CA for the Arts is thrilled to announce the appointment of Sam Bempong as the Bay Area Regional Program Manager (RPM), a new pilot position created to build a robust, community-driven arts advocacy infrastructure across the nine-county Bay Area. 

Sam is an East Bay native, a producer, a community organizer, and a builder of the kind of coalitions that change public policy. As co-founder and co-director of #MakeItBay, she helped secure the Oakland Film Rebate—generating $26 million in regional production spending within four months—and co-led the Out-of-Zone Coalition, mobilizing more than 40 statewide organizations to advance AB 1138 and expand geographic equity in California’s Film & TV Tax Credit. She has testified before the Oakland City Council, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, and state legislative committees. She knows this region’s political landscape intimately, and she knows the artists and cultural workers who make it come alive.

This RPM position is a pilot role—a first for CA for the Arts—and is supported by a grant from the Kenneth Rainin Foundation. Its creation addresses a long-standing need within California's arts and culture sector: connecting resilient, community-led advocacy infrastructure at the regional level to the work at the state and federal level. The core mission of the RPM pilot in a state as large and diverse as California is two-fold: to build systems that engage grassroots advocates and to share public policies in development before they become law. This process ensures that policies are informed by the people they impact most. Furthermore, it holds elected officials accountable to their constituents and involves the arts and cultural communities in advocating for the conditions necessary for them to thrive.

Working with Program Consultant Lead Ted Russell and under the supervision of Tracy Hudak, Director of Policy and Advocacy, Sam will also co-administer the Grassroots Artists Advocacy Program (GAAP), a nine-month paid fellowship that serves Oakland and San Francisco artists and culture bearers. Beyond GAAP, she will work across the Bay Area’s nine counties—Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Napa, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Solano, and Sonoma—listening, convening, and identifying the networks and tools that artists, culture bearers, cultural workers and arts organizations across the region need to show up powerfully in the political process.

“Sam is that rare organizer who combines deep Bay Area roots, a track record of real policy wins, and the ability to form genuine relationships with the arts, culture and creative economy communities we serve,” said Tracy Hudak, CA for the Arts Director of Policy and Advocacy.  “I’m excited to work alongside her and Ted Russell to support the kind of regional advocacy infrastructure that the arts across all nine counties deserve—and to pilot a model that we hope will inspire regions across the state.”

“Sam Bempong brings exactly the combination of deep community roots, policy expertise, and advocacy know-how that this pioneering role demands,” said Julie Baker, CEO of CA for the Arts. “Her work building the #MakeItBay movement and securing real policy wins for Bay Area creators demonstrates that she understands how to turn community power into systemic change. We are thrilled to welcome her as our first Regional Program Manager and to extend CA for the Arts’ reach into local advocacy across the nine-county region.”

We are grateful to the Kenneth Rainin Foundation for its continued investment in this work. Their support has made GAAP possible since its launch in 2024, and this new program—embedding regional capacity on the ground across the Bay Area—represents a meaningful expansion of what that partnership can achieve.

Please join us in welcoming Sam to the CA for the Arts team. We look forward to the relationships she will build, advocates she will activate, and wins she will help bring home for Bay Area artists and culture.

About Sam Bempong

Sam Bempong is a dynamic producer, community organizer, and proud East Bay native. As the founder of Mindful Media, an impact-driven production and consultancy studio, she is passionate about using media to create positive change. Sam is best known for her in-house production work with Dreams With Friends, the visionary production company of Rafael Casal and Daveed Diggs. A founding member of the East Bay Film Collective, she also co-directs the #MakeItBay initiative—a powerful movement that uplifts the Bay Area’s cultural economy. With her heart set on bringing her talents home to the Bay, Sam is excited to help revitalize the artistic ecosystem that shaped her, with a vision to nourish the community and see it thrive for generations to come.

If you’d like to connect with Sam, share what’s happening in your corner of the Bay, or just say hello, she’d love to hear from you — reach her directly at sam@caforthearts.org.