SLO LIFE Magazine AugSep 2020

et’s start from the beginning, Erica.
Where are you from? I was born in
Burbank, California, and I was raised in
the San Fernando Valley. I had a really
wonderful, unique upbringing. I’m the
oldest of three girls. My dad was born
in Nogales, Arizona, which is right
on the border of Arizona and Mexico.
His parents, my grandparents, were Lfrom Mexico, and when the border was initially erected in that area, the
residents of Nogales—at the time it was Nogales, Mexico—were asked,
“Do you want to be American citizens, or do you want to remain Mexican
citizens?” They elected to be American. And, so the border was literally
constructed right through the middle of town, and to this day, you have
a Nogales, Mexico and a Nogales, Arizona. My dad grew up in Nogales,
Arizona. He was one of ten children. He went to Tucson for high school
and to Los Angeles for college.
How did your parents meet? My mom was living in Los Angeles. She
was actually born in London, England. Her side of the family is Jewish.
When she was very young, her parents felt like London was so devastated
by the war and it was not a great place to raise their two children, so
they left. First, they went to Toronto, and then to Brooklyn before they
finally settled in the Los Angeles area. But she ended up meeting my
dad and they fell in love. So, I grew up in a very blended household,
which included both big and small family experiences. We had Mexican,
American, Catholic, and Jewish influences. It was a wonderful way to
grow up.
What were you like as a kid? I was really into the Girl Scouts. By the
time I was in high school, I was on the San Fernando Valley Girl Scout
Council. It was operated by a board of directors, and they always reserved
two seats for girl members. I was advised to join that board, and it was
my first introduction to the nonprofit sector from a behind the scenes
perspective. It was a wonderful experience for me, and I continued to do
that even in college. I went to UCLA and studied sociology with a minor
in public policy. I was always very interested in the intersection of race,
class, gender, and other social stratification systems. But also, policy and
the law. Through my time at UCLA, I was continuing to explore those
interests, and ultimately decided that I wanted to go to law school.
Tell us about that. I had a very dear roommate; we were randomly
assigned to each other and became great friends. We both had decided to
go to law school. During our junior year, she died very tragically of a brain
aneurism. That set me back. It was a lot to process. I ended up taking a
year off after graduation to work for a prestigious law firm that handles
appeals. I worked closely with an attorney who was blind. I was essentially
her assistant. Whenever she needed to conduct legal research, we would
walk down to the law library, she’d explain to me what she was looking
for, and I would find the books and read out loud to her. She would
record it and then draft her brief and prepare for oral arguments. It was
a tremendous education for me. Since it was appellate law, I was learning
the progression of the lawsuit.
And where did you go to law school? It was UC Berkeley. And it was
an interesting time to be there. It was certainly post-Prop 209, so the
demographics of the school were not incredibly diverse. There were only
a handful of students of color. And there was a sense that those of us
of color had to sort of work together to support each other; and to help
recruitment, and help with retention of other students in order to ensure
diversity in the law school, because it was so evident
to us, and it was certainly to me, that the benefit of
diversity expands the learning for everyone, right?
I was reluctant to get involved with the student
organizations because I was so focused on getting
my education. But there was another student there,
who is now my husband, who encouraged me to
become more engaged. So, I ended up becoming a
founding member of the Center for Social Justice,
which was a new organization that we started.
We put together an incredible judicial panel,
which included Justice Sotomayor, before she was
appointed to the Supreme Court.
So, what came next? I began an internship at one of
the country’s oldest public interest law firms called
The Center for Law in the Public Interest. I had the
opportunity to work on what went on to become a
couple of historic cases in California. One of them on
behalf of foster children who were not receiving the
health and mental health services they were entitled
to receive under state law. And the other, which really
changed the methodology of serving children in the
foster care system. During my time there, I learned
the impact of litigation as a mechanism for changing
society for the greater good. In those cases, it meant
changing the foster care system, and changing
the way that education resources are distributed
throughout the state of California for the benefit of
all school children.
What else did you work on there? We also started
developing innovative ways of looking at parks
and open space and other public resources like
that through the lens of civil rights and through
the lens of public health. It’s called the urban park
movement. And so, this was a new way of achieving
environmental justice. We sort of flipped it around.
Instead of looking at environmental justice in
terms of the communities of color and low-income
communities having more than their fair share of
environmental degradation, we were looking at
ensuring, or trying to figure out ways to ensure,
that they would have a fair share of environmental
benefits. It was a different way of looking at it.
And you took on another very important job:
becoming a mom. Yes, that’s right. It was around this
time that we had our first son. We had our second
son a few years later. I was fortunate to be working in
an environment where I was able to keep my foot in
the door and continue working on a project by project
basis so that I could be home almost full-time. It was
really important for me when my kids were young to
do that. To this day, when I speak with young women
or college students and they ask me, “Is it really
possible? Can you have it all? Can you be a lawyer
and be a mom?” I say, “Yes. It absolutely is possible to
have it all, but not necessarily all at the same time.”
And so, you do have to think about your priorities >>
AUG/SEP 2020 | SLO LIFE MAGAZINE | 33