Natalie Salazar
Director, Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department
Ms. Salazar is the Director of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department’s "Community/Law Enforcement Partnership Programs" (CLEPP), an innovative effort to involve the community in the implementation, development, and identification, of proactive community responses to gang, drug, and violence problems, and training residents and Sheriff’s personnel in their implementation. Prior to this assignment, Ms. Salazar served as the Executive Director of the Community Reclamation Project. A federally funded pilot program creating community responses to emerging gang and drug areas. She has co-authored a training manual titled, "Rising Above Gang and Drugs: How to Start a Community Reclamation Project."
Her twenty-five years in the field have included a two-year appointment by California’s former Governor George Deukmejian to serve as the Executive Assistant to the Director of the Governor’s Office of Criminal Justice Planning, staffing the California Council on Criminal Justice’s State Task Force on Gangs and Drugs, and the State Task Force on Victims Rights. She also served as the Executive Assistant to the Director of the Los Angeles Community Youth Gang Services Project, as the law enforcement liaison.
Ms. Salazar is involved in several community activities and correctional organizations. She is currently an instructor on "Reclaiming Your Community: Practical Strategies for Mobilization," for the federal Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention’s Gang and Drug Policy Course. She holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Criminal Justice.