Leadership

Carmen Cumberland, President and CEO

Community Harvest President and CEO Carmen Cumberland is a Fort Wayne native and graduate of South Side High School. Carmen is also a Veteran, having served four years in the United States Navy, and holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in Accounting from Western Governors University.

Carmen has been in the non-profit sector since 1998. After spending two years as the accounting assistant at Catholic Charities, she joined Community Harvest Food Bank in 2001, serving as the Director of Finance and Human Resource Manager.  In that capacity, she was responsible for the development and implementation of the agency budget and worked closely with senior staff and the board of directors.  Carmen also managed Human Resource functions for Community Harvest, including employee recruitment and selection, benefits and compensation, training and development, and employee relations.  In December 2014, Carmen was asked to serve as Interim Executive Director by Community Harvest‘s Board of Directors.  She maintained her roles in finance and human resource management while leading all aspects of daily operations of the Food Bank as Interim Executive Director.  In January 2016, Carmen officially became Executive President of Community Harvest as part of the new executive leadership team with John Wolf, CHFB CEO. In July 2021, Carmen accepted the role of President and CEO after John Wolf’s retirement.

In addition to her work at Community Harvest Food Bank, Carmen serves on several boards and committees. Carmen is a board member and treasurer of FIsH (Feeding Indiana’s Hungry), a finance committee member of Hoosiers Feeding the Hungry,  a member of 100+ Women Who Care Fort Wayne, NIPSCO’s East Region Community Advisory Panel (CAPS), a member of Alliance for Human Services (AHS), and is a member and secretary of the Women Business Leadership Council. In 2017, Carmen and her husband, Chad, purchased a 23-acre farm, which includes 16 tillable acres and a greenhouse.  They grow green beans, sweet corn, edamame, peppers, tomatoes, cucumbers, okra, and broccoli that are distributed through CHFB programs in northeast Indiana. To date, Shared Harvest, a female, Veteran-owned farm, has produced over 703,712 pounds of produce for neighbors in need.