Protecting Our Most Valued and Vulnerable 

My Values and Commitment to Change

How a society cares for its most valued and vulnerable people says a great deal about its priorities and humanity.  One of the most important roles of the Board of Supervisors is to serve those in need and to manage the delivery of human services for senior citizens and the disabled.

As Executive Director of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference-LA in the 1980's, I worked with social workers, staff and community advocates, on programs to strengthen and enrich families. From Project Ahead, an in-home support and mentoring program for at-risk youth and their parents to the Martin Luther King, Jr. Legacy Center’s dispute resolution programs, I gained firsthand, practical knowledge of the importance of such programs to helping communities and families manage issues like foster care, youth violence and neighborhood disputes. It was also at SCLC that we established the Rosa Parks Rape Crisis Treatment Center to provide counseling and treatment for women in South Los Angeles.

Public officials must work to provide the highest level of quality to the services rendered to protect the health, care, safety and quality of life for those dependent on vital services.  As a public official, I have worked on behalf of children, families and the elderly to ensure that they and their communities have a voice in public policy.

Working for Change, My Record of Results

As a Los Angeles City Councilman, I continued to work on behalf of women who were victims of domestic violence, establishing the City of LA's Domestic Violence Task Force and directing the Housing Authority to set aside $5 million annually for the construction and operation of domestic violence shelters.

A focal point of my agenda was also the creation of affordable housing for seniors and those who are disabled. During my tenure on the Council, we completed five new projects for seniors totaling 300 units and $28 million in investment and had an additional 533 units of senior housing in the pipeline as well as special needs housing.
My efforts to improve the delivery of social services also included a one-of-a-kind high school for children in high poverty areas of the Eighth District that included educational and childcare facilities as well as a health clinic that could be accessed by members of the community. The $9 million Rita D. Walters Learning Complex for Family and Community Development opened in partnership with the LAUSD and the Children's Collaborative and currently serves hundreds of children and their families in South Los Angeles.

As a member of the Legislature, I have fought on behalf of at-risk children and those with disabilities to fund child care resource and referral programs to provide enhanced training and technical support to improve their quality of care, increase awareness of the needs of this population to child care providers and raise parental awareness of available rights and services.

A large part of my legislative agenda has been the protection of the elderly and disabled.   I have authored numerous bills to reform and support the In Home Supportive Services (IHSS) and Nursing Home systems. My accomplishments have included legislation to  protect IHSS clients from fraud by requiring background checks for IHSS providers, increase opportunities for training of IHSS providers, require that Nursing Homes adopt the Quality First 10 point plan, increase access to low-cost prescription drugs for seniors and provide cancer screenings for the underinsured.

My social service agenda has been always been linked to my health care agenda (See Healthcare Policy Link) because children in foster care, those with disabilities and the elderly must often confront the declining reliability of our health care safety net.

My Plan

As a member of the Board of Supervisors I will improve the range of social services in the Second District from investing in counseling and support services for children and families to increasing access to senior services and facilities to increasing the incentives for the County to reduce the number of children in foster care either by reuniting them with their families or providing permanent adoptive homes.

On Foster services:

• Work to raise stipends for foster care providers (currently at around $600 per month which does not cover the cost of quality care) to ensure that we have a sufficient number of homes available for foster youth.

• Support greater investment in transitional housing, counseling and programs (including Independent Living) for youth who age out of the system so that the promise of college scholarships, mental health services and housing are available to qualifying students.

• Develop a long-term program in conjunction with County Departments that works with both the foster family and the natural family to facilitate communication and increased availability of counseling services towards the goal of reuniting children with their families.

On Elderly and/or Disabled services:

• Continue to create and expand policy and programs for low-cost prescription drugs.

• Establish public/private partnerships to develop affordable housing options for seniors and the disabled within the Second District.

• Continue to improve the IHSS service model towards increased client choice and training for providers.

• Appoint Deputies to the Senior and Disabled Communities in each city and unincorporated area of the District to develop Empowerment Congress Committees which focus on issues ranging from preventing fraud against seniors, increased access to public services for the disabled.

More Key Issues

Jobs and Economic Development

Public Safety

Sustaining our Communities

Healthier Communities