{"id":397913,"date":"2026-07-14T14:02:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-14T14:02:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/397913\/"},"modified":"2026-07-14T14:02:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-14T14:02:09","slug":"new-executive-director-for-fresno-arts-council-announced-amid-embezzlement-scandal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/397913\/","title":{"rendered":"New executive director for Fresno Arts Council announced amid embezzlement scandal"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"jxTEW Poyse ouIFx uieav lqtkC HkWF HfYhe kGyAC \">The embezzled money was part of the Measure P grant funds that the Arts Council was supposed to manage for the City of Fresno.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"KFSN logo\" class=\"awXxV NDJZt sJeUN IJwXl CfkUa EknAv NwgWd \" data-testid=\"prism-image\" draggable=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/origin-kfsn.png\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Tuesday, July 14, 2026 1:29PM<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"data:image\/svg;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAABAAAAAJCAQAAACRI2S5AAAAEElEQVR42mNkIAAYRxWAAQAG9gAKqv6+AwAAAABJRU5ErkJggg==\" alt=\"New executive director for Fresno Arts Council announced\"\/><\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao MvWXB TjIXL aGjvy ebVHC \">FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) &#8212; The Board of Directors of the Fresno Arts Council has appointed new leadership after a $1.5 million embezzlement scandal.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Lauren Nikkel has now been named executive director of the organization.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Nikkel currently serves as Executive Director of the Kingsburg Chamber of Commerce.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">She is set to take over at the Arts Council next week.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Andrea Mele had been serving as interim executive director since March following the discovered embezzlement.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">The money was part of the Measure P grant funds that the Arts Council was supposed to manage for the City of Fresno.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \"><a class=\"zZygg UbGlr iFzkS qdXbA WCDhQ DbOXS tqUtK GpWVU iJYzE \" data-testid=\"prism-linkbase\" href=\"https:\/\/abc30.com\/post\/former-fresno-arts-council-employee-pleads-guilty-fraud-18-million-scheme\/18928464\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Suliana Caldwell later pleaded<\/a> to the crimes after an investigation.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC eTIW sUzSN \">She is set to be sentenced on August 10.<br class=\" \"\/><\/p>\n<p>Copyright \u00a9 2026 KFSN-TV. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The embezzled money was part of the Measure P grant funds that the Arts Council was supposed to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":397914,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[159812,53107,11772,112,80880,114,113,159811,294],"class_list":["post-397913","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fresno","tag-159812","tag-embezzlement","tag-executive-director","tag-fresno","tag-fresno-arts-council","tag-fresno-headlines","tag-fresno-news","tag-lauren-nikkel","tag-timely"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/397913","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=397913"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/397913\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/397914"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=397913"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=397913"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=397913"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}