Biography
A fourth-generation Angeleno, Eric Garcetti grew up in Los Angeles and was elected to the Los Angeles City Council in 2001, becoming one of the youngest city councilmembers elected in the city's history. He was re-elected in 2005 and later that year was chosen by his peers to lead the City Council as its President. In his first two terms in office, he has emerged as an effective local problem-solver and a progressive voice on citywide and national issues. Since his election, Council President Garcetti led the creation of the nation's largest Affordable Housing Trust Fund, oversaw the economic and cultural revitalization of Hollywood, initiated programs to build more parks and clean up our drinking water, and helped fight to reduce the city's business tax and bring more than five thousand new high wage jobs to Los Angeles and his district.
The Los Angeles Times writes that Garcetti "offers refreshing idealism," while the LA Weekly featured Garcetti in their Best of Los Angeles issue and the Los Angeles Alternative Press readers named him "L.A.'s Favorite Elected Official." The Los Angeles Business Journal named him one of the 25 Angelenos who stand out for their potential to shape lives in Los Angeles. In 2006, on behalf of the Kennedy family and Kennedy Library, Caroline Kennedy and Senator Ted Kennedy gave the prestigious New Frontier Award to Garcetti, awarded to one elected official in the country under 40 years of age that best embodies John F. Kennedy's vision of leadership and idealism.
In his district, Councilmember Eric Garcetti has focused on bringing government and local services closer to the neighborhoods he serves. During his first eight years, he has built twenty-two new parks, seen fifteen new schools built, taken more than 4 million pounds of bulky items off city streets, and reduced graffiti by over 78% over the last four years with his nationally-lauded UNTAG program. Eric has met face-to-face with more than 2,000 constituents during his trademark office-hours and he is well-known for his monthly neighborhood walks and community coffees. He has also launched innovative new programs to train community members such as the Grassroots Neighborhood Leadership Institute and the Local Government 101, Planning 101, and Housing 101 workshops. During his time in office, he has helped add more than eight hundred police officers to the streets of Los Angeles, crime has fallen by double digits in all three police divisions in his district, and he has doubled the amount of money spent on youth and gang intervention programs, including launching a widely-lauded program to keep our parks open late during the summer hours to keep our neighborhoods safe.
Councilmember Garcetti authored more than 400 successful resolutions, including legislation to indemnify the neighborhood improvement activities of community groups; open the doors of opportunity to high school students through the innovative Free Cash for College program; reduce and simplify the city's business tax; open homeless shelters year-round; create the country's largest environmentally conscious "green building" initiative; establish the city's first Office of Immigrant Affairs; expand spay and neuter programs; fund a new Neighborhood Land Trust to build new parks in the city; grow jobs through the Healthcare Jobs Career Ladder initiative; increase funding for gang intervention programs; expand partner benefits for the employees of city contractors; and launch a system of citywide "furniture-buster" crews to remove bulky items from city streets.
He has also led efforts to promote responsible economic development in Los Angeles through his supercenter initiative and co-chaired ballot initiatives to strengthen ethics laws and to clean up the city's rivers, lakes, and bays.
In addition to his service at the local level, Garcetti serves in the United States Naval Reserve as a Lieutenant Junior Grade. He is active in the Democratic Party, serving as the Chair of the Democratic Municipal Officials and as an Executive Committee Member of the Democratic National Committee (DNC). He also served as the Obama Campaign Co-Chair for California.
Prior to his election, Eric Garcetti taught public policy, diplomacy and world affairs at Occidental College and the University of Southern California and was active with numerous community and non-profit groups including Human Rights Watch, the Pobladores Fund, and the Roth Family Foundation. He has worked on human rights issues on four continents. Eric Garcetti studied urban planning and political science at Columbia University, where he received his B.A. and M.A. in International Relations. He studied as a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University and the London School of Economics. He is an avid photographer, jazz pianist and composer. He lives in Echo Park and recently married his partner of fourteen years, Amy Elaine Wakeland.
