded its first McCaffrey-Knowlton Scholarship to Fresno State student Joshua Medeiros. The $5,000 scholarship is for students in the school’s Department of Geography and City and Regional Planning. The scholarship was created to support students studying city planning, a field with a direct impact on local quality of life.

▪ Twelve students in Fresno County and neighboring counties have received scholarship awards totaling $17,500. UnitedAg’s scholarships went to: Sandy Rubio of Firebaugh; Candice Lopez, Beatriz Garcia, Nathalie Marie Aceves, Denver Noell, Oscar Garcia-Medina and Venissa Garcia, of Hanford; Marcos Amaro and Sylvia Benitez of Visalia; and Peyton Fernandez of Porterville.

Awards

▪ Spherion Staffing Services, a local recruiting, staffing and workforce solutions provider, honored Fresno franchise owner Glenna Gates with the company’s 2016 Sales Excellence Award.

Donations

▪ Next Generation Philanthropy, a Central Valley Community Foundation partner, has selected Fresno Barrios Unidos, Valley Children’s Healthcare Foundation and Community Food Bank after a competitive grant making process. Each nonprofit will be awarded $8,000.

▪ Patrons of Pismo’s Coastal Grill, Yosemite Ranch and Westwoods BBQ helped raise $107,204 to benefit Poverello House clients coping with hunger and homelessness. The “May Matchup” was established by the Fansler Restaurant Group with the commitment to support the Poverello House “Raise the Roof” capital campaign. Restaurant patrons were invited to submit donations online or to fill out a yellow “smiley face” envelope at their tables. For 31 days, Fansler Restaurant Group agreed to match donations until they raised $100,000. By the end of the month, restaurant diners donated $57,204. The matching Fansler Restaurant Group donation increased the total to $107,204.

▪ Amazon donated $10,000 and six Kindle Fire tablets to the Foundation for Fresno County Public Library to support the Digibus. The foundation was then surprised with a matching donation from Dermody Properties, making the total donations $20,000. These donations are in support of the services provided by the Digibus including free access to Wi-Fi and computer literacy classes in the rural areas of Fresno County that may not have easy and free access.

New Faces

▪ Christine Panelli joined Manco Abbott’s commercial department as a property manager.

▪ Patience Milrod is the new executive director for Central California Legal Services Inc. She has a master’s in public administration from Cornell University and over 35 years of litigation experience.

▪ John G. Barrón will join EYE-Q Vision Care’s practice as a full-time optometrist on June 27. He will primarily practice in EYE-Q’s Selma office and specializes in glasses, contact lenses, computer visual problems and early detection of eye diseases.

▪ Realty Concepts added Parvis Laghaifar, Alyson Jansen, Kathryn Gould and Paul Mantey in the Fresno office.

Promotions

▪ Christopher Staub has been selected to lead the Central California Blood Center as president and chief executive officer, effective Aug. 1. He has more than 30 years of progressive leadership in hospitals and blood centers, with diverse scientific, business and management experience in blood banking and health care. He came to the Central California Blood Center in January 2016 as chief operations officer.

This story was originally published June 25, 2017 at 1:08 PM with the headline "The Board Room for June 26."