The Hispanic Association on Corporate Responsibility Board of Directors Selects Cid Wilson as New President and CEO

Margaret Moran, chair of the board of directors of the Hispanic Association on Corporate Responsibility (HACR) announced today that the board has selected Cid Wilson as its next president and CEO. Wilson, who currently serves as managing director, U.S. Equity Research for Princeton Securities Group, will succeed Carlos F. Orta. Orta successfully served HACR for nearly eight years.

“The HACR board has made an excellent choice. Cid has exceptional qualifications, bringing the perfect mix of corporate experience and a decades-long involvement with the Latino community and its organizations. He has a proven commitment to increasing the representation of Latinos in all areas, including Corporate America. He also has the vision to take HACR to a new level. We are very, very pleased,” said Moran.

HACR, headquartered in Washington D.C., is the nation’s largest advocacy group for Hispanic inclusion in Corporate America. In addition to conducting valuable research initiatives and advanced professional development programs, HACR creates a forum to ensure corporate responsibility and market reciprocity for the nation’s growing Hispanic population.

“I am honored that the HACR Board of Directors selected me as their next President and CEO,” said Wilson. “As an alumnus of HACR’s programs, I know firsthand the work that HACR does around the country to advocate for greater inclusion of Latinos in Corporate America. I look forward to leveraging my 21 years of Wall Street experience, with my national board experience, and my passion for Latino advocacy, to execute on HACR’s mission.”

Wilson is a graduate of The Ohio State University and has worked in the financial services industry since 1993. In 2006, Forbes ranked him the top equity financial analyst in his field.

In Sept. 2009, President Barack Obama appointed Wilson to serve on the National Museum of the American Latino Study Commission with the mission of presenting a plan to the president and Congress on the proposed creation and construction of a new Smithsonian Museum on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. In Nov. 2012, he was named chairman of the board of Friends of the National Museum of the American Latino, which advocates for Congressional support for the authorization and creation of the new Smithsonian American Latino Museum.

A lifelong resident of Bergen County, New Jersey, Wilson is a dedicated community leader, serving as the vice chairman of the board of trustees at Bergen Community College, chairman of the board for the Bergen County Relief Center, and a board member of the New Jersey Council of Community Colleges.

Wilson also serves on the ethnic advisory board for PepsiCo and the consumer advisory board for Verizon Communications. He has also been a board member of leading minority advocacy groups such as LatinoJustice PRLDEF (formerly the Puerto Rican Legal Defense & Education Fund), the National Council of La Raza (NCLR) and Dominicans on Wall Street. He is the former national president of the Dominican American Roundtable (DANR), and a Gold Life Member of the NAACP.

The HACR executive committee, and distinguished friends of the organization, executed a thorough national search process led by HACR Treasurer and Search Committee Chair Ronald Blackburn-Moreno and HACR Board Chair Margaret Moran.

“The HACR board did an outstanding job in the search for the new CEO,” said Blackburn-Moreno. “It was a long, very rigorous process involving the board and our corporate partners. We had 58 highly qualified candidates, which once again shows the depth of talent in the Latino community. Each candidate was evaluated on an array of criteria on a broad numerical scale. We then selected the top 15. The search committee, composed of the five HACR executive committee members and five non-voting corporate partners, evaluated each candidate again to decide on the final five that were interviewed by the board,” he said. “It was a difficult decision because of the quality of the finalists, but the board made the right choice.”

Upon announcing Wilson’s appointment, Moran and Blackburn-Moreno thanked Interim President and CEO Frank D. Alvarez, adding that the entire organization was thankful for his leadership during a time of change. “Alvarez did a remarkable job of keeping the organization focused and moving forward. Those efforts allowed our board and search committee to concentrate on the selection process.”