Elizabeth Mendia

Elizabeth Mendia has worked in both administrative and direct service roles in the HIV/AIDS services field for over 18 years, and is a recognized advocate for the provision of services for people living with HIV/AIDS as well as gay and lesbian and other marginalized youth and the transgender community. She is a 10-year employee of the Whittier Rio Hondo AIDS Project (WRHAP) and has served as its executive director since December 2005. WRHAP provides case management, mental health and other services to uninsured people living with HIV/AIDS and operates the Christopher Wahl Youth Center in Whittier. The organization’s direct services programs have been co-located with AHF in Whittier since 1999. In addition to her work with WRHAP, Mendia serves on the board of directors of the Interfaith Food Center and as a member of Whittier and Santa Fe Springs’s Chambers of Commerce, Whittier Time Bank, Transition Whittier, Whittier Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays and Soroptimist International of Whittier. She is the commissioner of the Los Angeles County Commission on HIV and serves on its joint public policy committee. Mendia is open about her status as a person living with HIV/AIDS and a male-to-female transsexual woman. She has been a resident of unincorporated east Whittier for 25 years and a longstanding member of Good Samaritan Metropolitan Community Church.