Dianna Garrett

Dianna oversees the marketing and communications functions at Center for Elders’ Independence. She joined CEI because “she fell in love with the PACE model of care.”

She came to CEI with a background in senior marketing, advertising, planning, and project management. She has experience working mainly with managed care plans such as United, Anthem Blue Cross, CIGNA and Health Net on their senior products. She also spent many years working on healthcare business for advertising agencies—handling direct marketing lead generation and advertising campaigns that grew and maintained membership in senior health plans.

Her passion for integrated long term care developed in 2001 when she struggled with her family to piece together dozens of services for her grandparents when they could not stay at home without additional care. She began looking for ways to become involved and be part of the solution.

So, when Dianna started consulting with the Center for Elders’ Independence and learned about PACE in 2003, she knew she had found a home. Dianna worked as a marketing consultant with CEI for a few years and then came on staff full-time in the fall of 2005.

She is board chair of Resources for Community Development – an affordable housing developer in the East Bay. She also serves on the Communications Taskforce for both the National PACE Association and CalPACE.

Dianna is an Oakland resident and in 2019 she was very excited to begin a term serving the City of Oakland on the Mayor’s Commission on Aging where she will be contributing to Oakland’s effort to become an Age Friendly City – a more livable city for all ages.