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The Power of Lived Experiences Three alumni share the personal stories that impact their policy efforts on homelessness — ‘the greatest moral and humanitarian crisis of our lifetime’ 

By Les Dunseith

Lourdes Castro Ramírez entered college as one of nine children from a tight-knit working-class family that had migrated from Mexico when she was 4. She had no idea how that background would guide her career as a policymaker focusing on housing affordability. 

“As a first-generation college graduate, I did not intend to get into this field,” Castro Ramírez recalled March 7 during a Meyer and Renee Luskin Lecture Series event that included State Sen. Caroline Menjivar MSW ’18 and Assemblymember Isaac Bryan MPP ’18. “In fact, I didn’t even know that this field existed.”

Now Castro Ramírez is the point person for Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass on housing and homelessness, working on an issue that has reached crisis proportions after too little national policy attention for decades.

“I do feel that there is hope. We are now finally seeing housing policy in action, getting the attention that it requires,” the 1996 UCLA urban planning master’s graduate told faculty, students, alumni and others at the Luskin Conference Center.

“Homelessness is the greatest moral and humanitarian crisis of our lifetime,” Bryan said. “We’re at a crisis position even though [California has] more billionaires than anywhere in the world. But that is the Los Angeles that we have created. 

“And it didn’t just happen. I don’t want to believe it was on purpose because it would be too painful to believe that somebody wanted tens of thousands of poor and disproportionately Black people sleeping on our streets,” he said. “I don’t want to believe that it was intentional. But neglect isn’t an excuse to not make it right.”

Bryan represents a district near the 405 and 10 freeways mostly to the east and south of UCLA that includes some of the L.A.’s wealthiest neighborhoods — and some of its poorest. He talked about the irony of needing to raise money by speaking to rich donors in the mansions of Beverly Hills and then returning to his rented apartment in a modest-but-affordable neighborhood just a few miles away. 

He has experienced housing precarity first-hand, including during his UCLA education. 

“I remember walking across the stage on graduation day. I was very proud. I was very excited,” Bryan recalled. “And there was a faculty member in the audience who knew that I couldn’t pay my rent that month. And she wrote the personal check to make sure that I could stay afloat till I found a job.”

Bryan was able to get his UCLA degree in part because he received a grant from the David Bohnett Foundation, which seeks to improve society through social activism and since 2007 has been providing awards that include a position in the L.A. Mayor’s Office for three selected fellows. Longtime adjunct instructor and UCLA Luskin Board of Advisors member Michael Fleming is the founding director of the Bohnett Foundation. He served as the moderator for a Q&A with Castro Ramírez, Bryan and Menjivar, who like Bryan is a former Bohnett fellow and a master’s degree recipient from the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs. All three talked about income disparity and how their personal experiences relate to affordable housing issues in California.  

Menjivar said her large family of Salvadoran immigrants struggled to make ends meet while living in one- or two-bedroom apartments in low- to middle-income communities like Tarzana. Her mother worked as a house cleaner. 

“I would commute to school and sometimes get a ride from my mom,” Menjivar recalled. “She would drop me off — her firstborn, first-generation student at UCLA, the No. 1 public university in the world — and then she would go down the street to clean a mansion.”

That perspective is never far from her mind.

“Now, I represent 1 million people in the state legislature, looking to bring more affordable housing,” said Menjivar, whose district includes Burbank and many working-class neighborhoods in the San Fernando Valley. “So, when [policymakers] talk about eviction protections and housing affordability, I don’t just speak on it. I’ve lived through that.”

Their lived experiences affect the decisions that Menjivar and Bryan are making and the issues they choose to advance as elected officials in Sacramento. Both have been involved in efforts tied to their backgrounds in public policy and social services. (Menjivar noted that, like herself, Mayor Bass was educated as a social worker.) 

In prepared remarks that preceded the panel discussion, Castro Ramírez spoke about her fondness for UCLA and why she was happy to accept the speaking invitation.

“Just walking into this space and seeing UCLA in the background, and seeing so many people I know here, just makes me really proud of my parents, where I come from and this university that invested in me,” she told an audience that included current colleagues on the Luskin School’s Board of Advisors.

It was a UCLA professor who first encouraged her to look into affordable housing as a potential career path, she said, and that led to roles as a practitioner and policymaker at the municipal level in Ventura and San Antonio, at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development under the Obama administration, and later in Sacramento as Gov. Gavin Newsom’s secretary of the Business, Consumer Services and Housing Agency. 

