Farewell to an old friend: LACERS: Raul Aguallo retires

Latino Leaders: The National Magazine of the Successful American Latino, May, 2008

Los Angeles, CA -- On March 27, 2008, amongst old friends, peers, proteges and family, LACERS veteran Raul Aguallo celebrated his retirement from public service after 33 illustrious years with the California Pension System. Roberto, a tireless leader who held the General Manager position at the Los Angeles City Employees' Retirement System, has decided to take a break from his work in public service, though he is expected to make an incursion into the private sector later on.

Throughout the years, Roberto became a champion for inclusion, diversity and innovation," says longtime friend and Multitrade's CEO Luis Restrepo. "He spent many years working hard with CalPERS and LACERS, and his work also took him to the [Robert] Toigo Foundation, where he also worked hard to help Latinos to achieve success through education."

In a ceremony held at the prestigious California Club in Los Angeles that was beautifully executed by Renae Griffin and her staff at RG Management, Aguallo celebrated a lifetime of achievements and contributions while enjoying dinner and a few words from guest speakers, which included Sue Toigo, Michael Rodriguez and Eric Holloman from the Toigo Foundation and Shelly Smith from LACERS. Entertainment for the event was provided by Dave Aguallo and the Fabulous Classics.

"Robert has made an absolutely valuable contribution to the pension fund. He has revolutionized the corporate culture of the pension fund. He's made it customer-service friendly He understands, as a long-time public servant, what the actual constituency of the pension fund needs and wants, and he has been the most far-sighted leader that the pension fund has ever had."

--Shelley Smith, Vice President of Los Angeles City Employee Retirement System

"I think he's been really fantastic. I've actually met him multiple times and he's always been reaching out to us as we (have gone) through business school and afterwards. He's also mentored us along the way"

--Alejandro Lara, Managing Partner of Avalon Residential, LLC

"The work that Robert has done in the arenas of pension funds, investments and bringing diversity-bringing Latinos to the finance industry, bringing a diverse perspective to the pension fund world-has truly been groundbreaking."

--Marcos Rodriguez, Managing Partner of Palladium Equity Partners

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"Robert's work at CalPERS was groundbreaking in several areas. As past civil servant in the investment office, Robert moved forward several initiatives to improve the operations of the investment office. But probably the most important thing he did was to really move forward our diversity initiative."

--Fred Buenrostro, Chief Executive Officer of CAPERS

"Robert is an extraordinarily generous man with the highest level of ethics and community responsibility. Every single thing he does, from my experience with him, takes into account the importance of paying attention to the community you're in and how you can benefit the community."

--Sue Toigo, Founder of the Robert Toigo Foundation

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