Fernando Giraldo is the Chief Probation Officer for the Santa Cruz County Probation Department and has been with the Department since 1995. He oversees Adult Services, Juvenile Services and the Juvenile Institution, supported by 127 staff and a $29 million budget. Mr. Giraldo has a master’s degree in Social Work from San Jose State University, California and holds a bachelor’s degree in Latin American Studies from The University of California, Santa Cruz.  Fernando is the son of immigrant parents, who came to U.S. from Colombia, South America.

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Santa Cruz County is a national model site for juvenile justice reforms through the Annie E. Casey Foundation and served as a learning lab for over 100 jurisdictions.  Fernando has spoken throughout California and the country about juvenile and adult justice reforms, racial and ethnic disparities in the justice system, evidence-based programs, shifting operational cultures, detention and pretrial alternatives and collaboration with community partners.

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Throughout his career at Probation, Fernando has led collaborative efforts to bring nearly $20 million dollars in competitive grant funding to the County of Santa Cruz to improve services for the criminal justice involved population. These dollars have helped transform service delivery and led to the development of resource centers, expanded collaborative courts, diversion opportunities and supervision and pretrial services. 

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Fernando currently serves on several local and state Boards. In 2016, Mr. Giraldo was appointed by California State Governor Jerry Brown to the California Sex Offender Management Board. Fernando also serves on the Board of United Way, Santa Cruz as the Chair.  

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As an active member of the community, Fernando helped launch the Youth Violence Prevention Task Force, was instrumental in the fund development for the AZTECAS Youth Soccer Program, is Vice President of Operations for the Aptos Tide Competitive Soccer League and has coached competitive youth soccer teams for more than a decade.