Events

Francisco “Frank” Urtasun returned to the Port of San Diego’s Board of Port Commissioners in 2022 as an appointee of the City of Coronado. Previously, he served as a Commissioner from 1992-2002 as an appointee the City of Imperial Beach. He is the first Commissioner in the history of the Port to be appointed by two different member cities.

Commissioner Urtasun is also the former president of Regional Strategies Group (RSG), a San Diego-based public affairs and strategic communications consulting firm. Prior to the establishment of RSG, he was the regional vice president of External Relations for Sempra Energy Services Corporation, a business unit of Sempra Energy. Sempra Energy is a San Diego-based Fortune 500 energy services holding company whose subsidiaries provide electricity, natural gas and value-added products and services. Over the course of his 38-year career at Sempra Energy, Commissioner Urtasun held several senior level management positions.

Prior to joining SDG&E, Commissioner Urtasun began his career in the real estate industry, focusing on buying, entitling, and constructing his own single and multi-family residential projects. Today, he also manages Southwesterly Properties, which owns and operates single and multi-family properties throughout Southern San Diego County.

Throughout his career, Commissioner Urtasun has served on numerous local community boards, including: chairman of San Diego Housing Commission, 2017 – 2019; chairman of San Diego Downtown Partnership, 2015 – 2016; chairman and Commissioner of the Port of San Diego Board of Port Commissioners, 1992 – 2002; Local Initiatives Support Corporation, 2015 – 2019; board member and awardee of the San Diego Regional Chamber of Commerce’s “Ten Lifetime San Diegans,” 2007.

Urtasun holds a bachelor’s degree from San Diego State University and was recognized as an Outstanding Alumni and the President’s Honorary Degree from Southwestern College. He and his wife, Caren, have two adult children and two grandchildren.

Dr. Divya Kakaiya is the Founder and Clinical Director of Healthy Within Neurofeedback Center in San Diego and a nationally recognized expert in integrative brain health. With over 40 years of experience treating brain-based conditions, Dr. Kakaiya holds a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology and a postdoctoral M.S. in Psychopharmacology. In 2019, she was awarded Fellow status by the Association for Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback (AAPB) for her contributions to neuroscience. 

Originally known for her work in eating disorders, Dr. Kakaiya pivoted her entire practice to brain optimization through neurofeedback, treating conditions such as ADHD, anxiety, PTSD, traumatic brain injury, autism, and learning differences. Her neurofeedback-only practice serves patients aged 4 to 89. As an integrative psychologist and neuroscientist, she combines QEEG brain mapping, neurofeedback, mindfulness, and trauma-informed care to promote brain regulation and healing without medication. 

Dr. Kakaiya is also a renowned educational and community leader. She founded the Healthy Within Foundation in 2002, reaching thousands of youth and parents through school-based wellness programs like “Full of Ourselves” and “The Council for Boys and Men.” She has trained over 385 interns in her career and continues to speak on topics such as the teen brain, trauma, and neurogenesis and creating safe communities. 

Dr. Benjamin L. Smarr, Ph.D. Neurobiology, is an associate professor at UCSD’s Shu Chien-Gene Lay Department of Bioengineering and the Halicioğlu Data Science Institute. His work leverages his domain expertise in biological rhythms and neuroendocrinology to uncover patterns in diverse sets of IoT time series data that carry actionable information to impact physical health, mental health, and performance. In 2020 he became the technical lead of the global collaborative TemPredict study, which developed algorithms for early detection of COVID-19 infection, and unique cyberinfrastructure to serve rapid, collaborative explorations of population-scale, personal time series data. Leveraging these data and others, the Smarr lab focuses on applications in women’s health and aging, and technical development in service of debiasing algorithms, increasing participant engagement, and accelerating the emergence of precision health care for individuals and populations alike.

As leader of Voice of San Diego, Scott makes sure the journalists at Voice have jobs and the editors get what they need to provide San Diegans with the best journalism possible. He also co-hosts the most popular public affairs podcast recorded in downtown San Diego (the Voice of San Diego Podcast) and collaborates on the weekly Politics Report along with his own occasional investigative reporting and analysis. He is a graduate of the University of Utah and lives in Ocean Beach with his wife and two children.