Gold Country Fairgrounds director Johnson retires; Newsom appoints 2 members

Governor Gavin Newsom appointed two new members to the Gold Country Fairgrounds Board of Directors, as Margaret Ann (Peg) Johnson retired after 12 years of service. Johnson joined the fairgrounds board in January 2016. She served as board chair and frequently as the chair of the Gold Country Fair Committee. "The fairgrounds has really grown while I was on the board," said Johnson. "We have done a lot of upgrades on buildings, and the agricultural department has gotten bigger." Johnson plans to remain engaged with activities at the fairgrounds. "I am stepping down but not stepping away. I will be volunteering to help with whatever is needed for the fair," said Johnson. She moved to Auburn with her family in 1985 less than two miles from the fairgrounds. Before coming to Auburn, she worked at the fairgrounds in Petaluma. She served as a volunteer at the Gold Country Fairgrounds until her appointment to the board in 2016. "I enjoyed being on the board," she said. The fairgrounds board has seven members, and with Johnson's departure, Newsom appointed two new members: Mitchell Dion and Anupriya Ramraj. Mitchell "Mitch" Dion lives in Newcastle. He joined the board after retiring as a senior consultant for Zanjero, Inc. and director of business analytics at MSD Engineering. Dion's career includes working for the city of Pasadena Water and Power, Calaveras County Water, Rincon Del Diablo and San Diego County Water Authority. He has an MS in Engineering from the University of Southern California and a BA in General Studies from California State University, Sacramento. Dion applied to be on the fairgrounds board after a friend's daughter who works at the capital mentioned someone was needed for Placer County. "I said I would be glad to join," said Dion, who recently returned to the Newcastle area after retiring. "I wanted to be more involved with Auburn." Anupriya "Anu" Ramraj resides in Granite Bay. Ramraj is founder and chief executive officer of Vaultzy, Inc. and co-author of When Robots Knock. She was partner of cloud, data and AI at PricewaterhouseCoopers, vice president of cloud services at Unisys and held multiple roles at DXC Technology, including director of AWS offering general manager and director of offering delivery. She also worked for Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Siemens. Ramraj is a board member of the International Action Network for Gender Equity & Law, an executive board member and advisory board member of the Strategic Artificial Intelligence Program at the University of San Francisco, the Stanford LEAD incubator and startup accelerator, board member for Advisors of the Indian Association of Sacramento, a mentor for the STEM Universal Reach Foundation and a member of Asian Pacific Islander American Affairs. She earned an MS in Computer Science from California State University, Chico and a BE in Engineering from PSG College of Technology. "When I left PricewaterhouseCoopers to start my own company, I got to make decisions about what I could do," said Ramraj. PricewaterhouseCoopers had a policy that prohibited Ramraj from applying for appointments. "I have been wanting to serve the community." Fairgrounds board positions are uncompensated, and with their appointments, the fairgrounds board has a full compliment, which includes Keri Askew Bailey (President), Corinn Crowley (Vice President), Bethel Vercruyssen, Doug Houston, Eddie Vegaalban, Dion and Ramaraj.