Chamber of Commerce’s 64th annual ‘Best of Santa Paula’ award winners lauded

This article was originally published by the Santa Paula Times. This is an abbreviated version of their article from their June 3, 2026 issue.

by Peggy Kelly

The Santa Paula Chamber of Commerce gathered with the community on May 14th at the Palazzio Event Center to honor the recipients of its 64th annual “Best of Santa Paula” Awards, celebrating the individuals, businesses, and organizations whose commitment to excellence, service, and community vitality defines what makes Santa Paula exceptional.

The program started with the VFW Mercer-Prieto Post 2043 Color Guard before Mayor Carlos Juarez led the flag salute and Deacon Al Guilin conducted the invocation. Chamber of Commerce Board Chair Elena Brokaw welcomed the crowd and introduced dignitaries including Mayor Carlos Juarez, Vice Mayor Jenny Crosswhite and City Council members Pedro Chavez, Leslie Cornejo and Gaby Ornelas, City Manager Dan Singer, District Attorney Erik Nasarenko, County Clerk-Recorder & Registrar of Voters Michelle Ascencion, Assemblyman Steve Bennett, and chamber board directors, among others.

Brokaw, also the CEO of the Museum of Ventura County, noted that her family has been ranching in the area for about 50 years, and “We are so proud to be a member of the business community for almost half a century. The goal of the Santa Paula Chamber of Commerce is to foster a thriving community by connecting our members to resources, advocating for businesses and promoting economic vitality.” Bennett said of the chamber, “It is the sense of community that you give to Santa Paula with everything that you do. Local businesses are the key and then the chamber is the key to making sure those local businesses work some way together,” for prosperity.

“We also want to congratulate all the recipients this evening of all the awards,” said Mayor Juarez. “Nobody really stands up and does things thinking they’re going to get an award. The motto of Rotary is ‘Service above self.’ These folks being recognized tonight surely didn’t do what they do to be recognized. But they are, and we can offer them gratitude for what they do.”

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Community Service Award recipient Ellen Brokaw has been a Ventura County resident for over 70 years, and co-founded Brokaw Nursery, one of California’s largest subtropical tree nurseries. She has spent decades championing farm worker housing, agricultural advocacy, and community service across the Heritage Valley.

Brokaw noted her close work with City of Santa Paula Community Services Director James Mason and Planner Tom Tarantino on housing creation for farmworkers and others needing affordable housing: “This award recognizes the value of city government and citizens working together to address community needs. And I am honored to receive it.”

Non-Profit of the Year was the Ventura County Community Foundation, which since 1987 has grown into a movement of more than 24,000 donors, granting over $150 million to nonprofits across the region —including organizations in Santa Paula — while championing early childhood education, census equity, and humanitarian relief.

Accepting the award were VCCF Vice President/CFO/COO Bonnie Gilles and Board Member Catherine Sepulveda, who both noted the leadership of VCCF President & CEO Vanessa Bechtel, who was in Sacramento.

Sepulveda said that the award “is also testament to the collective effort of all of us. What we do we do together, we don’t accomplish anything without each other.”

In life, she added, “We all need to lift sometime. Not the lift waiting out there to drive you home, but a different kind,” that ranges from being lifted into the light at birth by the attending physician to continuing to lift others and shed light in their lives.

“And,” said Sepulveda, “from there we’re able to move mountains together.”

Gilles outlined several VCCF programs including the Isabella Project Early Childhood Education Program “that we’re running here in Santa Paula.” VCCF also responds, “In of crisis and we raise money for those in need. And last but not least, we have an incredibly robust scholarship program. This year alone, we granted out more than $2 million dollars to 400 Ventura County students.”

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Citizen of the Year María Antonieta Jiménez was lauded for her quest to channel her own experiences of hardship and discrimination into purpose by founding Poder Popular. Since then, she has dedicated 22 years to educating, organizing, and empowering the Santa Paula community she chose to call home. Poder Popular focuses on educating, organizing and training the community. She has worked tirelessly to promote education, access to resources, and self-empowerment in the belief that all people deserve respect and dignity. Jiménez’s story is one of resilience and commitment, inspiring others to believe that a better future is always possible.

Speaking through translator Lourdes Gonzalez, Jiménez said, “Very humbly and respectfully, I want to thank those of you that have created and made this moment possible. And my community for walking along with me throughout these years. This recognition is not just mine. It belongs to the entire community.”

And, she added, that work was “born out of difficult experiences. Not knowing the language and facing injustices. But I knew that I could have strength, hope and wish that no one goes through the same thing without support. I learned that we are human beings. And that we deserve respect. And that’s why we started on the road to educate, to teach and promote self-love.”

Jiménez related a cooking lesson from her grandmother’s recipe, but the finished product did not taste the same. “It did not taste like hers,” although she used the exact ingredients. “‘You are missing the main ingredient… a teeny bit of love. And I understood that everything we do with love has a deeper and more profound effect.”

With 30 years in local government and 35 years as a Santa Paula resident, Mary Ann Krause has spent a lifetime building a more just and livable community — as City Council member, Mayor, affordable housing champion, and co-founder of Santa Clara Valley Together. Her community activism earned her the chamber’s Sam Edwards Lifetime Achievement Award.

There are people that love a community and those who spend a lifetime building community, Krause has done both. A native of Michigan, Krause and her husband Karl moved to Ventura County in the 1970s, where she put her master’s in urban and regional planning to good use as both professional staff for various cities and elected official in Santa Paula, her home for 35 years. As a city councilwoman and mayor, Krause championed those others too often overlooked and she fought for affordable housing, fiscally responsible decisions and economic development strategies that would lift the whole community. Krause played a pivotal role in trying to prevent the closure of the then Santa Paula Memorial Hospital in the early 2000s and now continues to fight for viable healthcare in the river valley. She was also a leading opponent of the reopening of the wastewater treatment plant that exploded in 2014, and hers and others’ actions led to the Conditional Use Permit being revoked by the county almost 10 years later. She has served on the boards of the Santa Paul Theatre Center, the Rancho Camulos Museum, the Housing Trust Fund and other organizations.

“It’s just so exciting to be in this room,” said Krause. “As I look around there’s so many people that worked together with me and many others on projects that would benefit the community. We forged alliances and coalitions, and it just really has made a difference. I think we’ve been able to do things in this community that other communities would fail at because they just don’t have the ability to work together.”

She gave a “special shout-out” to her son, Peter Krause, “because throughout his childhood, I dragged him to literally scores of public meetings when he would have rather been playing with his toys…and learning way too much about government.”

Karl Krause also received kudos “Because he was the one who urged me to take not the easy path but the riskier job,” of attacking projects that — or would — harm the community.

Krause thanked the chamber for the award, noting, “It means so much because Dr. Sam Edwards was someone that I knew personally,” first meeting when he as head of the Ventura County Medical Center. “And I helped him when he was putting together the new Santa Paula Hospital out of the ashes of Santa Paula Memorial Hospital. So, it’s really meaningful to the granted an award in his name. And I’m just honored that you fit me worthy of his memory.”