Marina Gonzales has left the San Antonio Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. She led the Chamber through the pandemic while moving the headquarters to Port San Antonio.
Gonzales will join former Bexar County Commissioner Kevin Wolff in a consulting firm, Gonzales Wolff Business Solutions, expanding Wolff’s solo venture that he started in 2005, she told the San Antonio Report.
“I was ready to embrace entrepreneurship on my own after three years of success and fun at the chamber,” she said, noting her experience to running the nation’s oldest Hispanic chamber was in the nonprofit world, including as president and CEO of Child Advocates of San Antonio.
Gonzales became the Hispanic chamber’s president and CEO in 2020.
Gonzales said the chamber’s succession plan calls for current board Chair JR Treviño to step into the CEO role on an interim basis as the board chooses how to seek a replacement. Treviño also serves as the mayor of Castle Hills; he was reelected to a third term in May.
Treviño, reached by text, confirmed that he would become interim president and CEO.
Gonzales’ departure leaves the Hispanic chamber as the third major San Antonio chamber of commerce without a permanent CEO. The North San Antonio Chamber’s Cristina Aldrete and San Antonio Chamber’s Richard Perez both stepped down late last year.
In addition to the consulting firm, Gonzales said she’s recently invested, as a silent partner, in San Antonio-based Happithy Marketing, which according to a news release in January launched new custom web design, social media marketing, app development and gamification services.
She said she’s also investing in her father’s latest restaurant venture in Corpus Christi, but Gonzales Wolff, where she will be CEO, will be her main pursuit. She declined to name any current clients, and said Wolff was “handling that at this time, to make sure I can appropriately transition from the chamber, and fulfill my duties here.”
Wolff, who served as Precinct 3’s commissioner from 2008 to 2019, said via text that he started his consulting firm when “I was on [city] council and needed a way to supplement my $20 a week pay as a council person.”
Wolff served as District 9’s representative in 2005 and 2008. He said he has been looking for someone to help grow that business: “I got lucky that I got a rockstar to partner with that can really run and grow that business for both of us!”
Wolff will be a Spire risk management partner for the foreseeable future, according to his letter. He is also a member of the VIA Metropolitan Transit board.
Gonzales says the two are looking for office space in downtown.