The CIBA Board of Directors works hard to provide a sustainable future for our organization by adopting sound, ethical, and legal governance and financial management policies and help ensure that CIBA has adequate resources to advance our Vision, “To preserve, promote, and perpetuate California Indian basketweaving traditions while providing a healthy physical, social, spiritual, and economic environment for basketweavers.”
Starla Madrigal (Cahuilla/Luiseño): Chairperson
Starla Madrigal is Cahuilla and Luiseno from the Pauma Band of Luiseno Indians. At an early age she learned basket weaving from her parents and elders. Her inspiration for weaving comes from her great-great grandmother and her mother. She enjoys basket weaving, cooking traditional foods, learning her language, making pottery, and Bird dancing. Her passion for traditional plant uses lead her to obtain a bachelor’s degree in Botany. She currently teaches traditional plant uses and basket weaving to her local communities. She believes in the importance of passing on cultural knowledge to Native communities and youth.
Cody Walker (Chukchansi): Vice Chairperson
Cody is Chukchansi Yokuts and is honored to be serving on the CIBA Board of Directors. He has been participating in and supporting CIBA events for many years, including the collaboration with the California Indian Museum and Cultural Center to promote basket weaving classes and demonstrations, the Rekindling Culture and Fire Program, and CIBA’s annual summer gatherings and youth basketry gatherings. Cody’s professional work in water quality and watershed management intertwines with the traditional cultural land management important to basketweavers. Access to land that is necessary for gathering quality plants to carry forward the traditions of basketweavers is paramount and it is important to build partnerships that will improve and provide access for basketweavers throughout the state. CIBA has provided wonderful networking and learning opportunities over the years and Cody looks forward to serving on the CIBA Board, and promote the vision to: Honor our ancestors. Preserve and expand our culture. Encourage and teach the youth.
Chrissy Atwell-Valle (Mono, Tachi & Chukchansi Yokut): Treasurer
Chrissy Atwell-Valle is Mono, Tachi & Chukchansi Yokut and is a tribal member from Big Sandy Rancheria. Chrissy is a 5th generation basket weaver being taught by her grandmother Maggie Sample and has been weaving for six years now, completing 32 cradle boards since she became a grandmother. “I had no idea how much my Gram was preparing me for my own grandchildren.” Reflecting and remembering all the basket weaving gathering material outings with her grandmother. Chrissy has a 25-plus year career in the field of Child Development and has worked in multiple Native communities but is most proud of her current role of “Preserving Our History” project for her own tribe at Big Sandy Rancheria. Her greatest blessing is chauffeuring her favorite elders around including Pearl Hutchins seeking basket weaving materials, plants for medicinal use and searching for pounding rocks used by our ancestors in our local community. Chrissy is excited to be a part of the CIBA Board and looks forward to the many ways she can strive for a productive and fruitful year.
Ericka Lopez (Luiseño): Secretary
Ericka Lopez is a Luiseno woman from the Pechanga Band of Luiseno Indians. She graduated from Los Angeles Pacific University with a Bachelor’s degree in Liberal Arts in 2025. She learned to basket weave at a young age and has continued to practice and teach basketry in her community. Learning how to use, gather and process materials to create baskets both big and small. This is Ericka’s second term serving on CIBA and she looks forward to being able to continue to teach and learn about basketry.
Jennifer Malone (Wukchumni)
Jennifer is from the Wukchumni tribe and has been weaving for 25 years, having learned from Beatrice Wilcox, her grandmother who was Master Weaver. Jennifer is active within her tribal community teaching both basket weaving and working on keeping the Wukchumni language alive. Jennifer works with several organizations in her local community, serving as the cultural advisor for Sequoia National Park’s annual, Go Native event. Jennifer is proud to have served on the CIBA Board for over a decade.
Diania Caudell (Luiseño)
Diania is a member of the San Luis Rey Band of Mission Indians. She has served multiple terms on the Board, being first elected in 2001 and has served as CIBA’s Treasurer for over 15 years. Diania works with several San Diego county-based tribes and schools, teaching basketweaving history and workshops. She currently represents CIBA as a member of the Tribal Pesticide Program Council (TPPC), a group which consists of tribal representatives from across the United States who are concerned about pesticides and its uses in Indian.
