Guadalupe Centers CEO on leave during investigation at Kansas City Latino organization
Cris Medina, the longtime chief executive of Kansas City’s Guadalupe Centers Inc., is on administrative leave pending a workplace investigation.
Medina has led the nonprofit organization for more than 40 years, overseeing its growth from a small organization to one of the area’s largest nonprofits with locations across the city.
It’s unclear why Medina was placed on leave. He did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
In an email to staff in early March, Guadalupe Center’s lawyer Mark Nasteff told employees that the board had placed Medina on administrative leave. He referenced an investigation under way by a third party.
“The Board encourages you to allow the investigation to run its course and to cooperate fully and provide truthful information to the investigator if you are asked to do so,” he wrote.
Nasteff declined to comment on the matter.
Paul Rojas, chairman of the board of directors, declined to comment last week.
CiCi Rojas, the board’s first vice chair, declined to comment on specifics.
“It’s a personnel matter,” she said. “Mr. Medina has been placed on paid administrative leave pending resolution of a workplace personnel matter.”
Beto Lopez, the organization’s chief operations officer, has been leading the organization during Medina’s absence.
“This is unfortunate, but it’s not stopping our ability to provide services, quality care and do all the things we normally do,” CiCi Rojas said. “We have an excellent team.”
Guadalupe Centers, which touts itself as the “Longest Continuously Operating Organization Serving Latinos in the United States,” celebrated its 100th anniversary in 2019. It offers a myriad of programs and services for the region’s Latino community. Those include housing and homelessness programs, substance abuse counseling, workforce development programs, youth sports and a senior center.
Guadalupe also operates charter schools that serve children from preschool through 12th grade.
Medina started at Guadalupe in 1980, when the organization occupied two buildings. He’s widely credited with growing the nonprofit over his four decades at the helm. It now occupies multiple campuses across the metro area and employs hundreds of people.
He was awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Missouri-Kansas City’s College of Arts and Sciences in 2014.
“Medina’s devotion to higher education preparation and creating opportunity for youth led to his nomination by faculty and selection by the University of Missouri System,” the university wrote that year.
The organization was founded by a Catholic women’s club in 1919 to serve underprivileged Mexican immigrants who had moved to Kansas City’s west side following the Mexican Revolution.
“Naming the entity after the patron saint of Mexico, the Guadalupe Center became one of the nation’s first social service agencies for Latinos,” the group’s website says, “and has grown to be the heart of the Latino community within Kansas City.”
Emails obtained by The Star show Medina sought to involve several local civic leaders in the situation at the organization. That included Manny Abarca, who previously served on the charter school board.
Abarca, now a member of the Kansas City school board who works for U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, said he did not get involved in the dispute.
“The goal of many folks engaged in some of these discussions is to focus on making sure the continuity of GCI is uninterrupted,” Abarca said, “and Mr. Medina’s legacy is somehow involved and celebrated so we can move forward.”
The Star’s Steve Vockrodt contributed to this story.
