Power & Possibilities Summit 2026

Dr. Marie Cannon is the President and CEO of Community Action Organization of WNY. CAO is a federally designated anti-poverty program providing safety net assistance, senior and youth activities, Early Head Start and Head Start programming, and recovery services through a substance abuse clinic. She is the first woman to lead the organization.

She previously served as Commissioner of the Erie County Department of Social Services. She led the largest department of county government, with a $618 million annual budget and a staff of over 1,600. The department includes Temporary Assistance, Medicaid, SNAP, Day Care, Employment, HEAP, Homeless and Domestic Violence services, Adult and Child Protective Services, Children’s Services, Adoption, Foster Care, Independent Living, a Youth Detention Center, and legal and human resource departments.

She was the first African American to hold this position. Marie has served as Chief Executive Officer for several not-for-profit organizations and has over 34 years of executive management experience in community-based organizations serving vulnerable communities.

Roquel Crutcher is the Director of Strategy, Advocacy and Impact at Common Future, where she advances advocacy and systems change strategies rooted in economic justice. Her career spans public policy, organizational strategy and civic engagement. She currently leads Legacy Lab, an initiative exploring how community-rooted businesses, collective ownership and flexible capital can build community wealth and shift economic power.

Clotilde Perez-Bode Dedecker is an internationally recognized philanthropic leader and foundation consultant who served as President and CEO of the Community Foundation for Greater Buffalo from 2005 to 2022. During her 17-year tenure, she helped grow the foundation’s assets from $150 million to more than $870 million while advancing transformational initiatives such as Say Yes Buffalo, the Greater Buffalo Racial Equity Roundtable, and the WNY Impact Investment Fund, attracting more than $100 million to the region. A respected national voice on philanthropy, civic engagement, and nonprofit governance, she has served on the U.S. Generosity Commission, chaired Candid’s board, and held leadership roles with numerous national and international organizations. Her contributions have earned widespread recognition, including induction into the WNY Business Hall of Fame, the Buffalo Niagara Executive of the Year award, and honors from the Points of Light Foundation, New York State, and the U.S. President. A native of Cuba and naturalized U.S. citizen, she holds degrees from Canisius University and the State University of New York at Buffalo.

Rahwa Ghirmatzion is a grassroots organizer and co-founder of Agency who has spent her career moving power and resources directly into frontline communities. As Executive Director of PUSH Buffalo, she directed hundreds of millions into community-controlled assets: green affordable housing, $90 million in green infrastructure, and the $22 million West Side Homes project, New York’s first net-zero, scattered-site affordable housing development. She supported development of School 77, a $15 million community-owned hub with senior housing and shared public space. Rahwa helped pass the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, securing 35–40% of clean energy funds for disadvantaged communities, ensuring investment builds lasting ownership, not dependency.

Asantewa K. Holley is Chief Operating Officer of Northland Workforce Training Center, where she leads operations and strategic initiatives advancing workforce development and economic opportunity across Western New York. With more than 20 years of experience in finance and operations, she brings expertise in organizational leadership, strategy, and nonprofit management. Holley earned her MBA from the University at Buffalo and completed Harvard Business School’s 2026 Women’s Leadership Forum and Harvard Kennedy School’s Driving Nonprofit Performance & Innovation program. A committed civic leader, she serves on several boards throughout Western New York, reflecting her dedication to strengthening organizations, communities, and opportunities for others.

Cindy Odom is President and CEO of Buffalo Together, Inc., where she advances a deep commitment to people, possibility, and community transformation. For more than 25 years, she has provided executive leadership across nonprofit, philanthropic, and community-serving organizations including New City Kid, the Girl Scouts, Hillside, and the Community Foundation for Greater Buffalo. As founder of Executive Insight Coaching, LLC, Cindy helps leaders grow with confidence, clarity, and purpose. Through her work and service, Cindy remains dedicated to helping people and communities recognize their power, embrace possibility, and move toward a more hopeful future.

Amun Ra serves as Director of Planning and Community Development for People United for Sustainable Housing (PUSH) Buffalo. A lifelong Buffalonian, he cultivated his expertise under the city’s most distinguished leaders, emerging as a community advocate, neighborhood steward, and accomplished entrepreneur. Joining PUSH as a Project Manager in 2019, Amun progressively advanced to his current directorship, where he now spearheads state-funded affordable housing initiatives designed to sustainably revitalize neighborhoods and empower communities. Guided by the enduring words of his late mentor, Stephanie Barber-Geter: “Remain laser-focused Mr. Ra. Do what you do for our elders, community, and the generations yet to come.”

Dariely Rodriguez is Chief Counsel for the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, where she works closely with the President and Executive Director, managers, and staff to provide strategic guidance for litigation and advocacy projects that advance racial justice. Dariely serves on the organization’s Senior Leadership team and plays a key role in supporting synergy and integration across the organization’s practice areas and overseeing the professional development of the organization’s legal staff.

Dariely previously served as the Lawyers’ Committee’s Deputy Chief Counsel and Economic Justice Project Director, where her work focused on combatting discrimination in employment, healthcare, and economic opportunities on behalf of communities of color. In this capacity, she served as plaintiff-side counsel in various impact litigation matters. Dariely regularly co-authors or otherwise significantly contributes to amicus briefs before the Supreme Court and other federal courts.

Dariely currently serves as an adjunct professor at Howard University School of Law’s Civil Rights Clinic. She previously served as a political appointee Chief of Staff in the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs at the U.S. Department of Labor under the Biden Administration. Earlier in her career, she was an Assistant Attorney General in the Civil Rights Bureau in the Office of the Attorney General of New York and worked in private practice focusing on labor and employment issues.

Dariely received her J.D. from Maurice A. Deane School of Law at Hofstra University, where she was the recipient of the Dwight L. Greene full tuition scholarship. She received her B.A. from New York University.