On the scroll: my name, as a founding Steering Committee member for the LA County Center for Financial Empowerment. Not on the scroll: the names of 42,000 Angelenos who opened checking accounts via our BankOn initiative, thousands more who claimed their fair share of $15 million in EITC tax refunds through our Free Tax Prep LA project, and over 5,000 train-the-trainer participants now sharing their financial empowerment skills with families and foster youth throughout the nation’s biggest county.

Ten million people live in LA County; total US population is 330 million, so one in 33 Americans is an Angeleno. As I said when I testified three years ago asking the Supervisors to pilot the CFE, that’s scale unlike anything else I’ve ever been part of. Huge kudos go to Supervisor Kuehl for believing in this pilot when we began it two years ago thanks to a grant that I secured, and for her successful motion today to make it a permanent part of how our government serves and empowers our communities.

I am very proud to be part of this powerful group that directly changes people’s lives AND changes policies and systems so that people aren’t forced into the position where they need help in the first place.