Gloria Molina

In 1982, Art Torres vacated his seat in California's 56th State Assembly district due to redistricting, with Torres and Assemblymember Richard Alatorre making Richard Polanco run in the district. Molina had approached the two about running in the district, but was told that she could not since Polanco was running.[10] She ran anyway, and defeated Polcano to become the first Latina woman to be elected in the California State Legislature.[11][12] Her win would set the stage for a political feud between Torres and Molina, with supporters being called the Torristas and Molinistas.[13]

Molina celebrating her win in the City Council in 1987

In 1986, the 1st district of the Los Angeles City Council was vacant due to incumbent Howard Finn's death, and the City Council decided that the district would be moved from the San Fernando Valley to Eastside Los Angeles. Now in a largely Latino district, Molina announced her candidacy for the special election.[14] She was mainly challenged by Larry Gonzalez, a member of the Los Angeles Board of Education.[15] In the election, she defeated Gonzalez and two others by a landslide, making her the first Latina woman to be elected to the City Council.[16] She was succeeded in the State Assembly by Lucille Roybal-Allard.[17]

While on the council, Molina feuded with Richard Alatorre, who had been elected to the council in 1985.[13]

In 1990, Peter F. Schabarum decided not to run for re-election for the 1st district of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, but served an extra three months while the board redistricted under court orders to create a majority-Latino district.[18] That year, Molina announced that she would be running for the seat, being challenged by U.S. Representative Matthew G. Martínez and Art Torres.[19] The runoff election was between Molina and Torres, with Torres having a lead in fundraising for his campaign.[20] Although Molina was at a disadvantage financially, she still defeated Torres to become the first Latina to be elected to the Board of Supervisors.[21]

At her first meeting, she was described as "[giving] hints of the in-your-face approach that sometimes characterized her years on the City Council."[22] During her 23 years serving the Los Angeles County board of supervisors, she became known as a fiscal watchdog committed to overseeing good government reforms, maintenance of the county's public health care system, and also quality-of-life issues for the millions of county residents living in the unincorporated areas.[23]

One of Molina's significant achievements was her involvement with the Mothers of East Los Angeles, a group formed to organize against a proposed plan to build a prison in East LA.[6] As city councilwoman, she found government unresponsive to her concerns of yet another proposal to build a prison near schools in the predominantly Chicano and Mexican neighborhood. In the mid-2000s she drove through skid row looking for families with children and would call the Department of Family and Children Services, to help families and remove children from unsafe conditions.[24][25]

In 2008, Molina piloted a program that became known as the Gloria Molina Foster Youth Education Program.[26] This program attempted to improve the high school graduation rates of students in the foster care system. By committing social workers to aid in helping manage and track these students' academic success the program was able to raise the graduation rate from the national average of 58% to 80%. When Molina retired from her supervisor position in 2014 because of term limits, she stated that one of her biggest regrets was that she was not able to do more to improve the high school graduation rates amongst fostered youth.[27][25]

In April 2008, Molina introduced legislation to the board of supervisors which would severely increase penalties on food vendors in unincorporated areas of Los Angeles County, including East L.A. The new rules would punish parking of a food truck for more than one hour with a $1000 fine and/or six months in jail. This move was specifically targeted at vendors operating taco trucks, a cultural institution in East L.A. as well as the county as a whole. Newspaper editorials decried the move, and a petition was quickly set up to attempt to force a repeal of the legislation. The taco vendors also hired a lawyer to fight their cause. The ordinance was ultimately struck down by a judge.[32][26]

In June 2010, Molina voted yes with two other Los Angeles County supervisors to boycott Arizona because of SB 1070. Molina said in her statement that the law "simply goes too far" and that "a lot of people have pointed out that I am sworn as an L.A. County supervisor to uphold the Constitution. All I can say is that I believe that Arizona's law is unconstitutional."[33]