Cathy Adams

Cathy Diane Adams, a graduate of Jackson State University, has been a part of the tapestry of the Oakland business community since 1983, where she began her work with The Northern California Black Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber, renamed as the Oakland African American Chamber of Commerce, named Cathy President and CEO in July 2019. Cathy has been advocating for African American owned businesses, and successfully navigated the through the Covid era, with the already pre-existing inequities and insufficiencies black business faced. Cathy introduced the OAACC Resiliency Relief Program, raising over $1 Million Dollars - effectively gifting grants to 230 African American owned businesses. In addition to Cathy’s work as President of OAACC, Cathy is also the President of CDA Consulting Group, Charter President of the National Coalition of 100 Black Women Inc., and founder of The Powerful Women of the Bay Awards. Cathy has received a multitude of national and local recognition for her amazing work. Community is the common link in all of Cathy’s activities. Her community is the forefront of all that she has done over the years, and all that she continues to do. Which goes along with what her mother told her when she was a little girl, “As you are moving up, take someone with you.”