Member Bios

First District

Robin Jurs

Robin has lived in Sonoma County since her retirement from a 40 year career in Early Childhood Development in 2016.  Over the years, her work with young children brought her into contact with hundreds of families.  It is this investment in family as one of the pillars of our social fabric that makes her want to make law enforcement more accountable to the community it serves.  She cannot imagine being a mother who worries everytime her daughter or son walks out of the house if they will return alive or not.  The death of George Floyd pushed her over the edge at which point she knew she had to take steps herself to work toward better policing policy and practice in her own community and throughout this country.  Robin lives in Oakmont, District 1, where she founded a club called Standing for Justice.  She provides educational forums about racial justice which lead people to civic action.  Her interests take her outside the boundaries of Oakmont and into the Sonoma County community. She feels fortunate to live somewhere that the citizens' voices can make a difference. 

Robin is the 5th of 6 children in her family, grew up in the East Bay (Berkeley) and has stayed in and around the Bay Area most of her life with the exception of 17 years she spent with her young family in New England.  She is a member of an organization based in Los Angeles called White People for Black Lives which educates white people to the role they have played and continue to play in upholding white supremacy as well as leading them into action that can help to dismantle white supremacy. She is a member of the local NAACP and has just allied herself with the Police Accountability Task Force of the North Bay Organizing Project.  She hopes to learn from her tenure on the CAC of IOLERO as well as to make any contributions she may be able to make. 

Nathan Solomon

Mr. Solomon holds a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology and a Master of Science in Computer Information Systems.  In college he was first introduced to the psychology of policing when taking coursework from Craig Haney who conducted the Stanford Prison experiments.   He currently works as a Senior Information Security Analyst for Jackson Family Wines.  Nathan has over 25 years of experience in IT working various roles including founding his own software company.

Nathan is a native of Sonoma county and has lived in Santa Rosa for the past 14 years.   He has a 17 year old son and wife of twenty one years who was raised in Santa Rosa.   Nathan's interest in serving on the Community Advisory Council for IOLERO stems from the Andy Lopez homicide primarily and the recognition that we as a community have to do better. 

Nathan lives in Sonoma County’s first district represented by Supervisor Susan Gorin.

Second District

Tom Rose

Mr. Rose grew up in Southern California and received a Bachelor of Arts degree from California State University Fullerton.  He moved to San Francisco to attend Golden Gate University School of Law, where he earned a Juris Doctorate degree and subsequently became a member of the State Bar of California.

Mr. Rose’s professional career was primarily with a bank affiliated entity in San Francisco. As a Senior Officer, he was the primary interface with internal, Federal Reserve, and National Bank examiners. Mr. Rose recognizes the importance of having reviews by outside oversight entities, such as IOLERO, and the necessity for openness and cooperation between the entity being reviewed and the investigating team. While living in San Francisco, Tom was serving as chair of the Glide Finance Committee when two major achievements were completed: the opening of a Family, Youth & Childcare Center on Ellis St. which provides neighborhood child care, after-school activities, and parental training classes; and the construction of a six story Community House on Taylor St.

Mr. Rose moved to Petaluma in 1999 and is pleased to be appointed to the CAC by Supervisor Rabbitt.

Casey Jones

I’m son of an Air Force pilot veteran of the Second World War. I was raised in Southern Cal and came north to attend UC Berkeley. I graduated from UC Law San Francisco, and practiced business litigation in San Francisco for 10 years. I fled north to find a sane balance between work, marriage, child raising and personal life. I was Assistant City Attorney for the City of Napa for 26 years, retiring at the end of 2022. My practice included advice to and advocacy for city officials and initiatives at all levels. I worked closely with city management and police command staff and line officers in all aspects of law enforcement, including policy development, training, accountability, liability claims, litigation, and trial. I believe that law enforcement is a crucial, complex cornerstone of our self-governance, and that citizen oversight is vital to law enforcement’s health, effectiveness, and responsiveness to the needs of citizens. Since retiring I’m providing legal services to other lawyers part time, continuing to coach high school mock trial as I have for many years, reading, writing, cooking, drinking good beer and wine, and trying to break 70 on the golf course.

Third District

Lorena Barrera

Ms. Barrera attended the University of California, Merced where she received a Bachelor's Degree in Political Science. Following her graduation, she moved to Sonoma County to attend Sonoma State University as a graduate student in the field of Public Administration. In 2016, she received her Master’s Degree.

While in school, Lorena served as a volunteer in various internships in all levels of government. During this time she became aware of the disconnect between people and their representatives and how this disconnect contributes to a lack of understanding in what government does or should be doing for people. Around this time, Lorena began working as a staffer for a member of Congress where she was exposed to policy analysis and became more aware of the loopholes that exist in policy that affect both the public and the public agencies.

As a minority in society, setting an example in the community is of great importance to Ms. Barrera. She believes in informing and educating people in order to strengthen communities. 

