Meet the Staff
Land & Health Director
Email: maya@ocej.org
Maya Cheav joined OCEJ in 2022. She graduated from Chapman University with a BS in Environmental Science and Policy and a minor in English with a creative writing emphasis. She grew up in Long Beach, CA, an environmental justice community and one of the most diverse cities in the United States. Seeing her home affected by the pollution caused by the Port of Long Beach and the freeways that transport goods there, she aims to advocate for and empower these kinds of marginalized communities of racial minorities and lower socioeconomic statuses. In her free time, Maya likes to write poetry and screenplays, make jewelry and crafts out of clay, and play music.
Youth & Education Director
Email: sydney@ocej.org
Sydney Cheung (she/they) is OCEJ's Youth and Education Director. She grew up in the San Gabriel Valley and studied Environmental Science and Policy at Chapman University. She has a background in community organizing in Los Angeles and is passionate about working with youth in the climate justice movement. Her vision and goal is to improve political education within youth and Asian American communities and to empower folks to get involved in social justice movements!
Finance Director
Email: Erica@ocej.org
Erica Gonzalez is a Xicana Santanera who has been grassroots organizing for over 10 years; she is an activist curandera reclaiming her indigenous roots through healing, raising awareness and uplifting her community. She started in 2013 by creating a body positive space for femmes and LGBTQA+ individuals in the form of group workouts that she hosted in her backyard or local parks, and has continued to support marginalized communities to the best of her ability. As a result of the first Trump administration, she joined Chicanxs Unidxs in 2018 and began raising awareness and helping to bring resources to some of Santana’s most vulnerable and underserved areas. She has been a part of several successful political grassroots campaigns and was also a part of the Bernie Sanders campaign in 2019. She began working as a volunteer with OCEJ in 2020, joined the staff in 2023 and is currently serving as their Finance and Logistics Director. In addition to her grassroots experience, Erica worked with the SAUSD after school program for 5 years and continues to work with youth. She has also served on the Delhi NA leadership team since 2020 and is a member of GreenMPNA’s CUAL committee, which focuses on protecting residents along the Industrial Standard Corridor.
Water Justice Director
Email: jocelyn@ocej.org
Jocelyn Sanchez (They/Them) joined our organization as Field Team Coordinator in 2024. They grew up in the Inland Empire and experienced the change from agricultural farmland to industrial warehouses, which deeply impacted air quality and economic opportunities in the community. This understanding transformed into a passion for environmental and social justice, particularly with an emphasis on community outreach, coalition building, and data analysis. Jocelyn’s involvement with OCEJ began as a student in the organization’s Environmental Justice Organizing Academy (EJOA) and as a canvasser, working on various campaigns both environmental and with values aligned candidates. Prior to their involvement with OCEJ, Jocelyn graduated from the University of California, Irvine with a Bachelors of Arts in Urban Studies and Psychological Science, with a specialization in Geographic Information Systems. Jocelyn also brings experience in data analysis, mapmaking, and community outreach.
Contact us
Please email our staff based on the campaigns you're interested in learning more about. If you have any general questions or inquiries, our staff will redirect your message to the best person available.
Meet the Advisory Board
Julie Vo
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​Julie currently serves as Chief of Staff at OC Action, an AAPI-Latinx-Labor-Environmental Justice Alliance committed to the long-term progressive transformation of Orange County through increased quality, scale and effectiveness of community organizing and integrated voter engagement in low-income communities of color. Previously, she served as Policy Director with the Orange County Asian & Pacific Islander Community Alliance (OCAPICA) and Director of Development at a network of environmental justice-oriented green schools in Los Angeles.
She currently serves on the Board of the Vietnamese American Arts & Letters Association (VAALA), and Steering Committee of the California Healthy Nail Salon Collaborative and organizes within a national network of Vietnamese movement builders. Julie is committed to developing powerful youth, promoting artistic expression as a way to nurture community, and building strategies for change within communities of color. She has taught at the National Academy of Social Sciences in Vietnam, and was awarded Best Advocacy Voice by New America Media (NAM). Julie holds a B.A. in Sociology and Asian American Studies and a minor in Education from UCLA.
Rebecca Robles​
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Rebecca Robles is a member of the Acjachemen Nation. She is the mother of three sons, five grandsons, and one granddaughter. She graduated from Northern Arizona University with a B.A. in Business Management. She is also an accomplished health
care provider with more than 30 years worked as a Registered Nurse. She has worked for 10 years in Indian Health Service on reservations in Arizona. Rebecca recognizes that the preservation of sacred places is critical to the cultural, spiritual,
and contemporary survival of Indigenous people of the land. She and her family continue to work on the preservation and protection of sacred sites initiated by her mother the late Lillian Robles. Each year the family hosts “Ancestor Walk “ a
pilgrimage to several sacred sites along the southern California coast. Rebecca has worked extensively with preservationists, social justice groups, community groups and tribal groups to protect sacred lands and open space. Rebecca’s vision is to
promote greater understanding and respect of Indigenous people of California, our history and the ongoing relationships with our homelands. Her goal is to promote healing of communities through decolonization and environmental justice as we move forward preparing for coming generations.
Patricia Flores​ Yrarrazaval
Patricia Flores Yrarrazaval, Advisory Board Member, and former Executive Director at OCEJ has been a has been a grassroots organizer for 10+ years and currently works as an Associate Director at American Rivers. While at OCEJ, she worked to advance OCEJ's campaigns to end soil, air, and water contamination in low-income communities of color and restore Indigenous environmental custodianship and sovereignty. Patricia began organizing as a student at UC Berkeley, where she worked to bring student power to bear in support of campus labor organizing and the local prison abolition movement; after graduating, she returned to Santa Ana, where she organized with Colectivo Tonantzin to fight wage theft and defend the rights of day laborers and domestic workers in Orange County, in addition to organizing alongside Acjachemen and Tongva activists to Protect Puvungna and other sacred sites across the region. In all her work, Patricia is dedicated to building bridges between local Indigenous communities and communities of color in defense of the water, land, and air that we all call home.
Connie McGuire​
Connie McGuire, PhD, Advisory Board Member, is Director of Community Relationships with the Community-based Research Initiative of the Newkirk Center for Science & Society at the University of California, Irvine. She works on Research Justice oriented projects in a variety of settings including in the struggle for Environmental Justice. She is a cultural anthropologist and a Latin Americanist by training and teaches community based participatory research methods course in UCI's undergraduate Community Engagement Minor. Connie has trained in and works as a coach and guide in several mindfulness-based practices including yoga, meditation and Hakomi, a mindfulness-based, somatic method for assisted self-study.
Dyana Pena
Dyana Peña, advisory board chair, was born, raised, and resides in Lynwood, CA, and works at Orange County Coastkeeper. She is a first-generation daughter of Mexican immigrants and a lifelong environmentalist whose respect and love for our world grew from a young age thanks to her parents. (Hi, mom and dad!) Through some hard work and luck, Dyana has dedicated her entire ten-year career to protecting the environment, specifically clean water, through program management, outreach, fundraising, and implementation. She comes to OCEJ with gratitude and excitement to be a part of an organization that aligns so deeply with her values, not just in protecting our environment but in doing so respectfully and inclusively.
Barry Lee
Barry Lee (he/him) is an environmental and land use attorney based in Orange County. He previously worked as staff attorney for a local environmental non-profit before his current role as an attorney for the California Environmental Protection Agency. As a first generation immigrant, he aims to promote opportunity and equity through environmentalism for our diverse community
