C.L. Lopez – Biography

C.L. Lopez has been San Bernardino County’s Human Services Communications Officer since 2012, overseeing communications in 8 departments in largest geographic county in United States. Her team has advanced the use of social media, media relations and videography to tell the stories of their agency. 

She has received training in crisis communication from the California Specialized Training Institute California Emergency Management Agency and is a graduate of CAPIO’s J. Lindsey Wolf PIO Institute. Her team has earned CAPIO Award of Excellence, PRSA Polaris and NACo Achievement Awards.

During her journalism career, she wrote for daily newspapers, was the president of the Society of Professional Journalists Inland Chapter, won awards from Associated Press for feature writing and was USC California Endowment Health Journalism Fellow.

She has a B.A. and an M.A. in Public Relations from California Baptist University, where her thesis was "SB CountyStrong: Media Relations in the Aftermath of a Terrorist Attack." This summer, she will begin work as an adjunct professor at California Baptist University where she will teach a course in crisis communications.  ​

Years served: 2013-2014, 2014-2015, 2015-2017

Positions served: 2nd Vice President, President