“And now I’m back in L.A., back to my hometown … and working on the issues that are really important and critical to our city, to our state, and to our country as chief of housing and homelessness solutions,” she said.

Castro Ramírez spoke about harmonizing federal, state and local government efforts, a process that the mayor’s office characterizes as “locking arms” to address the housing crisis.

The overall number of people falling into homelessness continues to outpace the number who are being housed, but this is not because individual efforts have been unsuccessful. 

“In fact, there are incredible nonprofit organizations, housing authorities, housing groups who are doing amazing work,” she said, noting that a supportive housing approval process that used to take six months now takes an average of 43 days. Almost 14,000 affordable units have been approved for Los Angeles. 

“This is what the intersection of policy and programming implementation looks like, being able to move with a sense of urgency, being able to implement the idea that having a place to call home is fundamental,” Castro Ramírez said. 

Public service can be frustrating work, charged with philosophical disagreement and subject to constant second-guessing often motivated by political opportunism. Fleming asked the panel what makes the aggravation worthwhile. 

“I want to make my community, my city, my state, my country better. And that is an awesome privilege that I try to never take for granted,” said Bryan, noting that his chief of staff is another Class of 2018 UCLA Luskin graduate, Caleb Rabinowitz. “And when we walk out of the Capitol, we can kind of ask ourselves, ‘Is the state better this week because we were here?’” 

Menjivar said she is motivated by her family history. 

“My mom came to this country for a better future for her kids not knowing that the future for our family tree would lead from house cleaner to state senator in one generation,” she said.

But there have been hurdles along the way, and that’s also a motivation.

“I was born with what I call the Triple L — a lady, a Latina and a lesbian. So you can imagine I have a handful of stories around discrimination, around facing barriers and overcoming them, and I know that others helped in getting me to the point that I am now.” 

Her lived experiences are vital to her success.

“I think about every barrier that I went through to get to this point, every ‘No’ that I got, even when I was running for office. And for every “No’ that I was given, I’m here now to ensure that other people like me don’t get those ‘Nos’ anymore.”

Castro Ramírez said she is grateful to have gone “to an amazing university and to step into a role that I never thought that I was prepared to step into.”  Glancing at her fellow alumni, she continued, “And I’ve been able to see the power of our collective ability to make change and to make a difference.”

She paused for a moment, then spoke again, softly. 

“I guess the last thing — and the reason I’m hesitating is because, you know, this is a very personal reason for me — I am the mother of three children. I had a son; he was 11 years old when he passed away due to cancer. He was really an incredible, talented individual who craved … leaving his mark in this world. And that didn’t happen.

“And I feel like every day that I wake up, every day that I show up to work, show up to address the work that needs doing, I feel like I’m showing up for him.”

The UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs hosts the Luskin Lecture Series to enhance public discourse on topics relevant to the betterment of society. This presentation was also part of an ongoing series of events in the 2023-24 academic year to commemorate 25 years since the first graduating class from UCLA Luskin Public Policy was sent into the world equipped to make changes for the better.

View photos of the event. 

Luskin Lawmakers

Experts Decry Decision That Would Gut L.A.’s Affordable Housing Plan

Experts at the Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies based at UCLA Luskin are at the forefront of research relating to affordable housing, and this work served as the basis for an opinion piece in the Los Angeles Times questioning a city planning department decision that would shield some wealthier neighborhoods from multifamily development. Aaron Barrall and Shane Phillips of the Lewis Center’s Housing Initiative write that a review of data “shows that L.A.’s current capacity for development … is disproportionately concentrated in lower-income neighborhoods and communities of color.” Half of this capacity is in the poorest quarter of Los Angeles, while the wealthiest 10% furnishes less than 1%. Although the authors call the situation “disheartening,” they say the city still has time to adopt a strategy to add homes where they’re needed most. “Until L.A. takes those steps,” they note, “very little about this housing plan can be called fair.”


