Jackie Goldberg

Goldberg was born and raised in the Los Angeles, CA and area on November 18, 1944. She and her wife have one son and they have resided in Echo Park since 1967. As an openly out Lesbian since her first involvement in the Los Angeles City politics in the 1980s she marked historical moment in Lesbian and Gay history. Goldberg began her activism for racial justice and gay and lesbian rights at the University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley) as a member of SLATE, and a major contributor to the Free Speech Movement. After UC Berkeley she went on to get her M.A. in Education from the University of Chicago that sparked her involvement in local Los Angeles educational politics of the 1980s.[1]

1983-1997: Earlier Political Contributions

In 1983, Goldberg was elected to the LAUSD Board of Education where she served for two terms. Her leadership was instrumental in creating a districtwide K-12 dual language (bilingual) education program, creating and implementing a secondary peace curriculum, establishing on-campus health clinics, improving curriculum in reading, math and science, fostering policies that helped the District overcome an acute teacher shortage, successfully building new schools and additions to begin to address multi-track calendars and other overcrowding issues, and developing school-based management to create accountability and ownership for teachers and administrators at each school site. Goldberg also authored a unanimous board resolution in support of Project 10 for LGBTQ students in LAUSD. This resolution was in response to Republicans in Sacramento voting to hold all funding for LAUSD unless the board ended its support for Project 10 at Fairfax High School.

After leaving the Board in 1991, Goldberg worked for Los Angeles County Supervisor Gloria Molina as her Ethics Deputy and Children's Services Deputy. Goldberg oversaw issues such as child abuse and neglect, domestic violence, and enforcement of child support while also teaching part-time at Grant High School in the San Fernando Valley.

In 1993, Goldberg was elected to the 13th District seat on the Los Angeles City Council becoming the first openly lesbian woman to hold office on the City Council. She was re-elected without opposition in 1997.

Goldberg's distinguished City Council legacy includes authorship of the “Living Wage” ordinance guaranteeing a living wage and benefits to all employees working directly or indirectly for the City of Los Angeles; her work with the economic revitalization of Hollywood, including successful negotiations to build a retail entertainment complex in the heart of Hollywood and provide a living wage to all employees of the complex; the creation of model after-school enrichment programs in every middle school in the district; the passage of a citywide ban on the sale of small, cheap handguns known as “Saturday Night Specials”; and the development of the extremely successful “Slum Abatement” program that holds landlords accountable to the City for the condition of their properties and provides an effective system of redress to tenants who have complaints.

2000–present: Recent Political Activism

In 2000, Goldberg was elected to her first of three terms in the California State Assembly representing the state's 45th district where, as chair of the Assembly Education Committee, she reviewed hundreds of bills on virtually every aspect of preK-12 education in the State of California, oversaw K-12 and higher education budgets and learned the intricacies of state and federal education finance as a member of the Budget Subcommittee #2, and where she was a principal author of two State Education Bond Issues that resulted in LAUSD building new schools that ended half-day sessions and relieved multi-track year-round schools. Goldberg also authored numerous preK-12 education-related bills that were signed into law. When Goldberg was sworn in December 2000 when Goldberg was sworn in, she entered equipped with experience from being a member of the Los Angeles City Council. Before being elected to the council, she had served on, and was president of, the Los Angeles School Board before which she had been a teacher in the Compton Unified School District.

In addition to her effective advocacy in the State Assembly for public education, health care, gun control, and issues affecting working families, Goldberg was the author of historic and celebrated legislation that gave LGBT couples in California all the rights and responsibilities of marriage, except for those involving income tax legislation. She was re-elected in 2002 and 2004 but term limits prevented her from seeking a fourth term in November 2006.

In 2019, Goldberg was re-elected to the LAUSD's Board of Education for the 5th District.[2]

Other Involvements

Goldberg is openly lesbian[3] and was a founder member of the California Legislative LGBT Caucus. She was one of three openly gay and Jewish members with Carol Migden, and Mark Leno.[4] She married longtime partner Sharon Stricker in 2008.[5] One detractor, KABC talk show host and author Larry Elder, gave her the nickname "Hurricane Jackie." She was a founding member of the Progressive Caucus in Sacramento.

• History of the Jews in Los Angeles

• 1999 National Security Archive Interview with Jackie Goldberg