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20 WINES&VINES March 2016 WINE INDUSTRY NEWS CALIFORNIA Cal Poly alums donate $1.2 million Troy and Basia Gillespie, alumni of California Poly- technic State University, San Luis Obispo, have pledged $1.2 million to the school's College of Agriculture, Food and Environmental Sciences for its planned Center for Wine and Viticulture. The Gillespies' donation will be used for a new viticul- ture lab. Basia Gillespie's family grows almonds, prunes, raisins and wine grapes. The couple's daughter, Courtney, is a senior studying wine and viticulture at Cal Poly. The nearly 40,000-square-foot bonded winery will include crush, fermentation, bot- tling and barrel rooms, plus teaching and meeting facilities. Family Winemakers name new chair and president Jon Ballesteros is the new president of Family Winemakers of California (FWC). Ballesteros was most recently senior vice president of public policy for San Francisco Travel, the destination marking organization for the city of San Francisco. The group also named Bruce Lun- dquist, who co-founded Rack & Riddle Custom Wine Services of Sonoma County, as its board chair. Lundquist is the former general manager of J Vineyards & Winery in Healdsburg, Calif., and has been on the FWC board since 2005. Hop Kiln acquired by Landmark L andmark Vineyards of Sonoma acquired Hop Kiln Vineyards in the Rus- sian River Valley. The acquisition includes the current estate on Westside Road in Healdsburg and more than 240 acres of land within the Sonoma Coast and Russian River Valley AVAs. Hop Kiln had been owned by the Vero Wine Group. Landmark is owned by Wonderful Co., which had previously been named Roll Global. Grapes have grown on the Hop Kiln property since the late 1800s. The Hop Kiln building is a regis- tered California Historical Landmark and is recog- nized by the California Office of Historic Preser- vation as "the most sig- nificant surviving example of a stone hop kiln in the North Coast region." Westwood names Winkler assistant winemaker Natalie Winkler is the new assistant winemaker at Westwood Winery in Sonoma Valley. Winkler has been with Westwood since 2014 in the position of cellarmaster and enolo- gist. Prior to joining West- wood, Winkler worked in Spain, Australia, France and at Windsor Oaks and Mill Creek Winery in So- noma County. Robledo named CEO of Mi Sueño Rolando and Lorena Her- rera, owners of Mi Sueño Winery in Napa, hired Vanessa Robledo to be the winery's chief executive of- ficer. Robledo will oversee business management, marketing and direct-to- consumer and wholesale wine sales. Robledo is a fourth-generation grape- grower whose career in the wine industry began in her family's vineyard as a child. She later worked as president of Robledo Fam- ily Winery and then Black Coyote Chateau before joining Mi Sueño. Perry promoted at Bokisch Elyse Perry was promoted from assistant winemaker to winemaker at Bokisch Regional News Natalie Winkler