 

Regents’ Lecturer Sees Unity of Purpose Among Planners and Artists

Urban planning can seem bureaucratic and risk-averse — seemingly closed off to experimentation and imagination. “But I believe that planners have a lot of creativity,” said UC Regents’ lecturer Mallory Rukhsana Nezam during a Feb. 21 presentation in the Grand Salon of Kerckhoff Hall. “I always find that planners are the most excited about their arts and culture work,” Nezam said. She has worked with many planners who are driven toward social causes and social change. “And artists are also drawn to that. So, there’s an overlap of values there.” In her consulting practice, Justice + Joy, Nezam seeks to de-silo the way cities are run and build models for interdisciplinary collaboration. “What planners are actually doing is work that pertains to a built environment, and I think that’s really ripe for this intersection with arts and culture,” she said during a presentation that included a lively Q&A session with Professor Chris Tilly of UCLA Luskin Urban Planning and audience members. Nezam’s presentation was organized around reimagining planning in three ways — structural, process and spatial. Citing examples from across the country, she outlined ways in which city planners are incorporating artists into government, including a growing number of artists-in-residence. “These residencies are embedding artists deeply as co-creators and problem-solvers,” she said. “We’re not talking about artists just painting murals, we’re actually talking about artists being at the table when we’re discussing policy.” She expressed optimism about approaches that reward innovation. “We have to imagine something different — imagine a world we haven’t created yet. And that’s where this creative, radical imagination of arts and culture can come in.”

Download an audio recording or view photos on Flickr.

Mallory Nezam Regents' Lecture

 

School Travels to State Capital for Research Briefing and Alumni Gathering Back-to-back events in Sacramento provide networking opportunities and showcase scholarly works

In mid-February, a contingent of more than 30 people from UCLA Luskin made the trip to northern California in an effort to connect with alumni, government officials and policy experts involved in state government.

The two-day gathering in Sacramento was envisioned as the first of what will become an annual feature of the Luskin’s School’s outreach efforts, pairing an alumni get-together in the state capital with a research-focused briefing for elected officials and their staffs.

The UCLA Luskin Briefing at UC Center Sacramento took place during the time when new bills were being finalized for the next legislative session, and the hope is that the research of UCLA Luskin and its various research centers can put current and future legislative leaders in a better position to make data-informed decisions.

“It was very well attended by elected and appointed officials,” noted Interim Dean Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris, who made the effort a priority for this academic year and actively participated in the planning process. “The elected officials I talked to afterward were very appreciative for the event and told me that they hope to see more such events from our School.”

Two briefing sessions were held. A session on water management highlighted research by Adjunct Associate Professor Gregory Pierce MURP ’11 PhD UP ’15, co-executive director of the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation. A session on affordable housing was led by Associate Professor Michael Lens, associate faculty director of the Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies.

The briefing and the Alumni Regional Reception, which took place the evening before, brought together faculty, staff or alumni from all four departments — Public Policy, Social Welfare, Urban Planning and the Undergraduate Program — as well as members of the Luskin School’s Board of Advisors.

A group of about 20 current Master of Public Policy students also made the trip, getting an opportunity to connect directly with alumni whose footsteps they may hope to follow, including Assemblyman Isaac Bryan MPP ’18, a member of the affordable housing panel.

Find out more about the briefing and view the bios of the 12 people who participated as speakers or panelists.

View photos from the alumni reception

Sacramento Alumni Regional Reception 2024

View photos from the research briefing

Sacramento Briefing 2024

 

Keeping Guard Against the Forces Behind Jan. 6

Sandeep Prasanna MPP/JD ’15 returned to his UCLA Luskin alma mater to share a pressing message about the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol: The threat is not over. Prasanna served as investigative counsel for the House Select Committee that issued a comprehensive, 800-page report on the insurrection. “January 6th was not just one event. January 6th was and is an ongoing effort to undermine our democratic institutions,” said Prasanna, whose team spent months interviewing or deposing about 1,000 right-wing extremists who carried out the attack. Now a senior advisor at the law firm Miller & Chevalier, he travels the country to speak with election officials about continuing threats to free and fair voting — including how to safeguard the essential workers who keep the democratic process running smoothly. Prasanna’s comments came at a Feb. 12 event marking the 25th anniversary of UCLA Luskin’s Public Policy program. Chair Robert Fairlie presented him with the 2022 MPP Alumnus of the Year Award, and Professor Mark Peterson led a conversation that touched on Prasanna’s time at UCLA. “I don’t think anyone starts a career in D.C. feeling prepared because things that you learn in a textbook are so different from interacting with people in real life,” Prasanna said. “But the thing they say about law school is that they teach you how to think like a lawyer. What I feel I learned at Luskin was how to do.” He encouraged UCLA Luskin students to take advantage of internships and other opportunities on the East Coast. “There’s a lot of work to do in California, for sure,” he said, “but I think D.C. could use more Luskin grads.”