As a resident of Sonoma County, Ms. Barrera seeks opportunities that will allow her to serve as a community representative because she cares about making a difference for everyone. Ms. Barrera has served on Sonoma County’s Commission for the Status of Women (CSW) since 2015 where she currently serves as the vice-chair. As a member of the CSW, she served on the CSW’s Mental Health Ad Hoc Committee where she did research on mental health and the stigmas that surround mental health conditions. Ms. Barrera brings to the CAC her experience studying mental health conditions and she will be instrumental in integrating that information into the CAC’s outreach and policy work.  

Ms. Barrera lives in Sonoma County’s third district represented by Supervisor Chris Coursey.

Fourth District

George R. Valenzuela

George was born and raised in East Los Angeles to immigrant parents from Hermosillo, Sonora, Mexico.  As a product of the LAUSD public school system, and as a First Generation College Student, he graduated from U.C. Berkeley (BA-Social Science/Ethnic Studies).

Upon graduation from Cal, George returned to Los Angeles County and worked as an Elementary/Middle School Spanish Bilingual Teacher.  During that time period he married his college sweetheart (Rachel) and their first son was born (Adrian).

In 1996, George and his small family relocated to Windsor, CA.   While George taught elementary school during the day at SRCS, he attended classes at night and graduated from Empire College School of Law (JD) in Santa Rosa, CA.

George was sworn in to the California Bar Association in 2001, and his second and third sons were born thereafter in Santa Rosa. From 2008-2020, George had the honor of serving WUSD as a School Board Member, wherein he served three terms as School Board President.

George has worked as an attorney in the areas of: Asbestos Personal Injury Complex Litigation, Child Support/Family Law, Child Dependency Law (CPS), Human Resources, Education Law (TK-12), Estate Planning and Landlord Tenant Disputes.

In addition to his law background,  George has 11 years of experience as an elementary/middle school teacher in LA County, Sonoma County and Mendocino County.  He also has 18 years of work experience as a school administrator in Sonoma County and Napa County.

George is currently employed as the Principal of Schaefer Charter School (TK-6, Santa Rosa) and he resides in Windsor  with his wife and two adult sons (Jacob and Elias).

Fifth District

Nancy Pemberton

Nancy Pemberton obtained her B.A. degree at San Francisco State University and her J.D. degree at Berkeley Law School (then known as Boalt Hall).  For most of her legal career, she specialized in representing defendants charged with capital crimes and facing possible execution, both as an attorney and mitigation specialist.  Now retired from legal representation, she works part-time writing and editing content for a website used by capital litigators.

As part of her litigation practice, Ms. Pemberton volunteered time to train attorneys and investigators in capital litigation issues, presenting at legal and investigative conferences and seminars throughout the country.  She also taught a clinical course, the Art of Investigation, at Santa Clara University Law School in conjunction with the Law School’s Innocence Project.

In 2000, Ms. Pemberton and a fellow investigator co-founded the Institute for International Criminal Investigations (IICI), an organization that trains professionals in the investigation of human atrocities.  She continues to sit on the IICI board.  She also sat on the board of the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California for many years, including chairing the board for six of those years. 

Having moved to Sonoma County in 2014, Ms. Pemberton became involved in the campaign to pass the Evelyn Cheatham Effective IOLERO Ordinance, also known as Measure P, adopted in November 2020 with the approval of almost 2/3 of the vote.  She now serves on the Committee for Law Enforcement Accountability Now (CLEAN), a group dedicated to ensuring the robust implementation of Measure P. 

Ms. Pemberton is delighted to serve on the Community Advisory Council.  She believes that it is the responsibility of everyone in a democracy to oversee the people in law enforcement to whom they have granted such enormous responsibility and authority; and she aspires to live in a community where law enforcement officers and the people they serve view each other with mutual respect and trust.  She looks forward to doing her part to achieve those goals.

Ms. Pemberton lives in Sonoma County’s Fifth District represented by Supervisor Lynda Hopkins.

At-Large Representative

Darnell Bowen

Darnell Bowen, a twenty plus years Sonoma County resident, is the co-founder of Nuestra Comunidad (NC) a local non-profit organization.  NC’s mission is to enhance the health, safety, and wellbeing of the community with an emphasis towards underserved communities by delivering services to improve the quality of life and fostering a culture of disaster preparedness.  His professional experience encompasses leading the finance, accounting, and human relation functions for organizations ranging from fast growing, private equity backed start-ups to larger Fortune 500 companies.  Darnell pursues the vision of a socially just society by serving organizations that focus on solutions including promoting equitable healthcare for vulnerable communities, providing housing & life skills support for those battling substance abuse, and supporting the work of local churches in the community.  Darnell’s educational background includes an MBA from the University of Arizona and a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from California State University, Fresno. In his leisure time he enjoys spending time with his wife and children, gardening, swimming, and backpacking.