Carlsbad Sister City Ambassadors Board of Directors

Tom Hersant, President

Tom is a Founding Director and now the current chair of CSCA. His career was as a public administrator with the State of California and at the time of his retirement was the Regional Manager of Child Care Licensing for both San Diego and Imperial Counties.
Since then he has volunteered as a tour director with local Public Radio Station KPBS, as a reader for LibriVox.org, and is, along with his wife, a regular traveler to Carlsbad’s two sister cities and other delightful locations throughout the world. Most recently he has joined Carlsbad’s Hi-Noon Rotary and thoroughly enjoys joining these fine folks in fulfilling the Rotary motto of “Service above self”.

Chris Kristiansen, Vice President Diversity & Inclusion

Chris recently joined the board of Carlsbad Sister City Ambassadors.  As a Carlsbad resident since 2019, she aims to be a bridge between cultures in the global landscape and contribute to the city of Carlsbad by bringing her wide range of corporate experience over the years.  She is passionate about working for Diversity & Inclusion and Sustainability in everyday life for future generations.  Her primary responsibilities at CSCA include protocol assessment and strategy integration for sister city relations.

Polly Yu, Director

Polly was born and raised in a multicultural, metropolitan community of Hong Kong where the best of the East-West cultures meet. It had a great impact on her upbringings in the importance of History, Language, Arts, Music and how it plays out in the global business environment.
Polly has over 25 years experience in organizing Education, Government & Business exchange between US and Asia. She led the San Diego Symphony, San Diego Youth Symphony, Timken Museum Asian Arts Study, City of San Antonio Sister Cities exchanges to Asia. Currently, she is on the Board of Directors of Sister Cities International & Carlsbad Sister Cities. She devotes much of her time and effort in developing Global Exchanges for the youth in Carlsbad.

Laurenn Barker, Secretary, Public Relations

Ms. Barker is the Secretary of CSCA and is active in the public relations outreach for the organization. She has been involved in several CSCA programs, particularly with students and art. She chaperoned a group of Student Ambassadors to Japan where they met with school and city officials, stayed with host families and traveled throughout the area.
Ms. Barker’s professional career was more than 30 years in public relations with several international consulting firms and in advertising and the arts. She has studied and lived in France and Italy and traveled extensively throughout Latin and South America, Australia, New Zealand, Scandanavia, China and parts of Russia. Upon moving to California, she maintained a sculpture studio in Sausalito and then moved south to Fallbrook and Carlsbad and became involved in the community. She went through the Carlsbad Citizen’s Academy and was on the Carlsbad Arts Commission and was Chair for two terms.
Ms. Barker joined CSCA because she believes in the purpose. Respect and understanding for people comes from interacting with them and getting to know them and international coordination is a way to help achieve world peace. She particularly believes in working with young people because they are the future.