Dennis Pastrana

March 17, 2010

CEO, Goodwill South Florida

Dennis PastranaAt the 2010 Goodwill® Conference of Executives, Dennis Pastrana, President and CEO of Goodwill South Florida (Miami) was awarded the Gerald L. Clore International Award for demonstrating passion for developing the capabilities of Goodwill agencies outside the United States. His dedication to the international efforts of Goodwill has served to further Goodwill’s international mission and operation.

Pastrana has showed continued interest in supporting Goodwill’s mission internationally.  Most recently, he hosted the Goodwill Industries International (GII) Latin American and Caribbean Summit in October 2009, in which seven organizations from six countries in the region participated.  He was present for the entire event, gave several presentations, led group discussions, and indicated an interest in working with GII to develop a training center for Latin American and Caribbean affiliates.

Goodwill South Florida has also assisted organizations in Panama, Venezuela, Costa Rica and the Caribbean to develop successful programming to further their missions. Pastrana sent staff from his Goodwill to El Salvador to provide hands-on training on strategies that have been vetted at his own agency, including a work evaluation program to assess the capabilities of those served.

Pastrana also sent vice presidents to Brazil to help an agency gain a foothold in its retail program, and to Trinidad to help implement a custodial services training program. He has welcomed to his organization rehabilitation professionals from Poland and the former Czechoslovakia who wanted to emulate successful workshop activities for people with disabilities in their own countries.

Most recently, Pastrana helped to lead Goodwill South Florida’s efforts to produce roughly 12,000 blankets with fabric donated by Polartec that will be shipped and distributed to earthquake survivors in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, the island nation’s largest city and capital.  He has also been actively engaged in coordinating efforts on behalf of GII to collect and send wheelchairs, crutches and walkers to assist those in need in Haiti.