President and CEO

 Having served in the communities of West Town and Humboldt Park since the beginning of her career, Ann has long worked to ensure that the needs of the area's residents are met. As President of Casa Central, Ms. Alvarez’s leadership has cultivated a strong growth period for the agency, whose programs and resources have nearly tripled during the past twenty years to further address the growing and changing needs of Chicago’s Hispanic community.  Today, Casa Central is the largest Hispanic social service agency in the Midwest and reaches over 20,000 individuals a year. Ms. Alvarez led the agency through the establishment of programs for homeless families, the significant expansion of services for children and elderly, and played a key role in establishing a collaboration of ten agencies to develop a comprehensive youth program in the neighborhood. In 1997 Ms. Alvarez led Casa Central through agency-wide accreditation by the Council on Accreditation and has maintained the organization’s accreditation since then. As President and CEO of the organization, Ann has been a strong advocate for the needs of Latinos in Illinois. She has worked closely with the Latino Policy Forum around advocacy for early childhood programs. Ms. Alvarez has also worked closely with Maldef and the Latino Policy Forum as a participant in the Illinois Latino Agenda, a collaborative effort among Latino organizations committed to securing equitable resources and investment for Latinos.  

Mrs. Alvarez has been widely recognized for her leadership and dedication to the agency and community. In May of 2002, she was among seven Chicagoans who garnered the highly coveted and prestigious NBC Jefferson Award; later that year, she received St. Augustine College’s El Puente Award for Community Leadership. In April of 2003, Mrs. Alvarez appeared in Hispanic Business Magazine as one of the national publication’s 80 Elite Hispanic Women, one of only four women selected for this honor from the nonprofit sector. In September of 2003, she received both the Vaseline Intensive Care Community Service Award at the 2003 Tesoro Awards and the Illinois State Treasurer’s Excellence in Community Leadership Award. In June 2004, Crain’s Chicago Business highlighted Ann among Chicago’s 100 Most Influential Women. In 2008 Ann was honored as the recipient of the Celeste Peña Community Service Award. In February of 2010 Ann Alvarez received the Award for Excellence in Public Service by the City Club of Chicago and, most recently, she received Maldef’s Lifetime Achievement Award in June of 2010.