Learn more about events marking Public Policy’s 25th anniversary. 

View photos of Prasanna’s talk on Flickr.

A Conversation With Sandeep Prasanna MPP/JD ’15


 

Journal’s Special Issue Is Devoted to the Berggruen Governance Index

Global Policy, an interdisciplinary journal pursuing public and private solutions to global problems and issues, today released a special issue focusing on the Berggruen Governance Index, a collaborative project between UCLA Luskin and the Berggruen Institute. The index is a tool for analyzing the Governance Triangle democratic accountability, state capacity and public goods provision — to better understand how governments can create a more resilient future for their people. Based on an analysis of 134 countries over a 20-year period, the index aims to demystify the intricacies of governance and shed light on how countries meet the needs of their populations over time. Helmut Anheier, adjunct professor of public policy and social welfare at UCLA Luskin and professor of sociology at the Hertie School in Berlin, is principal investigator of the Berggruen Governance Index. The special issue of Global Policy is organized into three parts. Part I offers an overview of the index and its implications, followed by regional and country-specific insights. Part II delves into detailed country and regional reports, examining key global powers and significant regions. Part III concludes the issue by summarizing a conference on governance indicator systems, surveying contributions from other projects, and presenting thoughts on the future of global governance indicators in an ever-changing and uncertain world. Articles in the special issue are open access and of interest to policy analysts, social scientists, and experts in government and international organizations.


 

Safety of Tap Water Discussed by Pierce on NPR Broadcast

Gregory Pierce, director of the Human Right to Water Solutions Lab at the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation, participated in a discussion about the safety of tap water in California organized by KQED, the NPR and PBS member station for Northern California. Pierce, who received his master’s and Ph.D. degrees from UCLA Luskin Urban Planning, spoke about findings in a recent study conducted in cooperation with the University of Texas at Austin that found social factors — such as low population density, high housing vacancy, disability and race — can have a stronger influence than median household income on whether a community’s municipal water supply is more likely to have health-based water-quality violations.


 

Segura on Expanding Representation and Accountability in L.A.

News outlets covering testimony before the L.A. City Council’s ad hoc committee on government reform carried the comments of Gary Segura, professor of public policy at UCLA Luskin. Segura is co-chair of the L.A. Governance Reform Project, a group of university scholars drafting recommendations to increase transparency and accountability at L.A. City Hall. A preliminary report from the project called for several reforms, including the creation of 10 additional City Council seats for a total of 25, including four at-large seats. “The purpose of that was to have an additional cohort of members of the council who had a citywide constituency and therefore were interested in advancing the interests of everyone in the city,” Segura said. He added that the Governance Reform Project is continuing research into the value of at-large seats and conducting further conversations with community-based organizations and members of the voting rights community. The group expects to issue its final report in November.


‘Become a Leader, Not Just a Bureaucrat’

A Los Angeles Times piece asking veteran public servants to offer words of guidance to the seven new members of the Los Angeles City Council included insights from Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin. Yaroslavsky, who served the people of Los Angeles as a city councilman and county supervisor for nearly four decades, stressed the importance of mastering the rules and processes of legislating, but said it’s essential to become a leader, not just a bureaucrat. He advised each of the new councilmembers to look in the mirror each morning and ask: “What issue am I willing to lose my job for?” He continued, “People will respect an elected official who takes a calculated risk in the interest of the public.” 


 

Germany’s New National Security Plan Lacks Specifics, Anheier Writes

An analysis by UCLA Luskin’s Helmut K. Anheier of Germany’s new national-security plan applauds the strategy but finds it too vague to be effective. Anheier’s article, distributed through Project Syndicate, notes that in modern times Germany has historically relied on the United States and NATO for protection, projecting itself as a champion of military restraint. “This illusion was shattered after Russia attacked Ukraine, and China, eager to exploit any perceived Western vulnerability, adopted a more assertive foreign policy,” writes Anheier, an adjunct professor of social welfare and public policy who oversees the Berggruen Governance Index. The plan recently issued by German Chancellor Olaf Scholz does not sufficiently address the institutional mechanisms — nor budgetary resources — needed to implement it. “The strategy will most likely remain on the shelf — a well-written account of what could have been,” concludes Anheier, who is also a professor of sociology at the Hertie School in Berlin.


 

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