Candidate for
Member of the State Assembly; District 47; Democratic Party

Rafael was born on January 4, 1976 in Santa Monica, California, where he attended St. Anne's Elementary and graduated from Santa Monica High School in 1994. In 1987 he and his family moved to the Fairfax/Washington area after purchasing their first home. His father has had the same union job as a gardener for over thirty years. His mother was a factory worker in Santa Monica and through training at Santa Monica College now works as an administrative assistant for a non-profit. Both his parents are of retirement age but continue to work full time.

Rafael attended Santa Monica College to complete lower division coursework and knows the value of our community colleges. In the summer of 1996, while still in college, he was selected to participate in the AFL-CIO's Union Summer internship program in Sacramento where he encouraged workers to unionize, walked precincts in support of working people's issues and helped register voters in low-income neighborhoods.

After Santa Monica College, Rafael transferred to UC Santa Cruz where in 1998 he received his B.A. in Sociology, the same degree earned by Martin Luther King, Jr. While in Santa Cruz, Rafael participated as a mentor in a year long program for farm workers' children suffering from low self-esteem. Rafael also participated in a summer long university program, Summer Bridge, where incoming university students of low-income households were introduced to college life.

In the fall after graduating from UC Santa Cruz, at the age of 22, Rafael was hired to teach educational and career planning at Crenshaw High School under LAUSD's emergency credential program, where he saw firsthand that half of his students could not read above a third grade level. After Crenshaw High, Rafael was hired by a non-profit organization in Culver City as a case manager for children with developmental disabilities, where he witnessed firsthand the rise of autism cases in our state and the devastating effect it had on families and school districts having to adjust to the special needs of children.

Realizing he had a passion for serving others, listening to their concerns and guiding them through crisis, Rafael enrolled at Loyola Marymount University's School of Education and received a Master's degree in Counseling in 2001. Rafael is currently serving people with developmental disabilities by providing counseling and advocacy services through a non-profit.

Serving others, listening to their concerns, bringing people together and creating solutions comes natural to Rafael. He carries his parents' small town values, parochial school teachings, and critical thinking skills of his sociological studies at UC Santa Cruz. He has a passion for justice and a conscience for righteousness. It is with these attributes that Rafael will work tirelessly in our State Assembly representing the people of our district.

Rafael will be honored to represent the diverse district he was raised in and respond to the diversity of its needs.