CAMEO is celebrating our 20th Anniversary at our Annual Meeting on June 17th in Sacramento! This year, we’re taking the opportunity to honor our founders, including Sheilah Rogers. Visit the 20th Anniversary page for this years agenda and more information on other speakers and award recipients.
Sheilah Rogers is a pioneer in international and domestic microenterprise development. As a Peace Corps volunteer, she worked with rural women in Ecuador to build a marketing cooperative that recognized their artistic talents and established new domestic and international markets for their artisan products.
Sheilah is the founding CEO of West Company in Mendocino County, one of the first domestic microenterprise development organizations that focused on low- income women’s economic challenges and their paths to social and economic well-being.
As the leader of West Company, she participated in national initiatives to achieve best practices to bring disenfranchised women into the economy and to advocate for public policies that support their entrepreneurship. She counts 30 years of leadership and advocacy for microenterprise as the sustainable economic development strategy for rural economies.
She is a founder and former board member of CAMEO, the California Association for MicroEnterprise Opportunity and AEO, the Association for Enterprise Opportunity. Sheilah holds a Masters Degree in International Development from the School for International Training in Brattleboro, Vermont.
In retirement, Sheilah has focused on one of the Six Targets of Opportunity for economic growth on the North Coast – Specialty Agriculture, Food and Beverage including producers, value added manufacturers, distributors, local vendors. She currently serves on the Mendocino County Food Policy Council, the North Coast Regional Food Systems Network and the Mendocino College Culinary Arts Advisory Committee. Each of these efforts is working to build a sustainable local food system that reduces hunger, increases healthy eating and expands economic vitality.