Delia “Dee” Dominguez (Yowlumne Yokuts/Ventureno Chumash/Kitanemuk)
Dee Dominguez is a past CIBA Board Member from the mid 1990’s. She was successful in bringing the CIBA Conference to the Chumash Interpretive Center in Thousand Oaks in the late 1990’s. Mother, Grandmother, Great Grandmother, Traditional Basketweaver, Traditional and Contemporary Storyteller, Family Tree Researcher. She successfully led a federal lawsuit against the Department of Energy in protecting hundreds of acres of culturally sensitive lands in the mid 1990’s, in Kern County. During her lifetime she has worked with or received training with various human rights organizations such as Center for Race, Poverty and the Environment (CRPE), the Dolores Huerta Foundation, United Farmworkers Union, Cesar Chavez, National Lawyers Guild (Los Angeles). To this day she continues to support human rights organizations such as the rights of the Ukrainians and the Palestinians where she has stood and voiced her concern for their safety and treatment from her views as a California Native Woman. Dee Dominguez continues to provide Yokuts cultural education regarding the Kern River of Bakersfield, for both the Kern River Yokuts and the general public. Currently there is a lawsuit regarding the ‘complete’ removal of the river water from the Kern River bed. The Los Angeles Times environmental writer Ian James interviewed Dee Dominguez and his videographer prepared a video of her speaking at the Kern River. She had told them she would speak from a Yowlumne Yokuts woman’s standpoint only, since her family descends from the river from time immemorial. The video can be seen online at the Los Angeles Times website under environmental issues.
Annalisa Smith (Payómakawish)
Annalisa is Luiseño and Cahuilla from The Pechanga Band Of Indians. She works for her tribes’ cultural resources department as the collections manager where she is able to care for many basket relatives. Her passion for weaving comes from the relationships she carries with traditional plants, medicine, and strong teachers. She is currently working within her community to bring the people together and to share the knowledge of basket weaving, making traditional clothing, dancing, singing, and gathering. Providing open and caring spaces to weave and learn cultural practices is one of her top priorities. She understands “we are stronger when we share; it brings connection and weaves us together.
Ramona Rodriguez (Gabrieliño/Payómkawish)
Ramona Rodriguez is a descendant of the Gabrieliño/Tongva Nation and Payómkawish/Luiseno and traces her lineage to the villages of Jaibepet, Tobpet, and Kaawchama/Wa’aachnga (plenty to eat). In 2023, Ramona began weaving under the tutelage of Master Basketweaver Abraham Sanchez (Purépecha) as part of Cohort 2 of the Tongva Cultural Collective’s Nohaaxre Miyii Pokuu’ (Weaving as One). She attended her first California Indian Basketweavers Association (CIBA) conference in 2024, where she showcased her first basket alongside those of her mother, two younger sisters, and granddaughter. As a descendant of nearly 30 Saint Boniface Indian Industrial School survivors, weaving has been a way for Ramona to (re)connect with the ancestral teachings taken from her ancestors at the Spanish missions and mission boarding school. It provides an avenue of healing intergenerational trauma through the (re)claiming of Indigenous knowledge systems and relationships with her tribal communities. Ramona joined the CIBA Board in 2025 and has spent much of her adult life doing community work for the city of La Puente’s—the Tongva village of ‘Ahwiinga—youth sports program that serves a diverse urban Native population. In this role, she oversaw program logistics and finances, secured funding, and created a lasting infrastructure that ensured the longevity of ‘Ahwiinga’s youth sports program for generations to come. As a CIBA Board Member, Ramona hopes to become even more engaged with the weaving community statewide, learn from fellow weavers across the state, and share knowledge and uplift California Indian basketry practices utilizing traditional practices and material.
Gavin Avila (Payómakawish)
Gavin Avila is Payómkawish from the Pechanga Band of Indians. He works for his tribe in the youth department. Gavin teaches cultural workshops and creates a safe space for younger generations to learn. He has inspired the youth to embrace traditional clothing, songs, dances, weaving, gathering and making traditional tools. Gavin is able to keep the youth excited and wanting to learn their history. He is dedicated to keeping a strong relationship with plant relatives, native people, and always seeks to improve connection and grow.
Hannah Lent (Sʰamala Chumash/Mono Lake Paiute)
Hannah Lent is Sʰamala Chumash from the Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Indians and Mono Lake Paiute of the Bridgeport Indian Colony. She earned her Bachelor’s degree in American Indian Studies from Arizona State University. Growing up deeply rooted in her Sʰamala and Numuu heritage, Hannah spent her childhood singing, dancing, and learning traditional ways that continue to guide her today. Her weaving journey began at a young age and has become a lifelong practice of cultural preservation and storytelling. What Hannah loves most about weaving is gathering and processing the materials an experience that connects her to the land, her ancestors, and her community. This hands-on relationship with nature fuels her advocacy for protecting ancestral gathering sites and ensuring future generations have access to these spaces. Through her work Hannah strives to keep traditional knowledge alive while creating opportunities for cultural continuity.