The REACH Healthcare Foundation is excited to welcome Jackie Loya-Torres to its Board of Directors. Loya-Torres brings years of experience in community development, grantmaking and community reinvestment, along with deep roots in Wyandotte County and the wider Kansas City region. She was appointed by the Unified Government of Wyandotte County and Kansas City Kansas to represent the Wyandotte County service area, for a three-year term beginning this year.
Loya-Torres is a manager for the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) and community development at Commerce Bank. She leads the bank’s community outreach and many of its community development and community relations initiatives, with a focus on low- and moderate-income and underrepresented communities across the bank’s footprint.
Before joining Commerce, she worked in the nonprofit sector as a program officer at a local charitable foundation. There she oversaw grants to area organizations working to advance economic security for women and girls, giving her firsthand experience on both sides of grantmaking.
Her work on community reinvestment, economic security and food access speaks to conditions that shape health long before anyone walks into a clinic. That perspective matters as H.R. 1, the 2025 federal law cutting Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), puts new strain on families and safety-net organizations across Kansas and Missouri.
“Jackie has spent her career making sure resources reach the neighborhoods that have too often been overlooked and underfunded,” said Brenda Sharpe, president and CEO of the REACH Healthcare Foundation. “She understands how economic security and health are tied together, and she knows our communities. Her leadership will help REACH stay the course and keep investing alongside the partners closest to the work.”
Loya-Torres currently serves as vice chair of the Board of Directors of Build WyCo and on the Executive Committee of the Kansas City Money Matters Alliance. She has previously served on the Community Development Advisory Council of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, the Board of Directors of Harvesters Community Food Network, the Board of Trustees of Cristo Rey High School Kansas City and the Marketing Committee of Resurrection Catholic School in Kansas City, Kansas.
She was a 2018 Fellow of the St. Louis Business Diversity Initiative, a program of the St. Louis Regional Chamber, and is a graduate of Rockhurst University.
“I’ve seen how much stronger our communities are when local leaders have flexible resources and a real voice in decisions,” Loya-Torres said. “REACH’s commitment to trust-based philanthropy and health equity is why I’m proud to join this board.”
Each member of the REACH Board lives within the Foundation’s six-county service area of Allen, Johnson and Wyandotte counties in Kansas; Cass, Jackson and Lafayette counties in Missouri; and Kansas City, Missouri. Learn more about the REACH Board of Directors.
