Tracy Hernandez

New California Coalition Co-Founder & Chief Executive Officer

Tracy Hernandez is a nationally recognized business leader, entrepreneur, media executive, strategist, and coalition builder who unites diverse stakeholders to drive practical solutions for California’s most pressing challenges.

Tracy Hernandez is a nationally recognized business leader, strategist, and coalition builder who has spent her career uniting diverse stakeholders to drive practical solutions for California’s most pressing challenges.

As Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of the New California Coalition (NCC), Tracy leads a growing, nonpartisan movement representing more than 1,000 business organizations and over 9 million centrist voters statewide. Under her leadership, NCC convenes business, civic, and regional leaders to advance data-driven solutions focused on housing, homelessness, middle-income job creation, and reliable water and energy infrastructure. Tracy also leads the New California Coalition Foundation (NCCF) and New California Coalition Political Action Committee (NCCPAC), aligning policy research and development, public engagement, and political strategy to advance NCC’s mission statewide.

Previously, as the Founding Chief Executive Officer of the Los Angeles County Business Federation (BizFed), Tracy built one of California’s most influential business advocacy organizations—a powerful “network of networks” representing more than 250 business groups, 420,000 businesses, and 5 million employees. Under her leadership, BizFed drove impactful policy advocacy, economic growth, and stronger collaboration between employers and policymakers across the region.

Through her leadership of BizFed, Tracy also expanded the organization’s reach and long-term impact by establishing several affiliated initiatives, including BizFed Central Valley, which united more than 80 additional business groups to strengthen regional influence in statewide policy discussions. She further advanced BizFed’s mission by launching the BizFed Institute to support research, civic engagement, and policy education, and creating the BizFed PAC to support pro-growth leadership across all 88 cities in Los Angeles County.

In addition, Tracy serves as President of IMPOWER Group, Inc., a strategic advisory firm focused on guiding startups and organizations through growth and transformation. Earlier in her career, she made history as the first female CEO and Publisher of the Los Angeles Daily News and led multiple award-winning media organizations through a period of major industry disruption, including mergers, acquisitions, and a successful IPO on the New York Stock Exchange.

A sought-after speaker and thought leader, Tracy regularly lectures at leading institutions including USC, UCLA, UC Berkeley, UC Davis, and Cal Poly Pomona. Additionally, she is a frequent keynote presenter at major business, civic, and international forums.

Her leadership has earned numerous honors, including recognition among the Los Angeles Business Journal’s 500 Most Influential Leaders, as well as the CORO Crystal Eagle Award, Star of the Valley Award, and Mujer del Año Award. She has also served on numerous boards, including Think Together, USC Crosstown, Woodbury University, MEND Anti-Poverty Agency, Valley Presbyterian Hospital, the Long Beach Symphony, and the Los Angeles Police Department Foundation.

Back to leadership

Change Is Possible

The New California Coalition is the non-partisan political home and voice for over 6.5 million “Common Sense” voters across California

We want results, and we are mobilizing to achieve them. The New California Coalition is organizing everyday voters, business leaders, and community organizations from across the state into a movement to demand change and action.

We want a massive amount of housing built to make homes accessible to buyers, renters, and the unhoused alike, not more excuses, red tape, and NIMBYism.

We want safe streets and communities instead of finger pointing, victim blaming, or hiding inaction behind empty and dangerous slogans.

We want clean and healthy public spaces that we can pass down to the next generation rather than complaining about or denying the damage being done. We want to build financial security through good paying jobs rather than blocking the industries that can transform our society and balloon the middle class.

We can have all of this and more if we organize for it now.

We are Californians from all different backgrounds – from business to workers, from disenchanted political organizers to unaffiliated and disaffected voters. We are ready to solve the most pressing challenges facing our state, but our first step is to create a political voice for this army of Common Sense Californians.

Common-sense

California's biggest challenges

Housing

Since 1980, housing construction has stalled in California but our population has exploded. Home buying is out of reach and rents are going up every year. We must ramp up home building to meet the needs of residents and bring down the cost of living.

200,000 built
2.5 million homes

Homelessness

California accounts for 28% of the country’s entire homeless population and more than 50% of the unsheltered homeless individuals. The homeless population in the Bay Area has grown four times faster than the overall regional population since 2010.

200,000 built
2.5 million homes

Crime

The homicide rate rate for some of California’s largest cities – Los Angeles, Oakland, San Diego, and San Francisco – increased by about 17% in 2021; and none of these even approach the overall per capita crime rates of places like Stockton, San Bernardino, Compton, and Richmond. Californians across the state report feeling unsafe as one of their biggest concerns and reasons why the Golden State is becoming increasingly unlivable.

Drought

Every year we see fires spread larger and watering restrictions become more severe, but the response to address climate change and resource consumption remains single minded and half hearted: consume less gas and use less water. California cannot survive without better water management and climate mitigation. From desalination to clean energy sources like solar, wind, green hydrogen, biomass, or geothermal – there are common sense solutions that already exist if our leaders invested in building rather than political jockeying and finger pointing.

Follow our movement

News

Bear Essentials March 13th: Everyone wants a piece
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Bear Essentials March 6th: Welcome to the Future
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Bear Essentials February 27th: Mind the Gap!
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