Norma Ramirez de Miess comes to the National Main Street Center’s team of field services staff after successfully leading the Downtown Neighborhood Association of Elgin, one of the largest and most diverse nationally accredited Main Street programs in Illinois. Under her leadership, Elgin went from completing designation in 2001 to achieving Premier community status. The program received more than 20 state and local awards for improvement projects, business development efforts, successful events, marketing initiatives, and strong partnership development. Named among the 25 most influential Latino Leaders in the suburbs of Chicago, Norma’s result-driven leadership is focused on building organizational value by delivering direct benefit programming and services. Her personal approach in connecting with people is founded on building relationships of trust to develop strong partnership and volunteer support. Norma’s multicultural background is a solid asset in understanding increasingly diverse communities. ASs a regular national conference speaker, she shares strategies to utilize the assets of a multicultural population. Before moving her family to Texas, Norma was honored with a Proclamation from the City of Elgin for her leadership support in the Elgin community.