As director of Communities, Joaquin Calderon leads First 5 LA’s place-based initiatives to alleviate deep-seated needs affecting prenatal to age 5 children and families in targeted communities across Los Angeles County. In this role, Joaquin oversees the agency’s portfolio of investments to better connect families to resources, to elevate the impact of parent, resident and cross-sector networks, and to explore multifaceted strategies that include housing insecurity, food instability, and equitable access to parks and open spaces. He is a member of the Leadership Team and serves as a thought partner to the Vice President of Community Engagement & Policy.
Committed to creating and fostering spaces where community members can drive social change, Joaquin’s background centers on advocacy and collective action. Upon joining First 5 LA in 2011 as a program officer, he managed grants and contracts that supported community capacity building across the organization’s Best Start Communities. He soon advanced to the role of senior program officer, where he led resident-centered community change initiatives in South Los Angeles. More recently, as the Communities deputy director, Joaquin worked to advance equity-centered strategies across initiatives.
Prior to First 5 LA, Joaquin worked as an organizer and representative with Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers (SEIU UHW), where he represented more than 1,500 members. He later led workforce-development partnerships at the UCLA Labor Center, providing training and technical assistance at a national level. Joaquin also served as adjunct faculty at Los Angeles Trade-Technical College, where he taught collective bargaining.
Joaquin received his bachelor’s degree in political studies from Pitzer College and went on to complete several leadership programs hosted by +Acumen & Omidyar Group, the Interaction Institute for Social Change and others. In 2024, he was selected to join CORO SoCal’s Board Leadership Training Accelerator cohort.
As a longtime resident of Monterey Park, Joaquin continues to serve the community by volunteering for a variety of causes, including Zer0 Debris, Action Civics LA’s Project Soapbox, and more. In his free time, he enjoys playing live Latin percussion, gardening and spending time with his son.
