The Change Makers class of 2025 gathers last year. The Sacramento Bee and Nehemiah Emerging Leaders Program have big plans for revealing this year’s honorees.
JOSÉ LUIS VILLEGAS
jvillegas@sacbee.com
Get ready, Sacramento. Change is in the air.
As in Change Makers, our annual Sacramento Bee partnership with Nehemiah Leaders Programs to spotlight 60 innovative and diverse people who are shifting our region’s landscape when it comes to the economy, public advocacy and more.
We’ll begin revealing our 2026 honorees starting Wednesday, Aug. 19, by publishing stories about each of them on sacbee.com and in our app, eventually profiling all 60 in the run-up to an October gala honoring them.
We’ll also promote this inspirational journalism in our email newsletters, on social media and on a special Change Makers webpage. And come October, we’ll distribute a keepsake, glossy magazine that collects these stories for our print subscribers and others.
Our fourth Change Makers gala for honorees, their families, friends, co-workers and the public is set for 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Oct. 13, at the Sheraton Grand hotel in downtown Sacramento. Tickets are available at sacramentochangemakers.com.
Since the program’s inception in 2023, we’ve honored nearly 200 Change Makers throughout Sacramento, its suburbs and neighboring counties through our partnership with Nehemiah.
“Change Makers push the boundaries, foster community and lead with dedication,” we said in those early days. “They care for their community and strive to transform the world around them.”
This year’s class of Black; Latino; Asian American and Pacific Islander; and Native American leaders embody those qualities. They work in a wide range of fields, including education, medicine and government.
We look forward to telling you all about them in the weeks ahead — and giving you the opportunity to meet them in person in October.
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The Sacramento Bee
Chris Fusco is executive editor of The Sacramento Bee and regional editor for all McClatchy newsrooms in California. Before joining McClatchy in September 2025, he worked as executive editor of the Press Democrat News Group in Santa Rosa, managing editor of the Houston Chronicle and executive editor of the Chicago Sun-Times. A suburban Chicago native, he is a 1994 graduate of Illinois Wesleyan University.