I am an educator. I’ve been teaching since 1999. That’s 20 years. I grew up in an immigrant home. My parents are both Mexican immigrants. I attended Cal State Long Beach. I have my undergraduate degree in criminal justice and my first master’s degree from Cal State Long Beach. I started my work actually, in the feminist movement right out of college. I took a job with the Long Beach Women’s Shelter, which is an organization that helps provide services for women and victims, women and children who have been victimized by domestic violence.
That work took me to Sacramento and also Washington, D.C., where we saw the passage of two very important laws that had a huge impact on me. The first is Megan’s Law, which is the law that requires sex offenders to register in their local police departments as registered sex offenders. And the second law was at the federal level, which is the Violence Against Women Act. The Violence Against Women Act provided tons of protections for women. In particular, women who had been victims of domestic violence. That left a huge impression on me at a very young age. And I realized that public policy was something I was interested in doing more of.
I left the Women’s Movement to work as a teacher in the City of Lynwood and taught history and also taught high school. During that time, we had a corruption scandal in the City of Lynwood, which called me to my service as a council member … During that time, we challenged a political machine that outspent us three to one. We ran a grassroots campaign. I got elected. During my time there, we instituted a number of reforms to open up government to the community and make our city more accountable.
We also built and designed five new parks. Built a senior citizen center, received about $9 million in federal funding for new street improvement projects. I currently teach in the community college system. I also serve on a special district called the Central Basin Municipal Water District where I represent almost half of the 33rd Senate District.
I am proud of the work that we have done there, improving our environment, including creating a Climate Action Plan to help reduce emissions in our district. I’m running for State Senate to work on some of the most important issues affecting our entire region, education, our K-14 system, healthcare and also our environment. Housing is also a huge issue in our entire region.
During my time as a council member, we worked to create more affordable housing units for moderate and low income families in the city. And that is yet another issue that I’m interested in working on in Sacramento.
Source: Introduction Statement, Women Rising: A Panel of Women in the Race to Lead SD 33, Feb. 25.