About
Acción Mutua is a capacity building assistance (CBA) program of AIDS Project Los Angeles (APLA) in collaboration with the César E. Chávez Institute (CCI) of San Francisco State University, funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
APLA has provided high quality research and capacity building services in partnership with community-based organizations, governmental agencies, and universities since 1994. The members of CCI have extensive experience conducting community based research and providing technical assistance to community-based organizations providing HIV prevention services.
Acción
Mutua works to enhance the programmatic capacity of community-based organziations and health departments funded directly or indirectly by the CDC to implement Diffusion of Effective Behavioral Interventions (DEBI) or provide other HIV prevention services under the Advancing HIV Prevention Initiative to Latino communities in the Western region of the United States.
Acción Mutua has provided capacity building services to community-based organizations and health departments that are implementing effective behavioral interventions for Latinos in the Western region within the United State since 2004.
Acción Mutua Team
Click each name to view bio
- George Ayala PsyD, Director, Health Promotion, Community Research & Capacity Building
- Benjamin D. Perkins, MA, MDiv, Associate Director, Capacity Building & Community-Based Research
- Miguel Chión M.D., M.P.H., Program Manager
- Homero del Pino Ph.D., Capacity Building Specialist
- Claudia Rodríguez, M.F.A., Capacity Building Specialist
- Mónica Nuño, Capacity Building Specialist
- Oscar Marquez, Capacity Building Specialist
César E. Chávez
Institute
- Rafael Díaz Ph.D., Director of the César E. Chávez Institute
- Kurt Schroeder M.B.A., CBA Prevention Specialist
- Diane Burkholder, Capacity Building Research Assistant
BIOS
George Ayala
Dr. George Ayala is the Director of Health Promotion, Community Research & Capacity Building at AIDS Project Los Angeles, a position he assumed in 2002. Dr. Ayala oversees the development and implementation of nationally coordinated and locally driven prevention, education and evaluation activities at the agency.
As a nationally recognized prevention expert, Ayala is a resource to several universities and national prevention efforts. In his role at APLA, he worked with the National Alliance of State and Territorial AIDS Directors to develop policy recommendations for AIDS directors concerned about the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Latino communities within their states or local jurisdictions. Ayala has also served as a consultant to the National Institutes of Health, where he conducted a quality assurance audit of an HIV prevention research project in six countries: China, India, Peru, Russia, Uganda and Zimbabwe.
Ayala has worked as a researcher for the University of California Los Angeles’ Center for Community Health and University of California San Francisco’s Center for AIDS Prevention Studies. He is currently the Principal Investigator on a project studying technology transfer processes with Latino community-based organizations and the Co-Principal Investigator of a CDC-funded, three-city epidemiologic study of black and Latino men who have sex with men.
From 1999 to 2000, he served as a Deputy Director at the Los Angeles County Department of Health Services, Office of AIDS Programs and Policy (OAPP). At OAPP, Ayala managed the overall operations of the office, including administration of program funds totaling over $80 million. Ayala earned his master’s and doctorate degrees in clinical psychology at Rutgers University and undergraduate degree at Cornell University.
Benjamin Perkins
Benjamin Perkins is the Associate Director of Capacity Building and Community-Based Research for AIDS Project Los Angeles, where he oversees a CDC-funded capacity-building-assistance cooperative agreement as well as several community-based research projects focusing on his primary research interests: HIV-prevention, social/sexual networks, social discrimination among gay and bisexual MSM of color.
Benjamin has extensive experience in community-based research settings, most significantly serving as co-Principal Investigator for a CDC-funded adaptation research project, 04064 (Supplemental), Adopting and Demonstrating the Adaptation of Prevention Techniques, which examined the adaptation of the Effective Behavioral Intervention (EBI) Community PROMISE for HIV-seropositive African-American MSM in Boston.
Benjamin has a B.A. in Geography from the University of California at Los Angeles, an M.A. in Clinical Psychology from Antioch University at Los Angeles, and a M.Div. from the Harvard University Divinity School.
Miguel Chion
Miguel A. Chion, M.D., M.P.H. is the Program Manager of AIDS Project Los Angeles’ Capacity Building Program, Acción Mutua. Funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Acción Mutua targets agencies that provide HIV prevention for Latinos in Western region of USA. He earned his M.D. in Peru and his M.P.H. at the University of California Los Angeles. He has more than 12 years of experience working in the HIV/AIDS/STD field. His primary interests include Latinos and HIV, evaluation, capacity building and the use of new technologies in health education. He is currently a member of the American Public Health Association and American Evaluation Association.
Homero del Pino
Homero E. del Pino was born and raised in Paterson, NJ and lived for a short time in Ecuador. He received his B.A. at Cornell University and Ph.D. at UCLA, both in Philosophy. His research focused on practical knowledge, action, and weakness of the will. He started working at AIDS Project Los Angeles in 2004 as the Program Coordinator for the HIV+ Peer Support Program. He is currently a Capacity Building Specialist with the Acción Mutua team and focuses primarily on trainings and curriculum development. In addition, he is a Master Trainer for Safety Counts. Previously he worked at the Fulfillment Fund, a nonprofit organization dedicated to working with high school students, and he taught high school in Paterson, NJ.
Claudia Rodriguez
Claudia Rodriguez is a capacity building assistance (CBA) specialist of AIDS Project Los Angeles’ CBA program, Acción Mutua. She received her Masters in Fine Arts at The California Institute of the Arts in 2002 and has taught at the Chicano/a Studies Department at Loyola Marymount University and at the UCLA César E. Chavez Department of Chicano/a Studies. Through her years of in working in the HIV/AIDS she has gained expertise in curriculum development, evaluation (process and outcome), and data analysis. She has been working at APLA since 2006. As member of Acción Mutua, Claudia conducts capacity building trainings, providing technical consultations, and develops educational materials. Claudia has successfully completed the mentorship program to become Master Trainer for the Safety Counts intervention
Monica Nuño
Monica Nuño has worked in the public health field for over 17 years and specifically in HIV/AIDS for the past 11 years. Ms. Nuño currently works as a Capacity Building Assistance Specialist in AIDS Project Los Angeles’ capacity building program, Acción Mutua where she serves as lead for the Recruitment and Retention training.
Employed with APLA since 2002, she previously worked on the UARP-funded Technology Transfer study and co-authored and designed the layout for the NASTAD-funded policy document on Latinos and HIV/AIDS nationally released in July 2003. Prior to coming to APLA, Ms. Nuño worked for the Los Angeles County Health Department, Office of AIDS Programs and Policy where she served as a program assistant to both the Commission on HIV Health Services and the HIV Prevention Planning Committee which are the Ryan White CARE and Prevention community planning bodies, respectively.
Oscar Marquez
Oscar Márquez has been volunteering and working in the HIV field for more than 7 years combined. Before coming to AIDS Project Los Angeles, he worked for four years at another community based organization where he successfully implemented Prevention Case Management (CRCS), HIV testing and counseling, Group Level Interventions, Individual Level Interventions, and Outreach and Recruitment. At APLA, he is a Capacity Building Specialist and also coordinates the HIV Peer Support Program. These programs provide capacity building trainings to agencies funded directly or indirectly by the CDC in the western region of the United States.
