After passing a civil service exam, David began working with the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) in 2008 and is currently a part of the Intergovernmental and Legislative Affairs team for the LADWP. Governmental work must be driven by passion and not by money, and David is very clear to remind us of that when he states: “It fills a place in your heart when you are able to help, and I think that is what drew me to it to begin with. Also, the social value that is there, the ability to talk with people and work things out to find resolutions to complex problems.
The LADWP serves over four million residents, making it the largest municipal utility in the United States. As one would assume, the LADWP deals with a wide range of issues. When describing a typical day working in the LADWP, David says “I like to tell people that I’m like an Emergency Room doctor every day. My day [ranges from] somebody calling and saying ‘My cat is stuck on top of a power pole, help me get him down’ to ‘I have a problem with my bill’ to ‘We have two billion dollars in bonds that need city council approval’ and we need to figure out a way to be able to impress upon the people that are the ultimate policymakers to approve this.”
The LADWP’s role as a local agency is what David loves most because it offers him the chance to make positive changes on a day-to-day basis. The main objective of the LADWP, as David points out, is “to increase our level of transparency to the public… If you live in the city of L.A., you own a piece of the department; you get a bill from them every two months… You pay into something and you want to see something.” In increasing their level of transparency, the LADWP offers energy efficiency programs, water conservation programs, and overall wants to make life better for the residents that it serves. Furthermore, by being transparent, the LADWP seeks to inform the community about where their water and energy comes from, as well as the shift to renewable energy and how it will be advantageous for the city in the long run.
This aspect of transparency is what David was especially passionate about when joining the LADWP in 2008, so he paid close attention to it; he continues to increase their level of transparency today. David states “the transparency piece was just paramount to me and it was all about doing the right outreach and talking to the right people and building those relationships within the community and for me that is the biggest part of my job that I love.” It may sound like a cliché, but David’s successful career in politics is a direct result of his desire to constantly improve the lives of those who live and work in the city of Los Angeles.

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