Our Team
Minerva Ochoa, President
Minerva grew up as a migrant Latino child that followed crops with her father & brother from southern California up to northern California living in shared units with other Latin farm laborers. These first-hand experiences have led her to her passion of helping the needs of the Latino community.
She has worked for the Riverside County Library System for over 38 years at the Coachella, Indio. Cathedral City, Mecca, Palm Desert, Desert Hot Springs, Thousand Palms, La Quinta & Bookmobile branches. She worked with the project Campesino Library Service delivering library materials to laborers in rural area, performing bilingual story times for children over 20 years and coordinating the Día del Niño/Día de los Libros events starting in 1997 with much success.
Minerva has been an officer with REFORMA IE since its inception in 2018 as Secretary, briefly Vice President/President-elect, and currently as President.
Ivan Aguirre, Vice-President
Ivan is a Chicano library professional currently enrolled in SJSU’s MLIS program. He is the Manager of the Norco Library which belongs to the Riverside County Library System. He is also a cohort member of the 2022 California Library Association’s DLCL (Developing Leaders in California Libraries). Ivan graduated from Mt. San Antonio Community College in 2014 and then transferred to SJSU where he graduated with a bachelors in Psychology in 2017. Shortly afterwards he became a research assistant for CSUSB’s CARE team that focused on Community Based Participatory Research (CBPR) in empowering impoverished youth in San Bernardino. From CBPR he began his library career in 2018 at the Glen Avon and the Rancho Cucamonga Libraries. At Glen Avon he was awarded grant funding from the Book to Action Grant to support the Human Rights Alliance for Child Refugees & Families and spread awareness of the immigrant experience.
At the peak of the Covid pandemic he was promoted to Library Manager of the Norco Library where grant funding from the California Humanities organization allowed for a Virtual Diversity Film Festival & Summit to begin the foundation of a BIPOC centered local history archive. Ivan strives to better himself and the community around him by taking the leads set forth by Anti-Racist frameworks and the principles of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. He is proud to serve alongside his fellow officers in the Reforma IE chapter.
Ivan is an officer and serves as the Vice-President of REFORMA IE.
David Rios, Treasurer
David's key responsibilities are developing the Chicanx, Spain, Portugal, and Latin American collections in support of campus programs, development, and promotion of joint local Cultural Heritage initiatives such as Inland Empire Memories and completing projects in support of divisional and Library goals. He holds an M. L. S. from the University of Maryland, College Park. David joined the library in 2001.
David is an officer and has served as Treasurer for REFORMA IE since 2018.
Carmen Sanchez, Secretary
Carmen is a bilingual, first-generation Mexican American mother of two teen-aged boys, and a resident of the Inland Empire since 2008. She holds a Bachelor's Degree in Art History, a Bilingual, Multiple Subject Teaching Credential and a Master’s Degree in Library and Information Science. In her career as a librarian, she has held the position of Children's Librarian and currently oversee the Collection Development Division at the Rancho Cucamonga Public Library. She was drawn to this profession by her love of reading, a desire to serve her community, and her endless curiosity. Carmen also loves travel, photography, her dog and is often reading multiple books at once, one of which is always an audiobook.
Carmen is an officer serving as the Secretary for REFORMA IE.
Daisy Flores, Immediate Past-President
Daisy Flores is a Library Services Manager for Ontario City Library. She oversees the public facing services for the main library including programming, outreach and mobile services, large scale events, and collection development for all ages. She has worked in school, public, and law library settings. Her passion for serving the Latino community led her to Ontario, California. During her time there she has established a weekly bilingual story time, annual Día del Niño/Día del Libro and Día de los Muertos programs, high circulating Spanish collections, and championed for the translation of written promotions.
She was one of the founding members of REFORMA IE and served as President from 2018 - 2020. She currently serves on the chapters’ Executive Committee as the Immediate Past-President and Webmaster.